Guiyang: 2004-09-06

Go is such a strange game. I look at a professional game, and half of the time I do not have a clue about what is actually going on. We spent most of the time in the room where the (Chinese) professionals were analysing the two games while they were being played. They can easily understand what is going on in both games, while I had enough difficulties grasping what is going on in one: in my case I was looking at the Peng - Ch'oe game. And it does not help that much to have other amateurs around who try out all sorts of silly variations.

The start of the game between Peng (black) and Ch'oe.

It started with an early ko fight, with an unclear end result. Then later at black's lower side white got a lot of territory, and black had a big wall to use in an attack against another white group. That group was neatly settled by Ch'oe, in fact the black wall itself became a target for attack. All the time we were thinking that black was doing well, but in the endgame Ch'oe had so many good sente points that he was confortably ahead when black resigned.

Chang versus Song

I followed this game for the first 30 moves or so. It started as a rather quiet game, but it also got very complicated later on. Maybe I should have tried to follow this game instead of the other one. Chang Hao's wife was analysing it all the time, with the help of many others.

Chang's wife Zhang Xuan 8 dan and another, unknown professional.

Around four o'clock I knew from her face that Chang was losing. She looked upset. She was not analysing it any more. On the board stood a position of at least one hour earlier. Maybe where her husband made the losing move?

Dinner

Yesterday's dinner repeated itself in another restaurant with a smaller group. I didn't see anybody that looked like the City Mayor, probably the municipality paid for it, that was all. The three westerners were seated next to each other, and unfortunately the few Chinese that spoke English were all seated on another table.

So it felt a bit strange. Many toasts again with the same liqueur as yesterday. The food even better than yesterday. But nobody brought a camera, so I didnt really feel that I was in the position to take pictures.

And why did they eat so fast? All in a sudden it was over. Half the food was left. Less than 1 hour and 10 minutes. Maybe it is that I eat too slow with sticks:-)

Tomorrow

I do not know yet what I will do tomorrow. It is the day of the seminar but I suspect that will not fill the whole day. Wednesday the second round is played. Thursday there is some site seeing planned, and the third round, if needed, is on Friday. But I will miss that round, I will fly back Friday morning early. I tried to change the return trip, but there is no flight on Saturday.