Europe xiangqi news

A belated report on the Macau tournament (By Alain Dekker )

2007-11-26T22:25:00.000-08:00

Here is a very belated report on the Macau tournament. Firstly, I want to thank UK Chinese Chess and the World Xiangqi Federation for giving me the opportunity to play in Macau. The tournament was very well organized.

Getting to Macau proved to be fairly easy. The trick was to travel to Hong Kong and then to catch the jetfoil ferry across the bay to Macau. The ferry was pleasant but the 13-hr journey from London wasn't that great!

The hotel was situated on a hill next to the Ta Shi Stadium. The stadium was decked in a huge banner advertising the 2nd Asian Indoor games, and specifically the soccer tournament. I saw some adverts on TV for these games, which had the headline "Asian Power". The hotel itself was very nice, but I personally did not find the food that great since I prefer to eat vegetarian. There is something interesting about the hotel which I thought I would mention here: There were 3 very good lifts which serviced all the floors. Usually, you were able to get from floor to floor quite easily, but at peak times, such as just before a round of Xiangqi, there might be a wait of several minutes. Being the adventurous sort, I investigated the back stairs and found the contrast between the plush and spotless foyer of the hotel and the run-down and dirty back stairs quite surprising! One set of stairs led to the kitchens (where the staff were at a loss as to how I had even arrived there!) and the other passed several abandoned bits of cleaning equipment, unfinished woodworking and even (on the 3rd floor) a whole room with holes in the floor and piles of junk everywhere! Clearly using the back stairs was not expected of the guests :o)

The playing venue was inside the Ta Shi stadium across the road. In front of the stadium are some gardens named after the famous Portuguese explorer, Vasco da Gama. The hall was well lit and the seats comfortable. All in all, we were very well looked after.

There were a few big improvements in this tournament compared with Paris, 2005. The major improvement was in the use of clocks. Let me first recap on the situation in Paris. In Paris the clocks were started at 3:01 and they slowly ran down to 00:00. You had to meet certain move requirements at various stages along the timeline. There were at least half-a-dozen disputes regarding the time that I noticed, most due to the clocks starting at 3:01 (instead of the more normal 3:00). In Macau, the situation was much clearer. We had 80 minutes for the game, but an extra 30 seconds was added for each move. There were no time controls to reach and no move number requirements, only that if you ran out of time, you lost. Simple! As far as I know, there were no disputes over time and I congratulate the organizers for doing so well in this regard.

On the other hand, I would say there were a few things that were not so good. As the tournament was generally very well run, I do no wish to dwell on these, but merely mention the issue of mobile (or cell) phones. * Mobile phones: I noticed on several occasions, the arbiters (the helpers at each table) speaking (sometimes very loudly!) into their mobile phones while the players were still playing. While I would not be in favour of an outright ban, I certainly think that the arbiters and players should not use mobile phones during the game. If the phone does go off, they should immediately vacate the playing area.

Then there are a few small issues that I feel would improve the tournament.
These are:
1) Number of rounds. More rounds are better, and Macau had only 9 which seem too few for a World Championship. The format in Paris allowed for 11 rounds, which is a more sensible number. If possible, fitting a day of rest somewhere in the middle of the tournament would also help.

2) Morning rounds. Given that players come from all over the globe, I feel that a 9am start was not a good idea. For players coming from Europe, for example, and suffering from jetlag (as happened to me), starting at 9am was very hard. If possible, the organizers should consider either playing the 1st round of the day starting at 14:00 and the second round at 20:30, or perhaps starting the 1st round at 10:30 or even 11:00. If you look at the final results, it is striking to note that the players from Europe generally did quite poorly. This is partly our own fault, of course: We needed to arrive in Macau earlier to give ourselves time to acclimatize, but a later morning start would have helped.

3) Female players. The WXF very kindly allows non-Chinese/Vietnamese players to compete on nearly equal footing with the strong Chinese players, and merely separates them out at the end for a separate category of prizes. The tournament would be improved if the female players were treated similarly.
My suggestion in this regard is as follows:

a) All players, male and female, play in one big tournament (requires
11 rounds);
b) At the end of the tournament, the non-Chinese and female players can be separated out from the main pool to decide which placing they have achieved;
c) For the team event, widen the scope so that the team consists not of 2 male players, but 2 male and 1 female. This will encourage every country that participates in the team competitions to bring a female player.

Finally, I want to thank the organizers for the lovely opening and closing ceremony dinners. It was difficult to find good vegetarian food, but that didn't detract from the vast array of foods on offer and the good time had by all.

