Monday, January 4, 2021

2019 and 2020

So many things happened in 2019! First of all, Andy met his good friend Ryo Chen at the Southwest Class tournament. We met Ryo for the first time in Spain at the World Cadet championship in November 2018. Ryo was representing Japan. So it was a shock to see him here. We found out that his family just moved to Houston in January. Ryo had a great tournament. He only lost one game to Andy and won all the rest of his games. I just remembered he followed Andy everywhere while Andy was still gradually warmed up to him. He was curious about everything and had many questions. That was the main character that attracted Andy (opposites attract). Andy had a great start and then trailed off (as I mentioned briefly that I messed up the time and changed the hotel for worse because of the cost). We saw Ryo again in Houston at Lone Star Open. I learned a lesson to let him play up. Since he was one of the top seeds, he was afraid of losing to the lower rated players. He ended up with a really bad tournament and it took a while for him to gain back his confidence. Ryo's dad recommended Ryo's coach R. to us as we were thinking about changing the coach. Andy soon started taking lessons with coach R. From April to August, we were having two coaches at the same time because we already agreed to let coach M. help Andy with World Cadet championship in China. 

My Dad had always wanted to visit his hometown in Shanxi Southwest of China with all his four children. I went there once with him and my uncle and my cousin in 1995 (there was no electricity or running water there back then). This time when he made a request to me, I said yes because he said that this was the biggest wish before he dies. We booked the tickets for July 2018. Unfortunately my 5-year-old nephew had lukemia and got in the hospital. I didn't think we should go ahead with the plan. So we postponed the trip to 2019. The tickets we booked were non-refundable. I tried to transfer them into a new itinerary. After countless calls it went nowhere. I kept praying to God not to let us waste those money. Finally I decided to have a last try. The agent informed me that the refund was granted already (right when I prayed!). I quickly booked the new tickets and changed the one-stop flights to the direct flight with cheaper price! I said thank-you to God with a joyful heart. As a result, we were able to travel to Spain for the World Cadet chess tournament in 2018. 

My nephew's sickness brought unthinkable stress to the whole family. My mom went to the hospital to help with my brother's family. My dad cried that he needed help too. Sadly my nephew passed away in May 2019. My parents decided to make the trip to their hometowns. We arrived at a court yard hotel in Beijing late afternoon. Our friend June's aunt picked us up from the airport. My uncle's family treated us for a nice dinner. It was the first time for them to meet the kids. I was a little embarrassed that I didn't bring some gifts to them as the Chinese custom. We met our friend Haixia the next day. She gave us a sim card to use while we were in China. We took the train to Xi'an the following day and met the rest of my family (my parents, my two brothers and their families, my sister and her daughter) there. My dad's cousin treated all of us for a dinner. We stayed in Xi'an and visited some places: the terracotta soldiers, the city walls, etc. Then we traveled down to my dad's hometown in Xun Yang, Red Army village. The minibus took us to a two-story hotel where all family filled up all but one room. My Dad's nephew arranged everything for us, which was really nice. The people there still lived like the old days. We had to skip the big rocks to cross the creek to get to the village. We lost power for two days after the thunder storm. We had to eat with candle lights. It was so hot in the rooms that the kids and I couldn't fall asleep. We couldn't open the windows either because Emily was afraid of the bugs coming in from the windows. After the dinners, we watched the square dances that were very popular in China. We visited my grandpa's tomb in the mountain before we headed to my mom's hometown in Sichuan. 

My mom's friend picked us up from the train station. They offered us to stay in their spare house. Before long we found out it was not a very good idea because it was far away from everything. After we visited my mom's family (her three brothers and their families), I started having allergic reactions. My legs were extremely ichy. Two of my brothers left by then. My sister and I visited the Panda preservatory, the Yangzi dam with my parents before we all said goodbyes to each other. We went back to Beijing and left my sister's phone in the taxi. The taxi driver refused to return the phone. We met with Haixia for dinner and then found a restaurant nearby for my hometown food. David and Emily headed back home the next day for school. Andy and I headed to Weifang for the World Cadet chess championship. Since we'd been traveling for the last month, I didn't have any expectation for Andy for the chess tournament. We stayed in an apartment for a week to get him back in chess before the tournament started. His coach then Mesgen brought a team of students. We quickly got acquainted with Raj (the world champion U8 from the Spain tournament) and Ekonsh. The tournament didn't go very well for these kids. Andy and Raj developed close friendship. They found out they were brothers in Christ. So they started sending scriptures to encourage each other. They took a walk together before each round to pray and sing their favorite hymns. Raj's favorite song "Bless The Lord O My Soul" became the theme song for the days that were full of stress. Now every time we sang this song at church, it brought tears in my eyes. For the last round, it turned out Andy was playing against Raj. All the parents joked that they would draw. But they said they would actually play their best. Andy lucked out in the end and got the 12th place. Raj's mom Prathma and I often prayed together while we were waiting for them. We became close friends too. After the tournament, Raj's mom and I decided to visit the Great Wall together. They persuaded us to stay in their hotel room together even though we booked our own at a different place. We had to say goodbye the next morning as they headed home and we moved to our hotel. The hotel we booked didn't let us to check in because Andy had the foreign passport. Luckily my brother quickly found another hotel not far from there. We visited the Summer Palace and the Beijing University before Haixia took us to the airport. That was the most memorable travel we've had.

Andy and Raj kept contact. Raj came to visit us in January when his family visited his relatives in Dallas. We were so happy to see them. Hopefully they will move to Dallas area someday! Every time when we sang the song "Bless The Lord O My Soul" or "One Thousand Reasons" at church, my memory went back to the scene where we sang and prayed together daily before the rounds. My eyes just welled up with tears. Covid broke out in March (we heard about it in January from China). The one week spring break turned into two-week lock down and then unending virtual school. I got to observe how the kids did school and realized how bad the quality of education was, especially with the ridiculous virtue environment. The kids went back to the in-person school after the summer vacation. Emily had a church camp at Deer Run during summer. It was cut short because of the virus. Andy took several online chess camps. The World Cadet Championship was moved to online too. The online tournament was in rapid format, with two selection stages: Continental selection and then final knock-out. Andy made it through the Continental selection and the final to the contention for the bronze medal. He tied with an Indian player. They had to play Armageddon to decide. Andy got the right to choose the color. I wanted him to choose White because White had more time (5 mins vs 4 mins). But Andy had more confidence in Black so he picked Black. As a rule for Armageddon, Black only needs a draw to claim a win but Andy forgot about it (and I didn't know that). He refused a perpetual during the game and pushed for win. Then he lost. He broke into tears when he suddenly realized he only needed a draw. Oh well, lesson learned. When he was having the tournament upstairs, we were downstairs quietly in the bedroom. Suddenly our neigh kids came to our backyard to play. They used to come in through our gates and jump on our big trampoline by themselves. They giggled, screamed, and yelled as usual. I was tempted to shoo them away so Andy wouldn't be distracted. But I thought, they were just kids, playing and having fun. People are more important than chess games. So I didn't do anything.

Online tournament was not the same as the in-person one. Andy and Raj missed each other. After US federation decided not to have the international tournaments, Andy played the song "Bless Oh My Lord O My Soul" on piano and sent to Raj ((20+) Facebook). Raj sang along with it and sent the recording back. I hope their friendship will continue for many years to come!








































































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