(1178) WORLD CHESS CHAMPIONSHIPS (TBN-May 31, June 06, 2010)

Sources: Chess Mate by Roberto Hernandez
              Tia Belau Newspaper
              Page 13
              Volume 19
              May 31--June 06, 2010 

(920) LEVON ARONIAN WINS 2005 WORLD CUP (TBN-April 06, 2015)

:       WORLD’S NO. 1 & 2 AT 2014 NORWAY CHESS OLYMPIAD

                  World’s No. 2 Levon Aronian of Armenia, left, lost to World’s No. 1 and current World Champion Magnus Carlsen of Norway in their match at the 2014 WCO in Tromso, Norway. Aronian won the 2005 World Cup while Carlsen won the World Chess Championship over Viswanathan Anand of India in 2013 and defended it in a rematch with Anand in 2014 at Sochi, Russia.

                                                     (Photo by Eric Ksau Surangel Whipps)

                           LEVON ARONIAN

           WINS 2005 WORLD CUP

ARMENIAN Levon Aronian, who turned 23 on Oct. 06, 2005, beat former FIDE champion Ruslan Ponomariov in 2 rapid tiebreaking games to win the World Chess Federation’s World Cup tournament in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia.

                Staged from Nov. 26 to Dec. 18, 2005, this knockout tourney featured 128 players and it used to be called the FIDE world championship event. Previous winners were Anatoly Karpov, Khalifman, Viswanathan Anand, Ponomariov and Kazimdzhanov.

                For 2005 however, the World Chess Federation, better known for its French acronym FIDE, decided to hold a double round-robin tournament for the world title which was won in Argentina two months ago by Bulgaria’s Veselin Topalov.

                In Khanty-Mansiysk, Aronian won the $80,000 grand prize and a place in the next FIDE world championship candidate’s stage. The event’s other top 9 players also earned candidates slots.

                Aronian was 9 years old when he learned to play chess. In 1994, he won the world under-12 championship ahead of future top players Ponomariov, Alexander Grischuk and Etienne Bacrot.

                Levron became a Grandmaster in 2001 and the world junior champion in 2002. In the 2004 FIDE championship in Tripoli, Libya, he eliminated Magnus Carlsen and Gadir Guseinov before losing to Pavel Smirnov.

                2005 is Aronian’s most successful year so far. He has gained over 50 FIDE rating points and made it to the world’s top 10 list in spring. He shared first place at the Gibraltar Masters and topped the Karabakh international tourney.  And now he has won the World Cup without losing a game. He was the only undefeated player in this 7-round event. On his way to the finals, he eliminated Egypt’s Ali Frhat (2306), Kazakhstan’s Darmen Sadvakasov (2612), Ukraine’s Alexander Areshchenko (2653), Spain’s Francisco Vallejo Pons (2674), Belgium’s Michail Gurevich –the 1985 champ of the USSR (2652), France’s Etienne Bacrot (2725) and Russia’s Alexander Grischuk (2720).

                The Armenian was stretched to the tie-breaker only twice—against Vallejo Pons and Ponomariov. Aronian won all the 2 mini-matches under normal time control, clinching 7 victories in 14 games. In the 4 rapid tie-break games he scored 3.5.

                In his final match with Ponomariov, “Aronian was in his element and showed tremendous character and will in what many described as the battle of nerves.” Playing white in the first tie-break game, Aronian went for complexities in the Tartakower variation of the Queen’s Gambit Declined and won a piece after Ponomariov blundered on his 12^th move. In the 2^nd game, the Ukrainian essayed a Ruy Lopez and sacrificed a pawn but he lost control of the endgame, giving Aronian victory in 51 moves.

                HERE ARE THE REST OF THE 2005 WORLD CUP RESULTS:

3-4 places: Bacrot beat Grischuk 2.5-1.5; 5-6 places: Boris Gelfand (Israel) lost Evgeny Bareev (Russia) 1.5-2.5; 7-8 places: Sergei Rublevsky (Russia) beat Gurevich 1.5-0.5; 9-10 places: Magnus Carlsen (Norway) lost to Gata Kamsky (USA) 1-3; 11-12 places: Vladimir Malakhov (Russia) beat Vallejo Pons 1.5-0.5; 13-14 places: Loek Van Wely (Holland) lost to Alexey Dreev (Russia) 1.5-2.5; 15-16 places: Konstantin Sakaev (Russia) lost to Joel Lautier (France) 3.5-3.5 (Lautier won the match by virtue of drawing the sudden death game as black).

