Choi Chulhan

White:  CHOI Chulhan (Korea) 9p
Black: KANG Dongyoon (Korea) 9p

Commentary by Michael Redmond 9p, transcribed by Chris Garlock 

This is an all-Korean final for the 2012 SAWMG Men’s Individual title. The players are top Korean players who have confidence in their reading abilities, which are on full display in this exciting game…

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Li He (left) vs Rui Naiwei

White:  RUI Naiwei (China) 9p
Black: LI He (China) 3p

Commentary by Michael Redmond 9p, transcribed by Chris Garlock 

Rui is a strong fighter, as well as a tenacious player. She’s been at or close to the top of the women’s game for quite a while now. Li, on the other hand, is a new young player who’s recently become very prominent in women’s go…

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Russia (left) vs Canada

White:  SHA, LIN (Canada)
Black: KOVALEVA, SHIKSHIN (Russia)

Commentary by Michael Redmond 9p, transcribed by Chris Garlock. 

This game is a good example of the players consciously using Pair Go tactics and techniques, such as setting each other up or the use of forcing moves to allow one’s partner to make a strategic choice…

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Ranka: How did you get started playing go?
Murakawa: At home, my father and grandfather played go, so I got interested and started playing when I was five year old. Then when I was eight, I became an insei.

Ranka: You’re also known as a student of the Korean language. How did you get started at that?
Murakawa: I go to Korea three times a year to take part in the preliminary rounds of international tournaments. I thought it would be nice to know the language, so I started studying it. I also buy Korean go books. But I’m still in the process of learning the spoken language, and I can’t read the books at all.

Ranka: Are there any particular Korean players whose games interest you, or with whom you have made friends?
Murakawa: I’m interested in the games of Park Jeonghwan, who played here, and Kim Jiseok, 8-dan. As for making friends, quite a few Korean pros can speak Japanese, so I’ve gotten to know them that way.

Ranka: How did the World Mind Games turn out for you as whole?
Murakawa: Although I wasn’t able to beat any of the Chinese and Korean players, the bronze medal in pair go made it come out all right in the end.

Ranka: Thank you.

Murakawa Daisuke (left) and Mukai Chiaki

Though not a title winner in Japan, Mukai Chiaki has challenged for women’s titles six times, and was promoted this year to 5 dan. She has frequently represented Japan in international competition, and has done well in team and pair competition at both SportAccord World Mind Games, earning three bronze medals. Ranka spoke with her after the individual competition, in which she defeated Su Sheng-fang of Chinese Taipei in between losses to Rui Naiwei of China and Choi Jeong of Korea, and again after the pair competition.

Ranka: How do you feel about the games you played in the individual competition?
Mukai: Aside from losing two of them, I’m dissatisfied with the way I played. I wasn’t playing well.

Ranka: And the pair competition?
Mukai: I’m glad that we were able to win a medal. I only wish we had been able to do a little better. Overall, I hope I can put my experience here to good use the next time I compete.

Ranka: How do you compare the team competition last year with the individual competition this year?
Mukai: There wasn’t that much difference. In a team tournament each individual game is a factor in whether the team wins or loses, so regardless of whether it’s a team tournament or an individual tournament, you have the same feeling as you play. But with a team tournament, there’s an additional sense of team spirit.

Ranka: Given the opportunity, do you want to play in the SportAccord World Mind Games again next year?
Mukai: Yes, I do.

Ranka: Thank you.

Natalia Kovaleva (left) and Ilya Shikshin

Natalia Kovaleva began competing in tournaments in the far east in 2004, when she and Alexei Lazarev won three games at the International Amateur Pair Go Championship in Tokyo. A high point in her career so far came at the World Mind Sports Games in Beijing in 2008, where she won a game from a Japanese professional opponent. For the past couple of years she has been working for the Russian Go Federation. Ranka spoke with her after the first pair round, in which she and Ilya Shikshin lost to Japan’s Mukai Chiaki and Murakawa Daisuke.

Ranka: Please tell us about the place where you grew up and how you learned to play go.
Kovaleva: I was born in Chelyabinsk, which is a city of about a million people in the Ural moutains, already in Asia. I lived there until two years ago, when I moved to Moscow where I live now. So Chelyabinsk is where I started to play go, when I was seven years old. I began because my older brother played go. At first I saw go as a game that children play, and then it became a way for me to travel.

Ranka: Please tell us about your job with the Russian Go Federation.
Kovaleva: I help to organize tournaments, master classes, and other events like that.

Ranka: Who teaches at the master classes?
Kovaleva: I do. I also have time to study the game myself and learn more about it.

Ranka: Are you enjoying the World Mind Games?
Kovaleva: Yes, of course, of course. Except for the weather it has been a very good tournament. I like having so many different games here: chess, bridge, and the other games. It’s interesting to talk with the players of these other games. It’s also been very good as a go tournament because so many very strong players are here, and it’s turning out very well for me.

Ranka: What has been your best game here?
Kovaleva: I guess the pair-go game against the Japanese pair. It was a very interesting game, and I like to play pair go. In my opinion pair go is more interesting than playing single.

Ranka: Thank you.

Ranka: Are you enjoying the World Mind Games?
Shikshin: Oh yes, but given the length of the tournament, I thought there would be more programs planned, perhaps some entertainment.

Ranka: Please tell us about where you live in Russia and how you learned to play go.
Shikshin: I was born in Kazan and I still live there. Kazan is a big city with a population of about one million people, sometimes referred to as the third Russian capital. My father started teaching me to play go when I was five. He taught at a chess school, but he had his own go class there. He had lots of pupils and I made fast progress because I was able to play with other kids who were at the same level.

