Interview with Baoxiang Bai, China
I was born and grew up in Jilin, a medium-size city in a province of the same name. I started to play go when I was five years old, going on six. I reached amateur 5 dan at about the … Continue reading →
Category Archives: 37th WAGC Edition
Day Four
Once again the central garden of the Ramada Plaza Hotel, a miniature wetland with trees and a large pond, was filled with early morning birdsong, but rather than indulge in birdwatching, almost all the contestants at the World Amateur Go … Continue reading →
Interview with Satoshi Hiraoka, Japan
This is perhaps my tenth visit to China, but my first to Wuxi. It impresses me as a pretty city, even though we’ve arrived in the middle of the rainy season. I first competed in the World Amateur Go Championship … Continue reading →
Day Three
Following some evening thundershowers and early morning rain, the grounds of the Ramada Plaza Hotel were drenched with moisture but alive with birdsong as the World Amateur Go Championship contestants tramped down to breakfast, then up to the playing venue … Continue reading →
Interview with Junfu Dai, France
I was born in Shanghai at the end of 1983. In 1988 Shanghai had an outbreak of food poisoning, from seafood, and both of my parents were stricken. During the year-long break they took to recover, they started playing five-in-a … Continue reading →
Day Two
For a third straight day, players with rooms on the north side of the Ramada Plaza Hotel were awakened by a cock crowing at 4:00 a.m., but today, for the first time, this call to action was followed by a … Continue reading →
Interview with Leon Rios, Peru
My first World Amateur Go Championship was in Hangzhou in 2010. At the time I was about to finish my university studies, majoring in economics, and I had decided to move to Taiwan to work and study Chinese. Work and … Continue reading →
Interview with Andrii Kravets, Ukraine
I grew up in Rivne, a small city in the western part of the Ukraine, where about 85% of the population speaks the Ukrainian language instead of Russian. I started to play go at the age of seven, so I’ve … Continue reading →
Interview with Sin-Voon Chin, Brunei
You can call me Ignatius, which is my Christian name. I’m the founder of the Brunei Darussalam Go Association. I learned about the game from watching the Japanese anime Hikaru no Go in 2003. At first I didn’t understand the … Continue reading →
Interview with Matti Siivola, Finland
I last competed in the WAGC in 2005. At the time I was working in computer security at a university. Since then I’ve been working in the same department at the university, but there have been some organizational changes, and … Continue reading →