                Aronian says Bent Larsen is one of his favorite players and when asked if he shares the Great Dane’s style of play, Levon replied: “Yes. I like jumping with my pieces here and there and pushing the pawns. Normally it makes my position just rotten. But then I try to make some active play, increase tension, look for tricks. I enjoy crooked positions.”

                Marilyn Torre, the wife of Asia’s first GM Eugene Torre, was met by Roberto Hernandez during the 2012 World Chess Olympiad in Istanbul, Turkey. She said many praises about Levon Aronian –the most gentleman-mannered among all GMs that she met. She said Levon is also humble and accommodating. She repeated those praises again to Roberto during the closing ceremony of the 2014 World Chess Olympiad in Tromso, Norway. A sort of déjà vu as the trio sat side by side during the closing ceremonies of Istanbul and Tromso Olympiads.

DEJA VU  --- ISTANBUL, TURKEY AND TROMSO, NORWAY
     During the Closing Ceremony of the 2012 World Chess Olympiad in Istanbul, Turkey, Roberto Hernandez of Palau, left, GM Eugene Torre of the Philippines, middle, and Mrs. Marylin Torre were side-by-side watching the show and awarding of prizes. It happens again in the Closing Ceremony of the 2014 World Chess Olympiad in Tromso, Norway. This time, Roberto is all by himself as his teammates are busy packing their belongings for the early morning trip back to Manila. (Photo by Roberto Hernandez)


               GM EUGENE TORRE --
          THE SINGING GRANDMASTER
Roberto Hernandez attended the 2014 World Chess Olympiad Closing Ceremony alone because his 8 other teammates are busy in packing their things for the 4am flight--Tromso-Bodo; Bodo-Oslo; Oslo-Helsinki; Helsinki-Hong-Kong and Hong Kong to Manila. It's a 36-hour trip and for them, the Closing Ceremony is not that important.

But for Roberto, he's not letting go the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to pass by. He also attended the FIDE Arbiters Seminar for 5 consecutive days hoping to pass the test/exam and be awarded FIDE Arbiter Title. Packing your things can be done in a few hours.

After getting off the bus, Roberto stand a few meters from the entrance. He saw GM Eugene Torre there standing by himself, waiting for his wife Marylin.

They have a long conversation about FIDE Senior Trainer Title that GM Torre got. Roberto got a FIDE Instructor Title after topping the FIDE Trainers' Seminar held in Palau by FIDE C. E. O Geoffrey Borg in April this year.

Their conversation was focused in music when Eugene asked, "So your job is just to play music?"

Eugene asked Roberto if he knows the lyrics of the song "As Time Goes By" from the movie "Casablanca" in 1942 and sung by Jimmy Durante. They sang it together without mistakes of the lyrics... 
     You must remember this, A kiss is still a kiss, A sigh is just a sigh. The fundamental things apply, as time goes by. And when two lovers woo, they still say I Love You, on that you can rely, no matter what the future brings, as time goes by. 
     Moonlight and love songs, never out of date, hearts full of passion, jealousy and hate, woman needs man and man must have his mate, that no one can deny.
     It's still the same old story, of fight for love and glory, a case of do or die, the world will always welcome lovers, as time goes by.
    **Would you believe that I typed this lyrics without looking at my song book?

Eugene is now convinced that I know how to sing songs. He mentioned what Toti Abundo told me when Toti visited Palau in January 2014... that he and Toti used to sing in karaoke bars and their competition is whoever forgot the lyrics lose!
      

In January 23, 2014, Casto 'Toti' Abundo, Asian Chess Federation Deputy President, seated in the middle, sung some songs at Breeze Bar of Palau Royal Resort without using the song books in front of him as he knows the lyrics of the songs that he requested to Roberto Hernandez, PRR resident musician. Playing blitz chess are FIDE C.E.O. FM Geoffrey Borg, left, and Palau top player Cyril Tomas Montel, Jr. Mr. Borg defeated all of his opponents including Toti in a show of his blitz chess prowess.
                                                (Photo by Roberto Hernandez)


Eugene and Roberto sung also the Spanish song "Besame Mucho" ....Besame, besame mucho, como si fuera esta noche la ultima vez. Besame, besame mucho, que tengo miedo perderte, perderte despues.
        Quiero tenerte muy cerca, mirarme entus ojos verter junto a mi. Piensa que talvez manana, yo estare muy lejos, muy lejos de ti.