Ranka: And you’ve also studied in the far east. Please tell us about that.
Shikshin: I’ve been to Korea many times, most often in the summer. I think I’ve lived there about one and a half years. I first went in 2002, staying for two months. The next time was in 2003, and then in 2006. In 2008 I stayed for nine months. I visited many Korean go schools and trained a lot. I played many games with Korean kids. One school in particular that I attended was the Golden Bell, located near the Korean Baduk Association in central Seoul. It was a small school with only eight students, but I hear that now it has grown quite big, and that some of its students have become professionals.

Ranka: Is there any particular professional player whose games you particularly admire?
Shikshin: Of the professionals here at the World Mind Games my favorite is Choi Chulhan. I think he is one of the strongest players in the world, maybe the strongest after Lee Sedol. I really like to watch his games. I played against Murakawa Daisuke from Japan in both the individual and pair competitions, and both times I felt that there were chances to win. I think European players might be able to reach his level. My feeling is that if European players studied harder they could compete with the Japanese, but not with Choi Chulhan.

Ranka: Thank you.

Rita Pocsai (left) and Csaba Mero

Ranka interviewed the Hungarian pair, Rita Pocsai and Csaba Mero, after their loss to the Chinese pair in the first round of the pair-go competition at the World Mind Games.

Ranka: Please tell us how you began playing go.
Pocsai: I got into the game easily because my father was very active in it. He taught me to play when I was six or seven years old, and then we started going to tournaments together.
Mero: I also learned from my father, when I was twelve or thirteen. He was about 3 kyu. It took me perhaps a year to overtake him. I started going to tournaments in 1994, I think, but that was a long time ago and I don’t remember the details.

Ranka: Have you studied go in the far east?
Pocsai: Not at all.
Mero: After winning the European Championship I really wanted to go to Japan to study. Finally in 1999 I was invited by Kobayashi Chizu, and spent two and a half years in Japan as an insei.

Ranka: An what are you doing now?
Pocsai: I’m a university student, studying special education. This came from teaching go to children in schools. I taught at many schools. I got the feeling that I liked being with children, and I got the idea of using go as a form of therapy. I don’t know how it will turn out; we shall see.
Mero: I’m working for a multinational company, doing statistical programming. That’s something like data science. You’ve got a lot of data, you have to clean it, you have model it, make predictions, that sort of thing. Not much connection with go.

Ranka: Are you enjoying the World Mind Games?
Pocsai: Yes, I am. I’ve lost all my games so far, but it’s been very nice to watch the other games and play against some strong players.
Mero: It’s nice to be here again.

Ranka: What are your future plans?
Pocsai: Well, the first step is to get my university degree.
Mero: I’ll keep on playing go, of course, but conditions in Europe are not very good for a go player who has a family to support. You can’t make a living at it. For that matter, even if I could make a living by playing go professionally, go would then become a job rather than the pleasure it is now, and maybe a different job would suit me better. If it became possible to play professionally, I suppose I would give it a try once in my life, but by the time it does become possible I suppose I’ll already be too old.

Ranka: How often have you been to China and what is your impression of the country?
Pocsai: I think this is my fifth time. I like China very much, but for me, although Beijing is a nice city, it seems very crowded and noisy and the buildings are huge. I prefer to visit smaller and more natural places. For example, last month I was in Suzhou for a women’s world championship (the Bingsheng Cup). It was up in the mountains and it was beautiful.
Mero: I’ve been to China three times, always to Beijing. I’m dying to see other parts of China as well.

Ranka: Thank you.

Vanessa Wong (left) and Jan Hora

During the gold medal individual matches, Ranka had a chance to speak with European women’s champion Vanessa Wong.

Ranka: Where were you born, and when did you move to Great Britain?
Wong: I was born in Hong Kong, but when I was starting middle school, I came to England to go to boarding school. My parents thought the British schools were better than the schools in Hong Kong. I went to the Shrewsbury School. Shrewsbury is a small town, far from London, close to Wales.

Ranka: Do you like boarding school?
Wong: Yes, I do. You learn to be independent, and there’s less parental control.

Ranka: And when did you start playing go?
Wong: When I was a schoolgirl in Hong Kong. My father liked to play, so he taught me. He’s 2 dan in Hong Kong, but he’d be about shodan or 1 kyu in Europe. It took me a year or two to catch up with him.

Ranka: How have you been doing in European tournaments?
Wong: I’ve finished second twice in the European Youth Championship, second last year and first this year in the European Women’s Championship, and 22nd this year at the European Go Congress.

Ranka: Have you studied go in the far east since moving to Shrewsbury?
Wong: I went to China to study go in 2008, and spent three months in Korea in 2009 at the Chong-am Dojang. That’s the go school that produced Lee Sedol.

Ranka: Who are your current rivals?
Wong: Lukas Podpera in Czechia is my main rival. He’s the same age as me, so I guess we were born to be rivals. Mateusz Surma in Poland is another rival, although actually we’re all three good friends.

Ranka: What are your future plans?
Wong: I hope to go to a university, and to play go professionally. I want to reach a level of go that I can be satisfied with. I’ll probably play professionally in Europe, because that’s where I have the most contacts.

Ranka: What are your outside interests and hobbies?
Wong: None in particular. I spend my time on my school studies and on go.

Ranka: You seem to be a serious girl.
Wong: Yes, I like to take things seriously.

Ranka: Thank you.

China (left) vs Korea

White:  LI, WEIJIE (China)
Black: CHOI, CHOI (Korea)

Commentary by Michael Redmond 9p, transcribed by Chris Garlock. 

This is another high-level pair go match that’s virtually indistinguishable from a regular one-on-one game. As in the second-round game between China and Japan, the outcome of the game is determined by the fight in the center, and, also as in that game, there’s a late-stage turn of fortune that’s decisive….

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