Back Where i Came from...
Well, by some twist of fate, I was back in KL to play chess, a week or two after returning from the Asean Para Games. It was like I woke up and found myself back in KL and was wondering what I was doing here...Ok fine, not so dramatic. But, yea was in KL this time to play in the KL Open, which of course is much more different than my last trip for the Asean Para Games. I would say this is the first Open tournament I’ve played and overseas, even though I’ve sort of been playing chess for 6 years.
Well, that is because of course I was really that into it then and I took a break in between when I began to improve, and so I took one step forward and two steps back, and perhaps you could say I’m now back to taking steps forward again, like maybe going two steps forward again, with my recent competition experience. And, anw as much as it was a tiring trip to KL again and during the tournament, I feel like I’ve again managed to be refreshed and really put any of my troubles behind. I’ve come back feeling good and not the least bit hung up over any of the issues in my life I was talking about previously or concerned.
In fact, I believe I’ve found the peace and resolution even if everything isn’t completely perfect, though now I feel everything just fine the way they are. I don’t know but this kind of trips seems to help me to grow and improve myself and just leave everything behind especially my cares and woes. And, I feel just back to the way I should feel and that is good. But, one thing of course, I missed church so yea. I feel as if I’ve made real progress in this chess tournament as much as I didn’t get that great a result, although considering the competition you could say it was not bad. And, I feel like I beginning to see a step forward in terms of being more open personality wise, as I go out and really do stuff and be involved in chess, the only activity which I have now btw.
Also, upon reflection, after coming back I just gained so many new insights and the tournament has been a good experience both on the fun side and on the chess improvement side of things. And, as much as it can be dangerous, I really enjoy the long road trips where I can listen to music and watch the world go by and it really always gives me time to reflect which is awesome.
Now then about the events and the place, the things we saw, things we did and the tournament itself. Yea, basically, the whole family travelled down by car to KL early Thursday morning and got there by the afternoon. Where we stayed was not bad I guess, quite near the Mid Valley Megamall, which has not bad shopping actually, it’s like the size of four vivo cities possibly. The rooms were nice and spacious just very old and the washroom was small, and yea there were lots of mosquito. Oh and before I forget, one bar next to the hotel where the drums and guitar from the band can be heard in the room late into the night, well that was for the rooms on one side which is where we were. It was cool, seeing all the chess players many with quite good ratings, and not to mention, the CMs, IMs and GMs, I’ve never played in tournaments with the number of players with titles. So that’s the low down on the tournament.
As for other stuff, the tournament was organised quite well, the hall being in the hotel and just across from our room. The tables were kind of too big for me so I had to move the board closer to me and I was slow to press the clock and lost some games because of time trouble. As for food, we mostly bought take away from the nearby eateries back to eat. And, yea, most of the time we were busy with chess coz there were two games a day, but certainly more reasonable than even the Asean Para Games format, which was crazy btw. Oh and I managed to have time to use internet as there was free internet connection and I facebooked a little here and there, it was also useful in preparation for the games.
As for my chess play, I began the tournament playing games which were not bad at the start but went wrong half way through, but overall my start was bad, I played three bad games and escaped with half a point from the Indonesian WCM. Haha, it was funny that on the klchess website, they mentioned about me in a picture saying that even someone with a physical handicap like me can play, to say that chess can be played anyone, but I was actually losing that game only for her to give me a perpetual check. But, more importantly, I managed to recover at the end, to get 2 wins and a draw in the last three rounds, and I felt like I’ve played better than ever and really broke a barrier in my chess, coz I hold back a lot.
Actually, it is really just as in life, I need to learn to not hold back so much. So yea, I ended the tournament with 3 out of 9 points, which was not too bad although I knew I could do way better than that. And, my brother did quite well coming in top 15 and got prize money. We didn’t stay for the closing ceremony though, coz we had to leave on the 8th Tuesday. And, the only time we really went out was on the first day when we met some relatives at the Mid Valley Megamall. And, i managed to buy some nice music CDs i’ve wanted at a good price there. So that’s basically it I think.
