台中西洋棋│臺中市體育總會西洋棋委員會 -- chess game 台中西洋棋│臺中市體育總會西洋棋委員會

Checkmate   
Checkmate!
By Westtland Li

Sri-Lanka is a beautiful place, though the flight wasn’t so comfortable. My hotel was located by a beach, where tall palm trees could be seen through the window. The yellow-red sun radiated hot bursts of power, as if it were trying to coat someone with fire. I could hear sounds of the waves crashing into the shore, wetting the sand, and moisturizing the rocks. I wonder, how could anything go wrong in such welcoming weather?


The chess tournament started at nine a.m, and took place in another hotel. There was a resting area for parents, but my parents decided to stay at our hotel. Many chess players were squeezing onto the bus that drove us to the venue, all of them from different countries around Asia. I stuck with my fellow companions from Taiwan, also known as Chinese Taipei. We were all nervous about the first game. From the international chess rating we could see that some of our opponents were strong; some of them were weak; some of them might even be underrated players who could play chess very well. I was nervous alright, but I knew at that time my initiatives on chess weren’t so good.

All I counted on was winning against weaker players and drawing against stronger players. My first opponent was from Sri-Lanka, a short kid around 10 years old who always smiled at everyone. We sat on opposite chairs across the table, and listened to the director of the tournament talking through blurry words echoing from the microphone. He said,
“Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the 2019 Asian Youth Chess Championships. We hope all candidates can play with luck on their side, even though it is theoretically impossible…”
I managed to stay awake throughout the speech and, finally, the tournament was about to begin.
“Alright ladies and gentlemen, let the first round begin!” I could hear the clear rings of sounds of the chess clock being tapped and echoing through the hall. The chandelier hanging by the high ceiling seemed to shimmer between bright and dark.

I looked at my opponent.
He smiled at me.
We shook hands.
The game started. I played white, and started first with the classical Spanish opening. He countered against it with the well known Berlin defence. At that time, I was a very weak player, and didn’t even know about the Berlin defence. I castled next move, and was caught by surprise when my opponent took the pawn in the center with his knight. I placed my chin above my fists, and stared deeply into the chess board. Finally, I moved my rook to the semiopen file. I found afterwards that the move was a positional mistake. After just a few more moves, I began to notice the game was moving in his favor. My pieces were tired of defending, and most of them were stuck behind each other as if there were a traffic jam. I started to spend more and more time thinking, getting more and more anxious as the clock kept ticking.
My opponent moved his queen to the left side of the board.
My heart started beating. I moved my knight to the center. I thought I trapped his queen.
He captured my knight with his rook. A surprise move. I recaptured with my pawn.
He lifted up his bishop. Slid it towards my king. Chomped down another one of my pawns. I hesitated.
My hands were shaking as I captured his bishop with my last defending pawn.
I watched helplessly as his queen cut straight through the board, executing his final plan, placing it two squares in front of my king exclaiming,
“Check!”
My brain was spinning and my thoughts scattered all over the chess board. I felt as if I were a victim of the sun outside, with no escape from the heat surrounding me. The stillness of the room was interrupting my thoughts, and I couldn’t even concentrate with the silence around me -- it was unbearable. Suddenly, I realized that I was forced to sacrifice both of my rooks in order to avoid checkmate.
My heart was racing and I felt a surge of disappointment as I slowly accepted the reality that there was no defence. I kept thinking. The clock ticked. I lifted my palm from underneath my chin, towards my king, and knocked it over.
I resigned.

The next six rounds with different players played out similarly, with me always on the losing side. Even knowing my parents were supporting me back at the hotel, my confidence was beaten again and again, as if it were a punching bag.

