Good afternoon, crossword fans — welcome to Week 209 of my contest. If you’re new to the contest and would like to enter, please see the site FAQ on the left sidebar for instructions.

THE MGWCC TIP JAR IS OPEN, THIS WEEK ONLY:

Tip jar open! Friday at midnight it closes again, not to re-open until June of 2013. Click the “donate” button to tip, or scroll down for more info.

LAST WEEK’S RESULTS:

We were looking for a famous one-named person last week, so who could it be — Madonna or Michelangelo? Pele or Prince? Socrates or Sting? Let’s take a look.

There was just one obvious theme answer, and they don’t get more obvious than 39-across: FIND SEVEN B-WORDS was the answer, clued simply as [How to solve the meta]. There were just three words starting with B in the puzzle grid, so that doesn’t work. But exactly seven clues began with a B, so let’s take a look at those:

1-a “Bali ___” = HAI
17-a Blarney Stone conferral = GIFT OF GAB
28-a Bruschetta ingredient = TOMATO
49-a Brahmin’s city = BOSTON
64-a Baghdad area = GREEN ZONE
12-d Bibi’s party = LIKUD
52-a Baha’i tenet = UNITY

What to do with those seven B-words? Hyperskilled metasolvers noticed that each of the seven refers to a specific country, and those countries share a common link:

Bali is an island in Indonesia
Blarney is the gift of gab in Ireland
Bruschetta is an Italian dish
Brahmins are from India
Baghdad is the capital of Iraq
Bibi is the nickname of Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel
Bahai was founded in Iran

Seven I countries? That can’t be a coincidence. In fact, the only missing I-country in the world is Iceland, so is there a famous one-named person from Iceland beginning with B? Why, yes — the mysterious singer BJÖRK, the most famous Icelander of them all and the Scrabbliest of the one-named crowd — and last week’s contest answer. With or without umlaut naturally acceptable, although you must admit it looks cooler with.

Miss Kali writes, while submitting BJÖRK:

Considering I’m likely your only one-named contestant, I really hope I nailed this one.

This week’s winner, whose name was chosen at random from the 74 correct entries received, is Jared Banta of Los Angeles, Calif. Jared has selected as his prize an autographed copy of Sip & Solve Hard Crosswords.

MONTHLY PRIZES:

30 solvers submitted the correct contest answer to all four of May’s challenges (MONOPOLY, DARYL HANNAH, DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, BJÖRK). The following ten lucky and skillful winners, chosen randomly from that group, will receive a MGWCC pen, pencil and notepad set:

Laura Effinger-Dean — Seattle, Wash.

Sean Trowbridge — Redmond, Wash.

Congratulations to our ten winners, and to everyone who went 4-for-4 in May (it wasn’t easy to do).

THE MGWCC TIP JAR IS OPEN:

My website turns four years old this week — congratulations, Matt! At this time each year I open the tip jar for eight magical days, after which the lid goes back on for another four seasons.

Chip in via PayPal below, or e-mail me if you’d prefer to send a check. Note that you *don’t* need a PayPal account to donate via PayPal; you can send a tip with a credit card by clicking the “donate” button below (e-mail me if you’re having trouble making that option work).

THIS WEEK’S INSTRUCTIONS:

This week’s contest answer is to be determined by you. E-mail it to me at crosswordcontest@gmail.com by Tuesday at noon ET. Please put the contest answer in the subject line of your e-mail.

To print the puzzle out, click on the image below and hit “print” on your browser. To solve using Across Lite either solve on the applet below or download the free software here, then join the Google Group (1,729 members now!) here.

Solve well, and be not led astray by words intended to deceive.