So, we returned on Tuesday night at 11pm-ish, after a four hour night drive, and was quite scary on the way back we saw a car accident that had already occurred but not too long ago along the NS highway. But, thankfully we got back safely, so that was fine. When got back, I was so tired, I went to bed. Then, the next day, I put recorded my games into the computer via chessbase. And, I really learned allot from the analysis of my own games, proving the tournament a good thing for experience in playing regular good quality chess tournaments.
And, the following day, today, my training with coach sparked some reflections about chess and life for me again. Like, he mentioned about touching a tiny cut and how it gets worst, but that instead when you leave it alone it heals. That was because in one of my games I moved my not so great knight which was on a5 back to c6 only the have it get into a worst position after a pawn push on d5 and then went back to a5 and was chased back by a b4 pawn push subsequently. And, as in another of my games, he mentioned how I always failed to see crucial details in my opponents position, how I focus on the least of my worries too much in the game, missing the main point sometimes. And, I feel like these are issues personality and intellectually wise I face sometimes in my life. Make me feel like maybe we can truly learn lessons from the parallels between chess and life.
And, anw one unrelated thing I’ve been thinking about recently has been about my life socially. I mean, ever since I came back from the Para Games, player has been trying to chat with me quite regularly. And, I don’t know all my life I have been used to having to talk to people and not people talk to me first. But, it made me realise that perhaps the reason why I haven’t really had that many proper friends, is that I haven’t had experience of people wanting to talk to me and sometimes I find it a struggle to keep with the opposite parties conversation in that I would find it difficult to be on the other end listening to someone although I know I make a good listener.
But, I’m used to being the one to make the conversation which I often fail miserably at, and therefore I’ve become too focussed on only where I’m coming from. So I feel perhaps if I can overcome this and learn to listen to other people and be a friend instead of always trying to talk to people to get them talking to me, I would finally break that barrier that keeps me from making friends. But certainly it is not just this realisation that will help me but I’m already making progress in that I’ve now become more open and less afraid to speak up than I was before, I guess probably due to my concerted effort and the experience of going out and doing more stuff nowadays that involves some form of interaction through chess I guess. And, the Lord has really helped I feel. I feel I’m now getting close to being on the more sociable side. Just proves that I can improve myself and be in Arts.
Well, that is because of course I was really that into it then and I took a break in between when I began to improve, and so I took one step forward and two steps back, and perhaps you could say I’m now back to taking steps forward again, like maybe going two steps forward again, with my recent competition experience. And, anw as much as it was a tiring trip to KL again and during the tournament, I feel like I’ve again managed to be refreshed and really put any of my troubles behind. I’ve come back feeling good and not the least bit hung up over any of the issues in my life I was talking about previously or concerned.
In fact, I believe I’ve found the peace and resolution even if everything isn’t completely perfect, though now I feel everything just fine the way they are. I don’t know but this kind of trips seems to help me to grow and improve myself and just leave everything behind especially my cares and woes. And, I feel just back to the way I should feel and that is good. But, one thing of course, I missed church so yea. I feel as if I’ve made real progress in this chess tournament as much as I didn’t get that great a result, although considering the competition you could say it was not bad. And, I feel like I beginning to see a step forward in terms of being more open personality wise, as I go out and really do stuff and be involved in chess, the only activity which I have now btw.
Also, upon reflection, after coming back I just gained so many new insights and the tournament has been a good experience both on the fun side and on the chess improvement side of things. And, as much as it can be dangerous, I really enjoy the long road trips where I can listen to music and watch the world go by and it really always gives me time to reflect which is awesome.
Now then about the events and the place, the things we saw, things we did and the tournament itself. Yea, basically, the whole family travelled down by car to KL early Thursday morning and got there by the afternoon. Where we stayed was not bad I guess, quite near the Mid Valley Megamall, which has not bad shopping actually, it’s like the size of four vivo cities possibly. The rooms were nice and spacious just very old and the washroom was small, and yea there were lots of mosquito. Oh and before I forget, one bar next to the hotel where the drums and guitar from the band can be heard in the room late into the night, well that was for the rooms on one side which is where we were. It was cool, seeing all the chess players many with quite good ratings, and not to mention, the CMs, IMs and GMs, I’ve never played in tournaments with the number of players with titles. So that’s the low down on the tournament.
