Chess in India.

So I recently accompanied my father to India for about six weeks while he did some sort of... assessing of local English teaching facilities for his university in Rajasthan (he's based out of Japan not Rajasthan, I wasn't really up on the details). We ended up travelling around quite a bit and made it up to Varanassi, Amritsar and Darjeeling.

But this is a chess forum, not a travel blog so...

Chess is very, very popular in India, and combined with the local youth's general desire to mingle with foreigners, carrying a chessboard around - much less playing a game - can draw quite a crowd.

Most of my early opponents were young guys in their twenties or so and they didn't put up much of a fight, the popularity of the game had me running veritable chess marathons however. Here are some pictures. These were mostly taken a little while later in Darjeeling.

These guys were my strongest opposition in India, discounting an isolated incident in Varanassi when a Sadhu beat me 3-0.

They congregate outside a tea store (sometimes there were ten of them huddled around the board) every night at around 6 p.m. It makes for an interesting study, actually when their games are observed. These guys play all the time, but they've been denied any of the simple chess knowledge that I take for granted when I'm playing because ... "everyone knows that". They play abhorrible openings developed against one another, and positional concepts which seem blatantly obvious to me are completely unknown (suffice to say their endgames stink).

That said, many of them had very sound tactical abilities - I'd estimate in the 1800's - and could play a good, challenging game.

Some more pictures.

I'm in there somewhere.

I have a few more pictures (though not of chess) which I could post if anyone is interested.

Cheers.

Very nice Kupov.

Excellent post for our little community.

Did they know all the little rules?

Thanks.

I haven't been playing much chess recently, and I really credit this trip for rekindling my interest in the game.

WOW Kupov, good job on this blog!  fantastic pictures & good reporting, sounds like youve had an interesting time :D

Really cool pictures and blog post.  This reaffirms my belief that chess truly is a universal game.  I would love to read more about your trip and see more pictures even if they are not chess related.

very cool :)

Nice one, Kupov. I take it that you are the young, blond fellah? I thought you'd be bigger (and scarier)!

Sadly I'm just an internet tough guy :(

I was going to give you credit for some retard strength, but whatever.

That sounds sweet. Shame they can't get the information we can so easily, 'cause they'd probably be quite strong after some formal training.

Nice pictures, sounds like a great trip.  So you could walk around with a chess board under your arm and end up playing all day and meeting new people?  That sounds awesome :)

I wonder what they thought of your openings/endgames, if they tried to adopt any of it or didn't notice some of the "obvious" things you take for granted.  I'd love to vacation somewhere like that... just play chess with people for about 12 hours.  I'd get burned out before 6 weeks was up for sure but it'd be fun for a week at least

Well, feels good to see some desi Indian pics . Nice one Kupov, and very glad that you enjoyed your chess and the trip.

Cheers,

Well they didn't think much of my openings (except that I played them quickly), but some of my opponents reacted with disdain to my 3.a6 in the Ruy Lopez - because it "loses" the pawn.

I played about a dozen games from this position...

I also taught somebody the proper petroff (so far as I know it) after I won a game like this...

And here are some more pictures.

Some Pictures from Hungary.

I had been to one of the natural water thermal baths in Hungary, the water temperature is around 34C/92F. Its unbearably cold outside esp in your innerwear but as you get into the hot water to play chess, the feeling is amazing. Some people stay the entire day in the hot pool playing chess. Nothing can beat this experience.

<I am not in the picture.>

Wow. We should do that in Banff...

Ah, that's a good one.  How many of us with no training would find the Ruy obvious?  I guess you had tons of moments like that realizing what you take for granted isn't obvious to someone with no formal study. 

Heh, I'd be the one looking at their moves with disdain/frustration if they insisted on taking the pawn game after game because black's advantage isn't at all obvious after (to me anyway).

Luckily I'm more of a d5 or e6 kind of guy.  Heh, they'd probably think the french is wimpy first move, and the sicilian is just silly/weird.

Pretty cool, Kupov.  Thanks for pointing it out to me.

Was that a photograph of the great Kupov himself?