NBC10’s Matt DeLucia heads to the Chowdhury house in Morton, Delaware County, to introduce us to Zahran, a 9-year-old with a knack for rapidly naming countries by the flag. Not only can he identify the flags, but he can share details about the countries such as population and main religion.
There are nearly 200 countries in the world and more than 70 territories, but how many do you think you can identify by name?
Zahran Chowdhury from Delaware County is like any other third grader: he's shy and not very outgoing. But get him in front of a map, and his confidence shines through.
At only 9 years old, Zahran can confidently identify 197 countries and territories based solely on their flag.
His father, Reza Chowdhury, explained that Zahran's fascination with countries started a few years ago when he first learned that different countries had their own unique sounds for emergency alarms and sirens. That set off a love of learning and researching on the internet, something the young boy said he started doing on his own because his class "doesn't even study geography."
"I knew that he was looking into these kind of videos online, but I had no idea he was actually absorbing this information," Chowdhury told NBC Philadelphia.
Zahran can not only identify the flags, but he can share other details about the countries, including their main religion.
What's next for Zahran? He is now memorizing population sizes of each country.
"At this age, it's like we should be teaching him. But things change now," Chowdhury said.
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