Chinese Chess

nospam@example.com (iceninejkw) — Thu, 26 Oct 2006 11:35:06 -0400

Author: iceninejkw

My hobby is Chinese culture and I�ve learned Chinese at least to the point where I can read newspapers and novels and handle most conversations (but not understand televised news reports or most TV programs which are fast, and packed with compressed grammar and words). I�ve also learned Chinese chess but was not interested in it too much until I found a couple of postal sites like brainking that featured it. The western symbols are a great innovation at brainking. At a park here in Shanghai or on a real time Chinese chess site, I get slaughtered quickly. I�m a big patzer and the kibitzers have a good laugh, �Foreigners can�t learn Chinese chess!� But in postal chess you can take your time and let the unfamiliar patterns soak in. What you can see in one minute in Euro Chess (let�s not say �International Chess� or �Chess� anymore) may not occur to you until after 10 or 20 minutes of contemplation in Asian chess. So now I�m taking down some Asian players. Their fast confident play will quickly kill you in a fast game but if you take your time you can spot any strategic or tactical mistakes and roll them back with a counter-attack. My Euro chess skills (my last USCF over the board rating was 2237 although that was about 15 years ago) come into play especially in the middle game if I survive the opening. �Hey! Is this guy using a computer? He plays like a patzer in the opening but a master in the middle game!!� No, I�m a Westerner with some transferable skills from Euro chess.

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Chinese Chess