24 Apr 2009 1 Comment

2009 Keio visit

(Report courtesy of John Hardy, photos of Andrew Gray.)

On 18 – 19 April 2009, Brisbane Go Club met with members of the Keio Old Boys group for friendly go and social activities. The venue, a large modified residence at Stretton in Brisbane’s southern outskirts, is known as Good Hope Residence by its owner and tour guide, Mr. Kanazawa. The group of eleven go players, led by Mr. Kiga, ranged in strength from 2 dan to 7 dan and consequently represents quite a challenge to the lower ranked BGC players.

This was the sixth annual visit by the Keio group, and it is always a popular activity for the BGC members. On Saturday, BGC President Dr. Mark Bell escorted the group to a day at the races, which has proved a popular acivity with our Japanese friends. On Saturday evening we played social go and enjoyed a delicious seafood dinner hosted by the Keio group. After dinner, Mr. Nomura 7 dan kindly acted as sensei, and showed us an interesting game played by him no less than 57 years ago! It is amazing that the game record still exists after such a long time, and shows clearly how much go players revere the game.

On Sunday, we were treated to a delicious lunch of Japanese soba noodles. This was followed by the now traditional team match between Keio and BGC. We matched their eleven players in two rounds of play (handicap) , and after the smoke had cleared, Keio had won by 12 – 10. The exciting final game between Matthew Crossman and Mr. Kamota was watched by many, as the result would decide whether BGC could draw the match. It was not to be – a slip in the endgame saw Mr. Kamota win by resignation. After that, we all enjoyed dinner of fresh prawns and salad hosted by BGC.

On the BGC team, the 2009 Queensland Go Champion, Kevin Jiang 6D, matched well with the Keio top players for a 1 – 1 record. Dr. Mark Bell also scored 1 – 1 .  Matthew Crossman is a recent addition to the BGC, and has achieved his current rank of 1D after just 15 months of playing go.  Jeremy Wen 1D aged 15 also scored a win in his game. Jeremy has rocketed up the ranks in the last two years, and he also is a star of the future. The Keio boys had better look out for Matthew and Jeremy next year!

The BGC looks forward to next year’s visit for more go fun with our Keio friends.

An Young Gil was also kind enough to provide us with two reviews of games from the event, which will be appearing in the printable version of the Journal. Stay tuned.

by Amelia in Events, Other, Photos, Team matches Tags: ,