Then came the eighth round and things went even worse than I could have ever imagined.
My opponent in the eighth round was an Asian. He could speak Chinese, but his federation was from Canada. He was considerably round, and he wore big glasses that kept slipping down his nose. He wore yellow, black and white striped clothes, and he looked as if he were very confident in beating me, since I already had the lowest points in the tournament. I didn’t know if it was a coincidence, but I sat on the exact same seat as I did in my first round -- white on the board in last place. I was already numb from all the losing, but this opponent provoked me to want to win. Just minutes before the game started, he said arrogantly,
“I know your opening. I saw you play it against so many players. Don’t you ever change it? Using the same opening suits only beginners. Or maybe you are one.”
I didn’t know how to respond to that, so I chose to stay quiet. Then he said to one of his friends, loud enough that I could hear him,
“I’m not losing against a beginner. Perhaps I can beat him within thirty minutes.”
“Thirty minutes really is quite a short time. Maybe you should consider beating me after one and a half hours,” I commented.
“One and a half hours is too long. Thirty minutes.”
I shook my head in exasperation.
Finally, the eighth round began. I played the Spanish game again, since I did not want to risk losing against him. He sneered at me, and mouthed the words, “Beginner.”
I pretended that I didn’t see him, and concentrated on the game. He played the Berlin defense. I now knew this opening and was already able to memorize the main variation. Instead of moving my rook on the fifth move, I pushed my pawn two squares forwards, fighting for the center of the board. He played the main variation, and retreated his knight, attacking my bishop. I then exchanged my bishop for his knight, and started developing rapidly. The clock ticked over thirty minutes, and I felt like I had already won a small victory. Small as it was, I was quickly caught by surprise when my opponent captured my knight, forcing me to recapture with a pawn, which would become a doubled pawn, creating weaknesses around my king. Seeing this, I quickly exchanged queens, and the game proceeded into the endgame.

Our kings raced each other to the center of the board. The fight for dominance has just begun. I started pushing my pawns and protected them with my dark-squared bishop, forming a fortress at the same time. My opponent also had his dark-squared bishop and tried in all ways to crush my position. I held my position and counter attacked him on his queen-side with my pawn storm, then suddenly changing directions and marching my king towards his undefended king-side pawns. Just as I seemed to pressure my opponent with my control over the chess board, I made a mistake.
A fatal one.
I moved my king three squares diagonally in front of my bishop. And I saw the blunder as I tapped the clock, but it was already too late. There is no taking back. The whole room went quiet. All I could hear was the sound of my own heart beating a hundred miles per hour. My chest was close to bursting from the pressure. My breathing became faster. I felt almost entirely out of air. My whole body was shaking. I kept repeating in my mind,
“Please don’t see it.
Please don’t see it.
Please don’t see it.”
He saw it. Yes, definitely. He saw it.
His fingertips glided across the board and reached his bishop.
The bishop then moved in the direction of my king and halted before it.
“Check,” My opponent whispered.
A moment passed and he lifted his eyes, looking triumphantly at me.
I felt as if I were falling down an infinitely long, narrow and completely black portal, unable to see an end to it.
I closed my eyes. Breathed slowly and shakily. Finally, I mustered up my courage and moved my king out of check. I watched helplessly as my opponent captured my bishop immediately, and started picking up my pawns one by 3 one, until I was left with only a king on the board, facing his army of pawns and a bishop. I could tell he was already toying with me, promoting all the pawns into bishops and knights and trapping my king until there were only two squares for it left to go.
I decided to end the torture and just before my opponent had the chance to checkmate me, I knocked my king down. I resigned, for the eighth time.
On the way out of the tournament hall, my opponent tried to start a conversation with me,
“Well, at least it took me over two hours to beat you,” he said. I forced a smile to my face and quickly walked out to the bus, leaving him staring back at me.

I held my tears back all the way through the bus ride and couldn’t hold it anymore after I arrived back at my hotel room.
I cried, though I didn’t know why. I just felt so bad, I felt like a loser. My parents didn’t need to ask me, but they held me close to them. I stopped crying after a few minutes, but I still felt miserable.
Then, I was taken by surprise when my mother asked me,
“Do you want to keep on playing chess? The choice is yours. We will support you no matter which choice you make.”
I was shocked for a moment. Then I said, firmly,
“I want to keep on playing chess, and I will never give up. From now on, I will spend more time on playing chess. One day in the future, I will become an unbeatable chess player, and my past few opponents would be lucky to have already played against me.”

