From: Eric macshogi com> Date: 01 mar 2007 Subject: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Shogi_in_Cannes_and_Second_C=F4te_d'Azur_tourname?= Hello, Last week, we have lived some very pleasant days dedicated to shogi,=20=20 thanks to the two ladies pros Fusako Ajiki and Asuka Ito and the=20=20 precious help of the members of the ISPS, including Naohiro Sanada,=20=20 Yasuyuki Utsunomiya, Fumio Yamada and Manabu Terao. On the first day, wednesday 21st february, the ladies pro played a=20=20 simul against some French shogi players. Despite their long trip from=20= =20 Tokyo to Paris, they managed to win the majority of their games :-))=20=20 Impressive ! A demonstration conference has been held in the evening with the two=20=20 ladies wearing very nice kimonos. They played a game, with comments=20=20 in front of a large audience including players and non players.=20=20 During the game, the public could hear explanations about the game=20=20 and historical part of shogi, and understand the place of shogi in=20=20 the Japanese culture. On thursday, we have moved to Cannes, to spread shogi during the=20=20 International Games Festival ! During 4 days, we have teached shogi=20=20 to many people, mostly newcomers who asked for a shogi initiation. We=20= =20 had the visit of many groups of children, some TV cameras, the visit=20=20 of the mayor of Cannes himself in the shogi area ! We had so many=20=20 people around us at this time that I couldn't took a photograph of=20=20 the mayor of Cannes with the two ladies pro :-( We have sold in less than 2 days all 30 shogi sets Terao Manabu has=20=20 kindly brougth for us in Cannes. And we were very pleased to see=20=20 children coming back to play with us this year after a first=20=20 initiation last year :-)) Some young players came to see us after=20=20 having seen shogi sets and pieces in some mangas ! Can the mangas=20=20 help spreading shogi in western countries ? Possible :-)) A big part of the shogi success in the Festival is for Fusako Ajiki=20=20 and Asuka Ito : many people was looking at the Japanese ladies=20=20 wearing traditional kimonos. After seeing the kimonos, some visitors=20=20 asked for a shogi initiation. Florent Gorges had a lot of work during=20= =20 those days, he needed to translate every explanations from Japanese=20=20 to French and questions from French to Japanese ! What a work !=20=20 Thanks Florent. The shogi festival attracts players from many countries, from Europe=20=20 and from far abroad as well. The shogi area was in the spirit games=20=20 part of the Games Festival including go and chess, some visitors for=20=20 chess and go were interested for shogi as well. And promised : next year we will bring much more shogi rules in=20=20 French. We definitely didn't have enough rules to give to the visitors. During the last day of the festival, a member of the festival=20=20 organizing comittee said to me that the first estimation of the=20=20 number of visitors was really increasing since last year. In 2006, a=20=20 record of about 100 000 visitors has been reached. This year, up to=20=20 saturday, the number of visitors has increased of about 30 % since=20=20 last year ! So the magical number of 120 000 visitors for all 5 days=20=20 would be surely reached. Let us wait for the final count ! And finally, a tournament has been taking place in the shogi area,=20=20 definitely too noisy this time !! Next year, I will ask for a quieter=20= =20 place, to help the players to concentrate on their games ! Fr=E9d=E9ric=20= =20 Pottier secured the first place winning all his games. Does teaching=20=20 during all the day at primary school to young children in a noisy=20=20 atmosphere help to win such a tournament ? Perhaps, anyway,=20=20 congratulations for this success Fr=E9d=E9ric ! Here are the final results : Tournoi : Cannes, Second C=F4te d'Azur Tournament Date : 25/02/2007 Nr Nom Prenom Rondes Pts Sos Sb Cum 1 Pottier Fr=E9d=E9ric 8+ 2+ 3+ 4+ 5+ 6+ 6 17 17 21 2 Utsunomiya Yasuhiko 10+ 1- 9+ 3+ 4+ 5+ 5 16 10 16 3 Sanada Naohiro 9+ 5+ 1- 2- 6+ 8+ 4 17 6 14 4 Lepelleter Erwan 7- 8+ 6+ 1- 2- 9+ 3 17 4 10 5 Morishita Mineo 6- 3- 8+ 9+ 1- 2- 2 19 2 7 6 Gedda Peder 5+ 7- 4- 8+ 3- 1- 2 18 3 9 7 Cheymol Eric 4+ 6+ 0- 0- 0- 0- 2 5 5 11 8 Caridi Nicola 1- 4- 5- 6- 9+ 3- 1 18 1 2 9 Ruin Gilles 3- 10+ 2- 5- 8- 4- 1 15 0 5 10 Guzek Florian 2- 9- 0- 0- 0- 0- 0 6 0 0 I will publish an extensive report about this tremendous event with=20=20 many photographs soon. Finally, I would like to thank all people who has help us a lot=20=20 during this week, and especially the two ladies pro and the members=20=20 of the ISPS. Without the participation of them all and their=20=20 kindness, shogi would not have such a sucess this year ! See you next year for our third participation in the International=20=20 Games Festival ! =C9ric ---------------- Study Shogi and read shogi reportages at http://eric.macshogi.com/ The first Mac OS X Shogi Database Program at http://www.macshogi.com/ --^---------------------------------------------------------------- This email was sent to: = shogi-l shogi net EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a2i6Ys.= aB5TiY.= c2hvZ2kt Or send an email to: shogi-unsubscribe topica com For Topica's complete suite of email marketing solutions visit: http://www.topica.com/?p=3DTEXFOOTER --^----------------------------------------------------------------