Excellent singing and pronunciation of that song BUT...
WHEN EUGENE ASKED ROBERTO IF HE KNOWS IT IN ENGLISH, He was completely lost. He knows also the English version.

Another song that he knows better than Roberto is the song "Save The Last Dance For Me". He can play it instrumental without mistakes but had not yet memorized the lyrics.

They sit together near the stage. While there is some technical problem of the video/audio, they are having again the singing of song --this time "Just The Way You Are" by Billy Joel. People in front of them --Australia's women's team, can hear them singing it while in the screen, they are showing some highlights of the 2014 World Chess Olympiad including Roberto's teammate Destiny Sisior, the youngest participant in the women's section.
  

DESTINY SISIOR ON NORWAY'S NATIONAL TV, NEWSPAPERS AND WEBSITES

       She is the youngest participant in the women’s section of 2014 World Chess Olympiad. The daughter of Palauan Harvey Sisior scored 2 wins and almost won her last game but couldn’t hang on to her advantage. Typical of a youngster, her time management still needs improvement. It’s written on the website …. “Destiny Sisior, 10 years old, from Palau. No words are needed…” 

                                      (Photo by Eric Ksau Surangel Whipps)


 In singing "Just The Way You Are", Roberto sometimes mixed up the 2nd stanza to the 3rd stanza. Eugene knows exactly the right lyrics from 1st to 6th stanzas. In the Refrain of the song, they sung it correctly.

    1. Don't go changin' to try and please me, You never let me down before, umm, hmm. I don't imagine, you're too familiar and I don't see you anymore.
    2. I would not leave you in times o' trouble, we never could have come this far, umm, hmm. I took the good times, I'll take the bad times, I'll take you just the way you are.
   3.Don't go tryin' some new fashion, Don't change the color of your hair, umm, hmm. You always have my unspoken passion, although I might not seem to care.
   4. I don't want clever conversation, I never want to work that hard, umm, hmm. I just want someone that I can talk to, I want you just the way you are.
   REFRAIN: I need to know that you will always be. The same old someone that I knew. Oh, what will it take till you believe in me, the way the I believe in you?
   5. I said I love you, and that's forever. And this I promise from the heart, umm, hmm. I couldn't love you any better, I love you just the way you are.    Alright!
    Ad lib: Sax
   6. (same as 4th stanza-pausing at the start of last 2 lines)
    In some songs like this one, the g is cancelled in 'changin'. Also in tryin'. The song Fallin' by Teri deSario has cancelled all the g of the title from start to finish.
    Some f are also cancelled like in o' trouble.
    Want to becomes wanna, going to becomes gonna. 
    Never becomes ne'er to fit the rhythm. Prayer becomes pray'r to make it like one word.

    During the singing of Turkish most popular singer in the closing ceremony of Istanbul Olympiad, Eugene and Marylin left because it's too loud for them. Roberto thought that they are not music lovers. When they come back, Eugene asked Roberto, "You can take that loud music?"
    ROBERTO ANSWERED, "I'M USED TO IT. I'VE BEEN A BAND MEMBER BEFORE PLAYING LOUD MUSIC."  


Source: Chess And Music (Perfect Combination)
            The Beginning of Chess in Palau
            By Roberto Hernandez
            August 2012 --August 2014
            To be published as a book in the future  


     

Sertab Erener's live performance at closing ceremony of Istanbul Olympiad. The background features some of her MTV.

With her band Go Easy.

CAN'T STAND LOUD MUSIC
     15 minutes before the start of the closing ceremony of 2012 World Chess Olympiad, from left, Menandro Manuel, Roberto Hernandez, vintage GM Eugene Torre and Bernardo Garcia. Torre can't stand the loud music and left with his wife Marlyn for 45 minutes.                                                             (Photo by Roberto Hernandez)



     SERTAB ERENER LIVE PERFORMANCE
         AT THE CLOSING CEREMONY OF
           ISTANBUL CHESS OLYMPIAD

The Palau Chess Team to the 2012 World Chess Olympiad in Istanbul, Turkey attended the Closing Ceremony on September 09, 2012 at WOW Convention Center.