************************************************

The final round started the next morning. My opponent for the final round was a tall and thin boy with curly black hair who always had beads of sweat on his nose. He wore a thin white jacket and kept his hands stuck in his pockets. He was from China and also a friend of my last opponent.
Minutes before the game started, I overheard my opponent from the eighth round talking with my current opponent. “Play the Italian opening,” he said, “I’ve seen him lose easily against that opening.”
“I won’t even need to prepare an opening to beat him,” my opponent said.
I sat at my seat, glaring down at the pieces. I told myself, I am not going to lose this time.
The ninth game started as the sounds of clocks clicking echoed through the hall for the final time of the tournament.
This time, I will play with confidence and without fear. As I reached out to touch my pieces for the first move, it suddenly occurred to me how beautiful the pieces and the board were. I could see warm light reflecting off the smooth curves of the pieces. I could smell the soft, welcoming smell of dark brown wood radiating off the board. I could feel the faint coolness of the pieces pulsing in harmony with my heartbeat. But as beautiful as the pieces were, the beauty of chess was even more stunning.
I was almost living in a dream as I defended against the Italian opening as the black side. The pieces seemed to move naturally through the board, cutting through it like a knife cutting through butter. My confidence grew as I saw my opponent starting to take time to think. In a matter of moves, I managed to grab the center of the board and started to maneuver my pieces to an attacking position. My pieces were all aimed at the right spot. My queen was prepared to confront his king. My knight was ready to discover an attack. My bishop was ready to sacrifice on his last defending pawn. My opponent made his final mistake by removing his knight from defence. It was my turn to think now. I took a deep breath and thought deeply on how to execute my plan properly.
I calculated on every single possible variation I could think of. I tried to block every single escape route my opponent could take. I racked my brain to find the best forcing variation I could play to end the game. I thought. And as I thought, the room became quiet, as if all people were watching my game, including my parents in the hotel room. Slowly, I began to see a winning route for my position. I calculated even deeper.
Finally, almost automatically, I reached out my hand, touched my bishop, and slid it towards my opponent’s very last defending pawn. I sacrificed my bishop for his unprotected king. My opponent seemed to shudder as if the capture impacted him physically. He laid his head down on his arms, not once taking his eyes off the chess board. I watched as he struggled to think of a defensive plan, 4 realizing that he didn’t have one. He seemed to sigh as he gave up thinking. He lifted his head back up, and grumpily moved his king. I saw the immediate win. Without thinking, I took the pawn in front of his king with my queen, exclaiming, ”Check!”
But I became aware of a change in attitude in my opponent.
His eyes lit up for a second, then he glanced at me, and seemed to force his eyes to darken. I was totally confused as I caught my opponent faking to think.
After what felt like close to eternity, my opponent moved his king again. I Immediately followed up by moving my queen directly in front of his king.
“Checkmate!” I said. I stood up.
Something felt extremely wrong.
My opponent looked up at me with a smug expression and touched his queen from across the board, sliding it in front of my queen, blocking the check.
“Not so fast,” he said quietly. My face fell.
How could I have not seen that move?
With the sacrifice of my bishop, I had to end the game quickly. I sat down, and placed my head on my fists. One minute passed. Two. Three. Ten. Twenty. Forty. And my clock was ticking.

Then, I saw something in the corner of my eye. A variation for a draw! But could I still win? I pondered even longer. Ten seconds left. Nine. Eight. I kept thinking. Three. Two. I moved my knight to check my opponent’s king. One. I slapped the clock. Then, he moved his king out of check. I followed up with a knight check. He moved his king. I checked again with my knight. His king was forced back to the same position. Threefold repetition! The game was a draw.

That night, the plane flight back to Taiwan was comfortable though very quiet because everyone was already exhausted from playing nine standard games of chess. Especially me. My mind was already exhausted from all the nervousness, thinking, and losing. But I could tell that the last game had changed something in me.
I no longer felt like losing. Quite opposingly, I felt like winning. Just in one day, I changed myself from totally losing to having a draw. So why can’t I do even better and change the draw into a win? Secretly inside, I started to boil with energy. I’ve found the most important tactic in chess -- confidence. One day, my dream would come true, and I would become a chess grandmaster -- the highest honor anyone can achieve in chess. As I set foot back onto my home country, I realized,
a new era of my chess adventures had just begun~ :D
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