A Historical Record
More than 1200 Pupils Attending the M1 56th National Inter-School Individual
Championship
By Olimpiu Urcan
Usually the readers of ChessBase are looking for articles and photographs
of five-star tournaments played all over the world. Statistics, results, games
and interviews are the target of their avid search. Here is a report which
will disappoint them. It is not about top level players, theoretically important
games or exclusive interviews of one of the top ten world players. Yet, it
is about something which is lately missed in most of the reports from tournaments:
How a tournament for kids is organized? What is the atmosphere of a tournament
before, during and after? How are such tournaments nowadays?
We invite the reader in the island of Singapore for at least several pages.
The occasion is the M1 56th National Inter-School Individual Championship
which was held between 18 and 20 March 2004 on the premises of the Anglo-Chinese
Primary School (Singapore). A historical record of more than 1200 participants
was registered. They were coming from about 141 schools all over the island
dressed in their schools uniforms. A chess tournament? Hardly. More like a
chess celebration.
The event was organized by the Singapore Chess Federation in collaboration
with other sponsors and firms among which M1 and ASEAN Chess Academy, the later
already established as a first class provider of chess utilities and chess
assistance in Singapore. Without wasting your time anymore, we let the images
speak.
Let’s start with the day before the first round. Tables and chairs needed
to be arranged, chess boards and pieces, chess clocks and score-sheets, well…if
you want specific details about thousands of score sheets and about 2000 chairs…The
photograph above is looking more like a wedding preparation than a chess tourney
arrangement. Yet, the doubts soon vanished at the sight of the first signs
of how a chess community was preparing for a chess event.
Local workers were hired to offer a hand. Chess is an industry after all,
isn’t it? Someone would need muscles and workers not only brains and
computerized management.
Finally the chess pieces and chess boards appeared. The white sheets arranged
on the tables chased away any regrets of those present there for a hard day
of labor.
The place was becoming nicer and nicer.
I imagined that one could hardly find another room in the world in that day
in which more than a thousand Kings were gathered together...
Finally, everything was ready. The stage was set, the headlines offered, the
clocks were set up for what would become in the history of Singapore chess
as the event with the largest participation ever registered: more than 1200
kids pouring in from all the corners of Singapore to compete in a traditional
chess tournament.
The crowds of children were finally allowed to occupy their seats for the
first round. The streams of parents preparing the score sheets and pencils
for their kids were kindly asked to leave the area.
Hands are shaken, moves are made, and parents are watching. Not only watching.
Hoping and shaking at each move their kids made over the board. The state of
agitation was even more amplified by arbiters’ insistence that parents
should keep a fair distance from the playing tables.
The opening speech held by Mr Kenneth Tan, President of SCF, and by Mr. Ignatius
Leong, the Secretary of the SCF as well as the Chairman of FIDE Development
Commission and tournament director, introduced the participants in the atmosphere
of the ambitious championship. Those present ceased their noise while hearing
the opening words of the mentioned gentlemen. Suddenly the question “Are
you ready to begin?” met a thundering “Yes!!” from a thousand
chests which must have troubled the neighbors of the Anglo-Chinese Primary
School. Thus it began. Clocks were hit – with more or less precision
skills -, pieces were moved speedily over the board, pencils started to record
moves while eyes and minds pursued to imagine threats and traps.
These lines of girls playing with the style of the professionals were paralleled
by images of younger boys who could hardly reach at the playing table. Some
of them were still in kindergarten.
While the first round wasn’t an easy one for everyone, contrasting images
appeared for a careful eye. Someone struggling to activate the rooks on open
files sweating inside the playing hall.
Some of the players had their chance to say “I won!” after their
game was completed and face the camera. “I won”, she whispered…
The first round was finished and streams of pupils were waiting to deliver
their score sheets and results to the officials’ table.
During the pairing and accounting results procedure most of the parents were
waiting outside for the official new round to be posted. The constant heat
made them beg for entering the air conditioned hall…
Off hand games and analyses were continuously played outside the hall and
someone argued that arbiters were needed in that area as well!
Inside the playing hall the trophies were resting waiting their performance
at the end of the act. The results and complete lists of the schools attending
this excellent event can be found on the website of the Singapore
Chess Federation. Identically, for ASEAN
Chess Academy – the institution which took care of the chess assistance
and utilities mission both with materials and human resources.
Now let’s browse the last clips of the tournament with the prize presentation.
Impressive to note was the full energy the participants had even after three
exhausting days of intensive chess.
Some of them managed to climb on the stage collecting trophies. Some of them
rested on the floor after a good three days long fight. Nevertheless, the game
still goes on, they said. In Singapore chess events are not a rarity.
As any fairy tale, a chess tournament must come to and end. The participants
left the venue with one of the most enriching chess experiences of their life.
This was the short movie of the M1 56th Inter-School Individual Chess Tournament
held in Singapore between 18 and 20 March 2003. A precious legacy such an event
left us is casting doubt on those who say that chess is not helping out our
intolerant world. I witnessed in a superb event in which an incredible diversity
of religions and races came together under the spell of chess.