At the entrance, Asia’s first Grandmaster Eugene Torre and his wife Marlyn were among the first at the entrance. They had a pictorial with Eugene, Menandro Manuel, Roberto Hernandez and Bernard Garcia, who obtained a Candidate Master title to be Palau first titled player while Elizabeth Manuel had a picture with Marlyn.

When Turkish most popular lady singer Sertab Erener performed with her band, the music gets louder and louder and the Torre couple couldn’t stand the noise and they left for 45 minutes.

When they come back, Eugene asked Roberto, “The loud noise didn’t bother you?” Roberto said no because he used to play with different bands.

HERE ARE SOME INTERESTING INFORMATION ABOUT SERTAB ERENER:

During her student years in Istanbul State Conservatory, Sertab Erener's musical distinctness and her voice known as Soprano attracted attention.

With her band 'Sakin Ol (Go Easy)' which sold more than one million copies, she became the best newcomer singer in Turkey.

In 2003, she won the Eurovision Song Contest with the song 'Everyway that I can'. In 2005, in the 50th celebration of Eurovision, 'Everyway that I can' has been chosen the best 9th song out of 1000 songs which had competed in 50 years.

In the summer of 2003, 'Everyway that I can' got the number one of the selling lists in Europe and it stayed in the top 10 lists of Germany and Switzerland and in the top 5 lists in Spain, Austria, Belgium and Holland.

It stayed as the number one in Greece for four weeks. Sertab Eraner was awarded by a platinum disk in Greece.

"Every way that I can' became hit in Israel, Czech Republic and Poland and it achieved to enter the top 75 list in England.

Source: Music and Me by Roberto Hernandez

            Tia Belau Newspaper

            Pages 8-9

            Volume 21

            Issue 70

            October 04, 2012

                Solution to last week’s puzzle No. 4384: 1. …Rh5+! 2. gxh5 Rxh3+ 3. Kg5 f6 mate.

                This week’s puzzle No.      : White to move and mates in 3 (Solution next issue)

Source: Chess Mate by Roberto Hernandez
             Tia Belau Newspaper
             Pages 9-10
             Volume 24
             Issue 26
             April 06, 2015

(692) ROBERT JAMES FISCHER 1943-2008 (Booby Fischer - The Times Obituary)

 ROBERT JAMES FISCHER, 1943-2008
                  Bobby Fischer: The Times obituary
                             from Times Online, January 18, 2008, by GM Raymond Keene

Bobby Fischer, the brash, unschooled chess genius from Brooklyn who toppled the might of the Soviet chess system before his 30th birthday, is the only North American World Champion and was the only non-Soviet or non-Russian title holder between the Second World War and the victory of Indian Viswanathan Anand in October last year.

Fischer's taking of the World Championship from Boris Spassky in 1972 was hailed as a symbolic moment for American hopes in the Cold War, and in many ways, Fischer's story epitomized the self-reliant, frontier ideals of Americans. (It also inspired Chess, the musical).

Yet Fischer was a deeply disturbed man, and the dream evaporated after his victory in Reykjavik. Dramatically, Fischer renounced chess after failing to agree terms for his defense of the title and did not play a single competitive game for 20 years. Instead he descended into paronaoia, characterized by hate-filled and poisonously anti-Semitic outbursts against his own country.

Robert James Fischer was born in Chicago in 1943 to a Jewish mother and a German father (though his actual paternity has been a subject of speculation). His parents split when he was 2, and he moved with his mother and sister to New York. He took up chess aged 6 and soon became obsessed with the game, eventually dropping out of high school.

He won the US Championship at 14, thus qualifying for the World Championship Candidates Tournament of 1958, and becoming at the age of 15, the youngest Grandmaster in the world in the process. He performed very creditably, but the top Soviet players who dominated world chess had no problem handling him, and he was crushed 7-1 in his games against Tal and Petrosian.

His reaction in the renewed failure in 1962 qualifying event in Curacao was passionate, accusing the elite contenders of playing as a team, and refusing to countenance participation until the tournament system had been replaced by a series of matches and tournament thereafter often featured similarly brusque demands, and his career was interrupted more than once by long periods of withdrawals from international chess.

When he did play, it was obvious that a remarkable talent had emerged. His sharp, clear and vigorous style, his breathtaking speed of play and massive determination at the board made him a legend even before he won the world title.

