From: DANERUD MARTIN <martin.danerud <at> TELIA <dot> COM>
Date: 8 nov 2002
Subject: A cultural difference?

Dear all,

Let me bring up something that happened at the lower levels of
Japanese amateur shogi...
Today, I had a strange experience in a tournament at the Nihon Shogi
Renmei. It was played with normal analog chess clocks and with 20
minutes per player. I played against a 3-dan player, and I had the
better position. However, in the end of the game it was obvious to
both players that a victory on the board would be less probable,
because of the very short time left on both clocks. So, both players
started to move extremely quickly in order to win on time. Suddenly,
after I had made my move and pressed the clock, my opponent
claimed "time", but when I looked at the clock (a second later) both
flags had fallen. However, my opponent claimed that he had seen that
my time was out, while his time was not. Unfortunately, no evidence of
his late claim existed. We called for the tournament director to rule
things out.
At first, they (a small group gathered) seemed to propose a replay
with 5 minutes each (or maybe a continuation). Then, however, they
called for another referee to make the ruling. He heard us both and
declared that I had lost the game. I claimed that there was no
evidence, I had not seen whose flag fell first, and that a replay
would be fair. However, after a while I let them have it, declaring
that it was their tournament, and congratulated my opponent.
Would this have been a chess tournament (which it was not, I know,
etc, etc), the ruling would have been clear according to FIDE rules B7
and B8 -> a draw.
Now, I wonder,
1) Was the ruling correct, according to general shogi practice (even
though games without byo-yomi are not so common, I know, etc, etc)?
2) If it was correct, and I suppose that it was, is the reason that
one can always trust what one of the players state that he has
observed, since it is not allowed to tell a lie? With other words, you
can expect a player to put the pieces on the komadai upside-down,
putting the pieces on the board so that they a positioned in more than
one square, talk during the games, and make repeated strange sounds
with the fan for instance, but you could never expect him to tell a
lie or make a wrong observation because of wishful thinking?
Please understand me correctly now, I do not think that my opponent
told a lie. I am just interested in the ruling and the possible
cultural differences behind the philosophy of the ruling.
I only want answers to this if you have something to say about
questions 1 and 2. I do not want any rubbish like "This is not chess."
or "Please accept that you lost." etc. I lost. My opponent won. I
congratulated him. OK. The questions I have are 1 and 2.

Best regards,

Martin Danerud

Reporting from the lower levels of Japanese amateur shogi