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Cho Chikun defended the Judan title 3-2!
He won the last game by 3.5 points.

Interestingly, this last game was played on a Western-style table, instead of the traditional tatami mat - see pictures here and here.

I am very glad Cho Sensei won - he is one of the last representatives of the old Kitani School that is still competing successfully with the newer generation of players in Japan.

There is a new volume of the Hikaru-no-Go manga coming out tomorrow: number 9 of the series:

Each time I visited Japan (I participated 3 times in the World Amateur Go Championship as the Romanian representative), and also while I lived in Japan as an insei, I noticed a lot of people (mostly men) reading manga (comics) on the train in the Tokyo area, during their commute between home and work.

I never got interested in manga while in Japan - I always regarded it as some sort of childish activity for people who don’t have time to read real books.

I only understood the manga phenomenon when I first read Hikaru-no-Go, years later: maybe it is because of the Go topic, or because it is about the places where I lived for one and a half years (both Nihon Ki-in and the Igo Kenshu Center are very accurately depicted), or just because it’s well written - but I enjoyed it a lot, and found it really awesome!

I also found it to be an excellent way to attract kids to Go: I showed the first few video episodes to my 6 years old daughter and a couple of her friends her age, and they immediately wanted to play Go!

I really hope they’ll make some follow up to the original story, and have … <removed spoiler from here>

I just found this nice article: Becoming a Professional Player in Korea

The title is self-explanatory. I was impressed with the number of Korean insei at any given time: 168! That is more than 3 times the number of insei in Japan, at least at the time when I was insei.

By the way, the article is part of a nice series of Korean lessons.

In the “Proverbs Part (2)” one, I found a quite funny comment in the “If You Have Lost All Four Corners, Resign” section:

“However, after many brilliant professionals in Korea discovered the value of the sides and the center, the modern version of this proverb goes like this: “If you have secured the four corners, resign.”

The funny thing is that I have known the updated proverb from Japanese sources for a very long time now, so the brilliant professionals in Japan must have discovered that before the brilliant professionals in Korea

I think every Go player knows about Catalin Taranu - one of the very few Europeans to became professionals in Asia. He is 5 dan pro at Nihon Ki-in (in Japan). Catalin is currently living in Romania, on an extended leave from Nihon Ki-in, in order to promote Go.

I recently discovered Catalin’s website. What I like in particular is his concentrated Guide to Go - which summarizes in very few words and examples a lot of key concepts - make sure you read it!

While I was insei starting in early 1994, Catalin came as an insei to Japan next year, in 1995, together with Mirel “Tsurukame” Florescu. There was quite some concentration of Romanian insei at Nihon Ki-in that year

They literally came to Japan together (I picked them up from the airport in Narita) - but while Mirel stayed, just like me, at the Igo Kenshu Center near Tokyo, Catalin was to become an insei at the Western branch of Nihon Ki-in, in Nagoya.

We did meet, all three of us, during the summer vacation in 1995 for a great vacation in Kyushu - thanks to the wonderful, late Nishimura-san - I am sure many European players remember him from several European Go Congresses. (Mirel and I also met Catalin during the same summer of 1995 at the annual insei Go camp at Hakone).

Soon after that great summer of 1995 I returned home from Japan, after a little more than 18 months as an insei - to continue my University studies - while Mirel and Catalin enjoyed many more years in Japan.

Yamashita just won the second Kisei game - I feel very sad for Kobayashi Satoru. I sure hope he will be able to recover in the following games.

I am not only sad on a personal level (he’s the brother of my ex-sensei in Japan, Mrs. Kobayashi Chizu) - but also since he’s one of very few “old boys” from the Kitani school that can still put up a fight with the new generation of players in Japan.

Go, Satoru sensei!