I'll be the first to admit it: I had NO IDEA Timbuktu was in Mali. Heck, I'm not even sure I'd have known it was in Africa—(If you'd held a gun to my head and said, "Guess!" I'd most likely have said it was in India...)

But Irvington fourth-grader Zachary Rosman was unfazed by this final question during the annual Main Street School geography bee on Friday.

"I think I knew Timbuktu was in Mali because I read a book about it once," said Rosman, who edged out fifth-grade runner-up Ari Greenberg with that question.

"You have to apply past knowledge to new situations," Rosman said with confidence later that afternoon. "You find unexpected things in books."

Greenberg said the hardest question he answered correctly during the finals of the bee had to do with knowing which state that borders Nebraska has the smallest population.

"It helped that I knew where all the states are on the map," he said.  

Greenberg said traveling a lot with his family helps him learn the Atlas—(and having a memory like a sponge probably doesn't hurt...)

"Next week, we're going to Argentina," he said. "I'm really excited."

Rosman said if he could go anywhere in the world, he'd go to Israel. 

Of the 163 kids who participated in the pre-bee, 25 qualified for the finals on Friday. 24 competed. 

The 25 finalists were: Nicole Aabbattista, Ian Accetta, Katie Accetta, Isai Andrade, Aidan Cain, Ethan Chang, Lucas Chu, Jacob Dunefsky, Ryan Flanagan, Jack Grados, Ari Greenberg, Rishit Gupta, Ziv Kedem, Ryan Kelly, Arielle Kolodzinski, Katerina Kovalevskaya, Yuji Lee, Aden Malone, Trygve Ordahl, Adriana Palmieri, Arushi Parekh, Zachary Rosman, Oliver Schwartz, Sara Takiguchi and Jared Topman (who qualified, but did not participate,)

*The Geography Bee was sponsored in-part by the Irvington PTSA; special thanks to Linda Luzzi for her photos of the event. Have more? Feel free to upload them here.