Happy Birthday to our 5 year old Go Club, Saarto!

Hehe, I seem to have a habit of being constantly inconstant when it comes to writing. Well, it doesn't mean I've been out of the game. In a matter of fact, I've had a lot happen locally in and around the game of Go while not having written about it so much. Sorry about the inactivity. I'll promise to try keep at it more from now on. Since I created the Steemit connection, it might even prove more fun.

Anyway, on with the story...

As the title suggests, five years back Today, on Tuesday 7th of February in 2012, our club (spearheaded by yours truly) officially opened its doors at Koulutuskeskus Salpaus' Culture Centre. From the get-go we had almost 10 participants, and while we've eventually had to move out from the school premises, and occasionally to change our meeting times, we've gladly stayed alive all that time. The faces and places might've changed, but we kept on playing. And quite frankly, we've managed to pull almost spotless record of weekly games.

To top this all, we've even hosted two Summer Go tournaments! Whee!

For this, we are now enjoying festivities and some treats for a job well done next Saturday. We are gathering to the clubhouse of our apartment buiding, bringing our kids along, order pizza and refreshers and spend the day having fun, playing games, discussion and mingle. And my wife Vera promised to bake us a cake. I am positive it'll turn out to be a fun day.

Yep, that's all for today. I had hoped I could had added pics here, but didn't have any accessible today, because I have recently had an UTF-8 breakdown on my harddrive and the OS won't let me access those directories, so this will have to do. Sorry about that... I'll add pictures later then.

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P.s. We are on lookout for new players.

If you would like to come play with us, please meet us weekly on Wednesdays starting at 17:00. We play at the Bar Hiidenkivi on Ratakatu 28, Lahti.

P.p.s. I'm now 7 kyu. (Hoping to be 6kyu 1dan really soon.

P.p.p.s. Follow us on Twitter @ WimGoban. I'll be possibly be adding some new links to the sidebar soon.



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Some changes on the blog

I've recently joined a blogchain network Steem, through a site called Steemit. It's a network built on a blockchain, like the Bitcoin currency. Steem rewards its users for posts by giving out its own cryptocurrency for highly voted content.

So... To make things easier for myself I have now connected the World is my Goban blog to Steem through Streemian (another Steem service) so that all my Go blog posts get automatically syndicated to my Steem(it) feed. Now isn't that fancy?

Good. Now that I've got the financial stuff handled, I might as well start blogging about Go again. I think before the weekend I'll have something up. So be seeing ya with another post then.

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Token: c7f513b175043252

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Streaming

Just a test. My Twitch stream

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Photography

Just a little something I shot a while back: photo of a goban I once saw being made.

You can click the picture and visit my Flickr album to see all my other photos. Not much more to report this time. I've been a bit busy with my kids having started their fall semester and all those other activities that go with it. I'll probably need to start planning for Miro's 5 year birthday parties too.

Oh, and I'm now established as 7 kyu EGF. Cool. It took a while, but I guess I can do better. Next step 6 kyu.

(Embedding images from Flickr is a pain, anyone know how to easily add them?)

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Big day tomorrow.

Hi again.

I haven't been writing for a couple of days, because I've been trying to get over a summer flu or heyfever or something that's been clogging up my sinuses lately, and also trying to prepare myself for the tournament we are hosting tomorrow. It's going to be an early wake up so I'll be hitting the bed quite soon now. It wouldn't do to play tired, after all.

Just sayin' I'm so going to get beaten this time, being a mere 7 kyu or whatever, going up against some 1 to 3 dan players.

Wish me luck! :)



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"For the Meijin, there is no such thing as Joseki."

So I watched this wonderful game tonight, between Takemiya Masaki 9p and Goto Shungo 9p.

I have very little time now before going to bed, but I just had to link to the video. The game was very exciting, and while I am dead tired, I just couldn't take my eyes off the screen. If you were wondering, Takemiya is the one who plays the "cosmic style". The video is subtitled in English, not sure if they work in embedded videos or not, but if not, you can always go directly to YouTube and watch it there.