He first sprang to prominence, when he won a brilliant game at the age of 13 in 1956 against the American master Donald Byrne. This game involved an amazing queen sacrifice, it went round the world and became known as the game of the century. It propelled Fischer's career in a way that no amount of first prizes in tournaments could possibly have done. He once won the US Championship with an 11-0 score and, in the Candidates' Matches of 1970-1, he succeeded in winning his first two matches against Taimanov and Larsen by six games to nil.

Fischer's World Championship match with Spassky was also characterized by his detailed demands and his near-refusal to play. After nerve-wrenching brinkmanship, Fischer condescended to sit at the board, persuaded by a personal telephone appeal from Henry Kissinger and the injection of considerable last-minute extra funds by British millionaire Jim Slater.

He began to play magnificent chess, which he backed up with an extraordinary battery of off-the-board protests that must have put great psychological pressures on both players. Fischer did not turn up for the second game, which was awarded to Spassky by forfeit; for the third game, Fischer insisted on the exclusion of all TV and film cameras and that the game should be conducted in a small closed room.

Has Spassky refused, the subsequent history of world chess might have been very different; Fischer won his first ever game against Spassky and quickly went on to establish a lead in the match. The Russians ultimately and belatedly retaliated by having the hall swept of electronic and chemical equipment and X-raying the players' chairs. The result of this exercise in paranoia was the discovery of two dead flies in the light fitting.

The match ended in an emphatic victory for Fischer, yet, after his recent Candidates performances, the 12.5-8.5 score actually lost him rating points.

The 6th game was widely regarded as the most elegant. The Argentine connoisseur Grandmaster Miguel Najdorf compared it to a symphony by Mozart. Harry Golombek, chess correspondent of The Times, who was present at the match added: "One very nice touch was that Spassky joined in the applause at the end. 

Fischer being human was affected by this, but as he subsequently told a friend, he had to hurry away to hide his feelings. "What a gentleman Spassky is,' Fischer is reported to have said. However, he wanted to restrain  such feelings for fear that they would interfere with the tigerish quality which he regarded as essential for crushing an opponent."

Fischer's demands performed one lasting service to the followers of chess and to his fellow-professionals. The vast prize of modern prize funds is a direct result of his insistence that chess players should be paid on a scale comparable with champions in other sports. And his cult of invincibility created a massive upsurge in the popularity of chess, particularly in the West, having shown that the Soviet stranglehold on the game could be broken.

The contest seemed to have strangely traumatic effects on both players: Spassky subsequently disappeared into a shell of caution, Fischer into self-imposed exile, like that of Paul Morphy, the earlier American genius. He forfeited his title after refusing to defend it against Anatoly Karpov in 1975.

He lived a peripatetic existence, abandoning conventional chess and promoting both his own form of the game, involving a semi-random arrangement of the pieces on the first rank, and a method of time control involving time being added after each move: the later has achieved greater currency in chess circles.

He did not even visit a chess club, or chess event as a spectator until his profitable but competitively meaningless "return match" with Spassky in Yugoslavia in 1992. But Yugoslavia was then the subject of US sanctions, and Fischer was threatened with prison if he took part - a warning he literally spat on at a press conference. A warrant was issued for his arrest and he never returned to the US.

Fischer occasionally surfaced elsewhere, condemning the "stinking Jews" whom he accused of plotting to dominate the world (the Holocaust was dismissed as "a money-making invention"), and the "brutal, evil dictatorship" of the US. On Filipino radio in 2001 he hailed the attacks of September 11 as "wonderful news. It is time to finish off the US once and for all."

In 2004 he attempted to fly out of Japan, where he had been living with his long-term Japanese partner, Miyoko Watai, head of the Japan Chess Association. The US authorities had, however, revoked Fischer's passport, apparently without telling him, and he was detained at Narita airport. He was held for almost nine months while the US attempted to have him extradited.  

The Icelandic government, with fond memories of 1972, offered him residency. This was not enough for the Japanese, but after Iceland's parliament unanimously voted to give him full citizenship, he was flown to Reykjavik, where his arrival was broadcast live and crowds turned out to greet him. Iceland's welcoming of Fischer drew international criticism, but the Icelandic ambassador to the US said the decision was a humanitarian one, unrelated to Fischer's noxious views. Fischer, he said, should be "considered the subject of pity, rather than hatred."

Bobby Fischer, chess champion, was born on March 9, 1943. He died of kidney failure on January 17, 2008, aged 64.