From: Richard Sams PARKCITY NE JP> Date: 28 oct 2002 Subject: Re: Oriental players? on 02.10.28 1:16 PM, Larry Kaufman at lkaufman COMCAST NET wrote: > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Richard Sams" PARKCITY NE JP> > To: TECHUNIX TECHNION AC IL> > Sent: Sunday, October 27, 2002 9:48 PM > Subject: Oriental players? > > >> In his recent report on the Tokyo International Forum (posted on > October >> 23), Larry Kaufman made the following comment on the results: >> >> "The remarkable thing about the results was that not one of the >> Oriental players made it to the four-way tie for first! The Japanese >> and Brazilian (ethnic Japanese) players were thought to be among the >> favorites, and there were also Oriental players from China, Thailand, >> and Paraguay. So the results were a great success for Shogi in the >> West. Furthermore, even among the players with 3-2, the two top >> finishers on tie-break were non-Orientals!" >> >> I am rather surprised that Larry should put all "Oriental" players in the >> same category. While the Japanese and Brazilian (ethnic Japanese) players >> have an obvious cultural advantage regarding Shogi, the players from China >> and Thailand are essentially in the same situation as players from the > West. >> Both countries have their own versions of chess - Chinese chess > (shiang-chi) >> and Thai chess (makruk) - so they are not much more likely than Westerners >> to encounter Shogi. The Japanese tend to think that Chinese people have an >> advantage over Westerners in learning Shogi because they can read kanji >> (Chinese characters), but I haven't met any players from Europe who had > much >> difficulty remembering or identifying the eight Shogi pieces! >> >> >> Richard Sams > > I believe that the Chinese have a big advantage over us Westerners in > terms of being able to access Japanese literature. It's true that spoken > Japanese and Chinese have little in common, but since they use many of the > same Kanji I would imagine that a Chinese person could somewhat understand > what a Japanese magazine or book was saying about a position without having > to know any Japanese at all. Also, many more Chinese now play shogi than > all westerners combined, perhaps because they are not discouraged by the > Kanji. Regarding the Thai written language, I must plead ignorance. > > Larry Larry's argument seems speculative at best. According to Yaichiro Ono 6-dan, who has made several trips to China to promote Shogi there, the Shogi boom in China during the last few years has nothing do with the Chinese ability to read kanji. It is mainly due to the amazing efforts of one man, Mr. Xu Jiandong, who was present at the Tokyo International Forum. Mr. Xu worked in Japan for eight years and starting promoting Shogi in China upon his return five years ago. He said that he encountered quite a lot of resistance to Shogi at first because people preferred Chinese chess, but through his efforts about 30,000 Chinese people (mainly children) have now been "converted" to Shogi! The Shogi Renmei has recently put more energy into promoting Shogi in China than the West because it is much closer to Japan and cheaper (I'm told they also prefer the food!). Richard Sams