From: bogin YAHOO CO JP> Date: 28 oct 2002 Subject: Congratulations I'm not from Europe but I agree wholeheartedly. Congratulations Mr. Schnider. Attaining 5dan is truly an wonderful accomplishment. It's something that I can only dream of attaining here in Japan. At the Japanese Shogi Federation branch in Osaka, in order to go from my current rank of 2dan to 5dan, a Japanese player would have to go 32-0 or 45-6 (12-2, 15-2, 18-2) including handicap games against increasingly higher dan competition. This would include handicap games (giving and receiving) as well. Even a small losing streak of losing more than 2 out of 3 would mean that one would have to start back at 0-0 again. If this isn't difficult enough, one would also have to achieve these results within a given period of time. If one is in active for more than 2 months then they would have to start at 0-0 again as well. So, to be able to attain such a rank in a single tournment is truly incredible. Hopefully, in future years the Japanese Shogi Federation will allow foreigners who reside within Japan to also participate in such tournaments. That will probably be my only chance of attaining that high of a rank. I hope the JSF also gave Mr. Schnider the 5dan certificate. Even if a Japanese player obtains such a high rank it is not automatically given out. Except in certain cases, most people have to buy it if they want it. Currenty, the JSF sells it to qualified candidates for \105,000. It's quite elegent, comes in a nice frame and has the current Meijin and JSF Chairman's signatures on it. Even so, it is still quite expensive. Congratulations again. Bill Gaudry __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! BB is Broadband by Yahoo! http://bb.yahoo.co.jp/