From: Reijer Grimbergen ETL GO JP> Date: 9 jan 1996 Subject: This week in Shukan Shogi (no. 617, 10/1/96) To be honest, if you don't have a subscription to Shukan Shogi, buying this week's issue was a waste of 250 yen. As I can say from personal experience, the first week of January in Japan is the most boring time of the year. If you think the Japanese are a hard-working people, try walking the streets of a major city from January 1st until January 3rd. You will find hardly any shop or company in business. Unfortunately, the same goes for Shogi. Not a single game was played during the first week of January and only a few in the last days of 1995. For curiosity's sake, here are all the results (winners on the left): 12/26 Ryu-O group 4: Hatakeyama, N. - Kinoshita Oi preround: Iizuka - Ouchi Oi preround: Yonenaga - Nakata, I. Oi preround: Maruyama - Tatsu Oi preround: Fukaura - Minami Oza preround: Naito - Tanaka, K. Kachitenuki: Miura - Aono 12/27 Oi preround: Shima - Sanada Of course Shukan Shogi has 24 pages again and opens with an interview with the chairman of the Renmei, Futakami. As can be expected from a chairman, especially if he is Japanese there is nothing shocking in the interview. He hopes for a good start of the Shogi year from a PR point of view, like last year's thrilling Osho match. There are some general remarks about the Shogi boom in Japan (this was news to me as I thought that thinking games were in decline in the world in general) and the marriage boom of professionals. Also some general remarks about using the Internet, but no policy as to how to use this medium effectively (I would have loved to hear the Renmei's point of view on that!). No word about Shogi outside Japan, which is unfortunate. So, I managed to fill a complete article without saying much. Sorry for wasting your time. I will have much more for you next week, since I will be off to Shizuoka tomorrow to see the opening game of the Osho-sen. Reijer P.S: Added to my homepage in the past week are a bulk of Shogi terms in the Shogi vocabulary (sorry, no index yet) and the dates for the games in the Osho titlle match. -- Dr. Reijer Grimbergen Electrotechnical Laboratory Palcious Tsukuba 302 1-1-4 Umezono 1-24-8 Ninomiya Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki-ken Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki-ken 305 JAPAN 305 JAPAN E-mail: grimberg etl go jp Tel: 0298-59-1606 WWW: http://www.etl.go.jp:8080/etl/suiron/~grimberg Tel: +81-(0)298-54-5080 extension: 67431 Fax: +81-(0)298-58-5918