I finish with my own recommendation for overcoming jetlag (this affected me very badly in Macau):
Do not go to sleep when you arrive and have a larger than normal dinner. Around about 8-9pm, get into some shorts and find some stairs (the back stairs of the hotel will perform this task admirably). Walk up and down these stairs as many times as you can manage to really physically tire yourself out. Go have a shower and go to bed...oh, and don't forget to ask the hotel reception to give you a wake-up call!

Thanks again to the organizers of Macau 2007. I look forward to seeing you all again in Vancouver, 2009.

Regards,
Alain Dekker

Chinese chess masters visit Cambridge

2007-09-22T20:19:00.000-07:00

20 September 2007
Three of the world's leading players of Xiangqi – the ancient Chinese mind-game sometimes known as “Chinese chess” – will visit the University of Cambridge today as part of a tour of the UK.
Xu Yinchaun, Wang Yang and Zhang Guofeng, who are all Xiangqi grand masters, will be treated to a punting tour on the River Cam and tea at a Cambridge college – Trinity Hall – during a break from a week-long tour promoting the ancient strategy game. Their guided visit will be given by fluent mandarin speakers currently living and working at the University.

Click here to see the complete news.

Xiangqi Grand master teach xiangqi skill in London

2007-09-20T23:27:00.000-07:00

On September 19, Xiangqi Grand master Xu Yinchuan (right) teach a game to a British girls in London. That day, Zhang Guofeng, Xu Yinchuan, and Wang Yang are jointing the activities of “World Xiangqi Masters 2007 " in London for xiangqi publicity and promotion.

German GM in Western Chess publishes comparative study on ENDGAME FORTRESSES both in Western Chess and XiangQi

2007-09-05T20:02:00.000-07:00

The German GM in Western Chess, Dr. Karsten Müller from Hamburg, Germany, is a leading expert with regard to endgames. He has already released many publications on that topic, and those publications have always been appraised by the experts.
Now Dr. Karsten Müller has written and published an even more interesting study:
a comparative study on ENDGAME FORTRESSES both in Western Chess and in XiangQi!
That sole fact of the publication of the study – in English - is good news.
Moreover the study is very interesting to read.
You can download the article in PDF here.

The author, Grandmaster of Western Chess Dr. Karsten Müller (centre), together with the reigning World Champion of Western Chess, Vladimir Kramnik from Russia (right) and the German chess journalist Dr. Helmut Pfleger (left) on the occasion of an event at Hamburg, Germany

Two well-known GM’s of Western Chess playing Chinese Chess

2007-08-26T20:49:00.000-07:00

Herewith a very interesting photo: two well-known GM’s of Western Chess – moreover: GM Kasimdzhanov has been World Champion of the FIDE few years ago – are playing Chinese Chess, after a tournament of Western Chess in August 2007, Mainz, Germany

Dr. René Gralla

Xiangqi in Finland

2006-12-22T13:10:00.000-08:00

By David H. Li

This morning, 12/21/06, a good friend of mine in Finland, Raimo Lindroos, President of Friends of Chinese Chess in Finland, sent me the following e-mail:
On Saturday [9 Dec 2006], we had our ninth Xiangqi friendship match against the Chinese Embassy in Finland. The match was played in Jarvenpaa with ten players from each side. We played three rounds with mixed pairs. The Embassy won 18.5 : 11.5. The Ambassador Mrs. Ma Keqing and the Jarvenpaa Lord Mayor Erkki Kukkonen played [two] friendly [games] outside the match. The very new Ambassador (she started in May in Finland) won both games. I think these matches are very unique in the entire World! Season Greetings, Raimo
This match is indeed unique, both in scope (10 regular players and an honorary player on each side) as well as in longivity (9 annual matches so far!). It takes both organizational skill and foresight to bring these matches about. And Mr. Lindroos is indeed well suited to this role (as evidenced by his being re-elected as the FCCF's president many times). In addition to being a successful entrepreneur and a correspondence-(western)-chess master, Mr. Lindroos plays a vicious game of Xiangqi. In the second of my 6-volume series on Xiangqi, Xiangqi Syllabus on Cannon - Chinese Chess 2 (1998), dedicated to him and other members of Friends of Chinese Chess in Finland "for their contribution to promoting Xiangqi internationally," I annotated a game he played which won him the 4th Jarvenpaa Xiangqi Championship (August 1996). In recent years, he has become a mentor to younger Finnish Xiangqi players -- a Finnish delegation made its presence felt at the 8th World Xiangqi Championship (Hong Kong 2003), and one of its members won the fourth prize at the 9th WXC (Paris 2005). Well done, Raimo. We again salute you for your contribution to promoting Xiangqi internationally. Kindly keep up the good work.