I hope you liked it as much as I did. These guys really make the game look simple, and by listening the commentators you can learn a good deal of new tricks.

Good night, and have good games, as always!

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Kylmä kivi – Cold stone (tournament)

25th July, is the name day of Jaakko (Jaakonpäivä, illustration from Google doodles). (From Wikipedia:) According to an old Finnish legend, Jaakko throws a cold stone in the waters on 25th of July, on his name day, symbolically freeing himself of the burden of sins. (Which in turn refers to the religious myths of St. James' Road to Santiago.)

The myth of Jaakko and the cold stone was believed to be the reason for the cooling of waters, and generally marked the end of mid-Summer and nearing of Autumn.

Cold stones, indeed... We actually think they need warming up. So...

Interesting review

Just watched this excellent video stream review made by xhu98 (of the Nova League) and theduddha2 yesterday. Here they talk about the last public game of the Meijin, Honinbo Shuhei 9p which he played against Kitani Minoru 7p. A fine example of true dedication in the game. A must watch for anyone who likes Go. Go ahead and watch it if you have the time!

Practice #1

Don't do too many tsumego in a row. Especially if it's 2 o'clock in the morning.

Just sayin'.

Here's a simple one just for you:

My friends are too strong. ;)

I went to the go club today, and surprise surprise took Leo there with me. He seems to enjoy coming there and even played one game, slowly. (I'm puzzled if the old Batman re-runs that can be seen on the big screen there have something to do with his apparent enthusiasm though.)

Blogging about Go

I noticed there is a trend.

Parenting and go.

Improving one's skill is a gradual progress. No one is born a master, and while some definitely have the capability to learn faster, it certainly doesn't mean the rest of us couldn't learn the same things, or that the fast learner didn't put in any effort in what they learned. Even prodigies like Mozart had to spend time and effort into learning their trait.

Normal club night.

Since the bar owner doesn't seem to mind it, I took Leo to play some games and drink lemonade at the club today. There were three regular members attending tonight. Pretty normal, down a bit from our heyday, but enough to make a game.

Leo got to play two games on the 13x13 board, against a 1dan, and me. He did lose to our friend with 13 stone handi by 12 points, but managed to beat me with 9 stones by resignation. So... I Finally got to see some real determination in his play!

Kids and Go

In my previous blog post, I forgot a lot of what I was supposed to be writing about. Blame time constraints for I'm a father of two lively children. (Yes, Two! I never got around to telling about that either. Oh my.) Leo, whom about you already know if you had read some of the earlier posts, and Miro who was born in September 2010.

They both play Go.

Well. This is not a story about them, actually. It's more of a story of how kids ultimately get interested in stuff like Go.

Hello! A bit of status update...

A lot has happened between now and then, so I will shortly address something that was, what is, and what will be in this post.

A long time has passed with no update...

Life is like that. We do not always live online, and we tend to forget. I'm happy to report that we now have an active go club in my town. Still, a busy rest of the day ahead with my kids and the club, so I'll leave with this. I hope I'll be back soon. :) Good games everyone!

Posting from school

Hello!

Looks like I haven't posted anything in a while. Maybe I should start doing so again, so here's an update.

Some interesting news

 Last summer I was eventually admitted to a school, and started studying in August. I'm to become a model builder/designer.

Guess who joined the ASR League again!

Yes! After an excruciating two months of not playing on the league (or even KGS for that matter) I decided it was time for me to join again.

An ASR League game reviewed by topazg82.

topazg 1d reviewed an October ASR League game between me and Turpa 5k. It's pretty amazing although it does have some sound issues. Here's the review:

Watch live streaming video from topazg at livestream.com

Leather is sexy, especially with polka dots!

As I'm working as an intern in a little workshop that prints and binds calendars and presses many different things from many different materials I got an opportunity to use a silk press to print some leather gobans for the go club I plan to set up. Now all I need is some stones.