As for other stuff, the tournament was organised quite well, the hall being in the hotel and just across from our room. The tables were kind of too big for me so I had to move the board closer to me and I was slow to press the clock and lost some games because of time trouble. As for food, we mostly bought take away from the nearby eateries back to eat. And, yea, most of the time we were busy with chess coz there were two games a day, but certainly more reasonable than even the Asean Para Games format, which was crazy btw. Oh and I managed to have time to use internet as there was free internet connection and I facebooked a little here and there, it was also useful in preparation for the games.
As for my chess play, I began the tournament playing games which were not bad at the start but went wrong half way through, but overall my start was bad, I played three bad games and escaped with half a point from the Indonesian WCM. Haha, it was funny that on the klchess website, they mentioned about me in a picture saying that even someone with a physical handicap like me can play, to say that chess can be played anyone, but I was actually losing that game only for her to give me a perpetual check. But, more importantly, I managed to recover at the end, to get 2 wins and a draw in the last three rounds, and I felt like I’ve played better than ever and really broke a barrier in my chess, coz I hold back a lot.
Actually, it is really just as in life, I need to learn to not hold back so much. So yea, I ended the tournament with 3 out of 9 points, which was not too bad although I knew I could do way better than that. And, my brother did quite well coming in top 15 and got prize money. We didn’t stay for the closing ceremony though, coz we had to leave on the 8th Tuesday. And, the only time we really went out was on the first day when we met some relatives at the Mid Valley Megamall. And, i managed to buy some nice music CDs i’ve wanted at a good price there. So that’s basically it I think.
So, we returned on Tuesday night at 11pm-ish, after a four hour night drive, and was quite scary on the way back we saw a car accident that had already occurred but not too long ago along the NS highway. But, thankfully we got back safely, so that was fine. When got back, I was so tired, I went to bed. Then, the next day, I put recorded my games into the computer via chessbase. And, I really learned allot from the analysis of my own games, proving the tournament a good thing for experience in playing regular good quality chess tournaments.
And, the following day, today, my training with coach sparked some reflections about chess and life for me again. Like, he mentioned about touching a tiny cut and how it gets worst, but that instead when you leave it alone it heals. That was because in one of my games I moved my not so great knight which was on a5 back to c6 only the have it get into a worst position after a pawn push on d5 and then went back to a5 and was chased back by a b4 pawn push subsequently. And, as in another of my games, he mentioned how I always failed to see crucial details in my opponents position, how I focus on the least of my worries too much in the game, missing the main point sometimes. And, I feel like these are issues personality and intellectually wise I face sometimes in my life. Make me feel like maybe we can truly learn lessons from the parallels between chess and life.
And, anw one unrelated thing I’ve been thinking about recently has been about my life socially. I mean, ever since I came back from the Para Games, player has been trying to chat with me quite regularly. And, I don’t know all my life I have been used to having to talk to people and not people talk to me first. But, it made me realise that perhaps the reason why I haven’t really had that many proper friends, is that I haven’t had experience of people wanting to talk to me and sometimes I find it a struggle to keep with the opposite parties conversation in that I would find it difficult to be on the other end listening to someone although I know I make a good listener.
But, I’m used to being the one to make the conversation which I often fail miserably at, and therefore I’ve become too focussed on only where I’m coming from. So I feel perhaps if I can overcome this and learn to listen to other people and be a friend instead of always trying to talk to people to get them talking to me, I would finally break that barrier that keeps me from making friends. But certainly it is not just this realisation that will help me but I’m already making progress in that I’ve now become more open and less afraid to speak up than I was before, I guess probably due to my concerted effort and the experience of going out and doing more stuff nowadays that involves some form of interaction through chess I guess. And, the Lord has really helped I feel. I feel I’m now getting close to being on the more sociable side. Just proves that I can improve myself and be in Arts.
So I guess this concludes the post, just back to the main point of my blog post about the KL Open Chess Championships, I’ve had a blast. It has been a great experience chess wise. But, the time away from home has given me that perfect opportunity to improve myself in a personal way and for the family to grow through the time spent together as sort of a holiday for us. And, I’m refreshed and have put all the unhappy things behind. Such that now, I feel my life is great and I’m happy, there’s nothing that feels wrong at all, it seems all perfect and like everything’s just fine. Well, so that was me going back to where I just came from and returning back home again...
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