How many countries could you name when you were 5? We’re guessing about five or six, maybe ten if you were a whizz kid. For Kristian Alakkad’s 2020 audition on the first series of Malta’s Got Talent, the five-year-old geography expert put even adult skills to shame, naming 31 countries on the map in a row without a glimmer of hesitation.
Before realizing they hosted a child genius in their presence, the MGT judges spoke to Kristian in soft voices. He was a shy and tiny child, stumbling towards the centre of the stage with a nervous smile and an excited wave. During their chat, Kristian was clearly a child of few words — but his audition displayed a word bank most parents couldn’t dream of for their own five-year-old.
With the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire suspense soundtrack transforming his audition into what should be a nerve-wracking quiz show moment, Kristian breezed through his performance without a moment of uncertainty. One by one, countries lit up on the huge map projected behind him, and from Argentina to Malaysia, Kristian pinpointed places most adults would lose on a world map, including Uzbekistan, Malawi and Zambia.
Kristian Alakkad left all four judges awestruck by his talent. Unfortunately, we can’t translate their Maltese feedback, but judging by their gobsmacked expressions and the fact that one judge gave the five-year-old the Golden Buzzer, Kristian’s prodigious talent went down a storm. For his semifinals performance, he identified 67 countries and their capital cities by their flags in two minutes flat. Kristian may have lost out on a place in the finals, but this child prodigy is remembered like no other.
If you’re a parent, Kristian’s audition has probably got you asking — how are child geniuses made? According to an interview with Go.com, Kristian is a massive fan of puzzles, and at the time of the interview, he was finishing off a 500-piece puzzle with his dad. His family clearly dedicates tremendous amounts of time and support to nurturing Kristian’s talents. His dad even helped Kristian transform his love of puzzles into a love of geography by “cutting out the countries of the world out of cardboard and sticking them onto a map as a sort of craft.”
Not much has been heard of the five-year-old since he stunned the nation on Malta’s Got Talent, but with humble dreams of becoming a teacher, it’s clear that Kristian is a star in the making, no matter which path he chooses to follow.