Watch: Naysa Modi may not have won the US Spelling Bee, but she can mimic accents wickedly
Highlights: The generic Indian accent and the specific Gujarati accent, as heard in the US.
Naysa Modi, all of 12, lost the US Spelling bee 2018 after failing to spell “bewusstseinslage” correctly. (It’s another matter that she was closer to the correct spelling than any of us ever will be.) Fourteen-year-old Karthik Nemmani beat her to the title, but Modi has another skill that was not on view at the Spelling Bee.
And that is the ability to do a number of different accents from different parts of the world, including a generic Indian one as well as a Gujarati accent, in tribute to her home state, as heard in the US (video above).
The 12-year-old starts with a disclaimer, assuring everyone she means no disrespect, and that the idea is “not to laugh AT anyone but to laugh WITH them.” After which the show begins, revealing what a wonderful year she has.