David Li
http://omooc.blogspot.com/

Xiangqi in Finland

2006-08-03T18:41:00.000-07:00

Open 2006 xiangqi tournaments:

1) Tournament in Jarvenpaa (near Helsinki) 5th - 6th August
Please visit this page.
2) Tournament in Otaniemi (near HelsinkI 29th August - 1st September
3) Braingame festivals, Oulu (north of Finland) 13th-22nd October (exact Xiangqi days not known)
4) The Finnish Xiangqi-Championship Helsinki 11th - 12th November
5) NianDi-tournament in Jarvenpaa (Near Helsinki) 28th December

Board of the National Xiangqi Association in Finland:

The Board 2006:

President and Honorary member: Raimo Lindroos, Jarvenpaa (Raimo.Lindroos@kolumbus.fi)
(International contacts)
Address: Ahokuja 2, FIN-04430 JJarvenpaa, Finland,
(phone: +358-9-286255, gsm: +358-50-3235025, fax. +358-9-287174)

Vicepresident: Arto Vaara, Jarvenpaa (vonurmas@hotmail.com)

Secretary: Markku, Jarvenpaa (MRamo@jippii.fi)

Treasure: Tero Riskula, Helsinki (epra@kolumbus.fi)

Member: Timo Aitta, Otaniemi (timo.aitta@luukku.com)

Member: Jukka Tuovinen: Helsinki (tuovinenj@hotmail.com)

More information: Raimo.Lindroos@kolumbus.fi
Please take a look at: http://www.kolumbus.fi/railin/xiangqi/in_english.html

Chinese Chess (Xiangqi) August tournament at Järvenpää

2006-08-02T20:18:00.000-07:00

Chinese Chess (Xiangqi) August tournament at Järvenpää
on August the 5th and 6th (2006)

The tournament takes places at Oksapolku 1, Järvenpää (approximately 40 kilometers from Helsinki). Everybody is welcome to take part in it.

If you¡¯re interested in participating in the tournament, please send e-mail to raimo (dot) lindroos (at) kolumbus (dot) fi in order to sign up, or call Raimo Lindroos: 050-3235 025 (Please use English while signing up).

Schedule:
Each player is given 45 minutes time per round.
Referees will be appointed before the 1st round.

Saturday August the 5th : Confirmation of participation 10:30 šC 10:45
1st round : (approx.) 11:00
2nd round : (approx.) 12:30
3rd round : (approx). 14:00

Sunday August the 6th :
4th round : 11:00
5th round : (approx.) 12:35
The results and prizes will be presented at about 14:30

Non-Finnish players can participate in the tournament for free.

Prizes : Xiangqi books and other related material. The players can choose their prizes in the order of results.

Coffee, tea and other refreshments available for a small fee.

Organized by : Chinese Chess Association of Järvenpää (Järkis)
Organization committee : Arto Vaara (General management)
Raimo Lindroos (signing up and public relations)

Getting there :
1) The H-train from Helsinki stops at Saunakallio station, from where it¡¯s a 500 meter walk to the game site (located in the back of Jamppa shopping center). Please refer to the map at :
***Map***
2) Other players from Helsinki area might be able to give you a ride there in their car, please ask Mikko Törnqvist
mikko (dot) tornqvist (at) hut (dot) fi

Welcome!

PS. HUT Chess club plays Chinese chess on Mondays starting at 6 PM at Jämeräntaival 1A. Everyone is welcome to join us!

New website for xiangqi activities in the Netherlands

2006-05-12T14:28:00.000-07:00

Dear xiangqi fans,

We have now our own website for chinese chess activities in the Netherlands. We publish all events in our diary or "agenda".

You can follow this link to see our new website: http://home.planet.nl/~leeu7901/

You will see also that we have for the first time the 25th European Xiangqi Championship held in Haarlem.

Still are some things to fix like the dns. Later you can find us under the name (nxb.nl) and that stands for "Nederlandse Xiangqi Bond.nl"

Further we like to place some links on our site but mainly we will keep it as a kind of a bulletinboard.

Greetings, Arnout de Leeuw

News from Italy

2006-04-30T11:33:00.000-07:00

Wonderfull occasion for Xiangqi to show all the world chess player its beauty
Many thanks to our Xiangqi friend Mr. Agostino Guberti, president of Italian XiangQi Federation, who has kindly let us know that from May 20 to June 4, 2006, there will take place in Turin the most important chess event ever to be held in Italy.

Mr. Guberti said : "This could be a wonderfull occasion for Xiangqi to show all the world chess player its beauty. China and World Xiangqi Federation could send for this event players and xiangqi sets to let all the international chess players from every countries in the world come in touch with Chinese Chess."

Repost from http://www.ukcca.org/