English Chess Forum

"Anyway, they are providing plenty of material for my next New in Chess article..."

never mind an article, it sounds as if you could fill at least one magazine.

The term "porkies" might not be popular in that part of the world.

I forgot to mention that, at the opening ceremony, Kirsan announced that FIDE would look favourably on Iran hosting the Olympiad.
Forget about the Israelis (I am sure Vice President Gelfer can be persuaded to support the measure) or the gross indignity of forcing hundreds of women to wear the hijab - what about the Bermuda Party? It is just a hunch but I suspect it might not swing that well without alcohol and with the religious police in attendance.

Funny enough it’s gorgeous down at Bournemouth and you can still procure a large gin and tonic, or a whiskey-mac, if you know the right bars, and there are lots of them. On the topic of shorts, the downside is there's no fashion police patrolling the seaside neighbourhoods to discipline those exposing their grisly, and yet distinctly manly, chess legs in the sight of unprepared and defenceless tourists. They know who they are - I’ve seen better looking pairs of Rooks.

Andrew Bak wrote:

Kevin Thurlow wrote:"The English Chess Forum is one of the few websites which I frequent that isn't blocked."

Wow!

Maybe Soheil asked the government for special dispensation so he could ask endless questions about English vocabulary.

Facebook and Youtube were not blocked prior to 2009..........

I'd ask them to unblock these websites if I had a say...

I have 2.5/3 after beating Mousavi (2432) yesterday. The 16 year-old, Maghsoodloo, who I barely survived against in the first round, beat Mchedlishvili and Edouard in the following rounds, so he is more than on track for a GM norm - although who cares about that these days? Our team is so far exporting 41 Elo points to the Islamic Republic, although I will wager (outside of the God-fearing Republic, naturally) that there is a lot more to come.

Congratulations Nigel, you have made it back to oldest player in the world top 100 (92nd to be precise). Eat your heart out, Sam Collins.

Thank you Leonard. To be honest, I would be happier with a much larger cushion, though. Knowing that just one bad move will ensure that you are sent scurrying from the exalted top 100 list is not exactly comforting.
Talking of bad moves: yesterday's game against the 12 year old (!!) Iranian Champion was pretty awful. I missed two separate elementary tactics that would have decided the game immediately. The exhausting conditions here are starting to catch up with me. I didn't return back to the hotel until 23.15.

Never mind, as my friend Jonathan once told me, always squash 12-year-olds. And as of round 4 you are the top individual scorer of the event.

4.5/5 so far. But after seeing my son's terrified messages from Istanbul Airport, this all seems pretty pointless...

From BBC news:
Istanbul's main Ataturk airport is now under army control, and flights - which had been interrupted for some hours - were due to resume from 06:00 (03:00 GMT).

Eyewitness, quoted by BBC:
The past night was a real nightmare and chaos here, with sounds of jet fighters shaking the building and also with supporters of Erdogan entering the airport territory. One thing that has shocked everyone here is the absolute lack of any member of Turkish Airlines personnel. They all left last night and the tourists were all here alone with zero information, it was truly scary. Today, we were hoping to get info on flights but still no personnel around. It's just unbelievable. Security is completely forgotten as well. People are tired, children are exhausted and some of them are hungry. We have no clue when all this will be resolved. Total chaos."

Seems the airport problems continue. Another BBC eyewitness:

As Turkish Airlines restarts flights from Istanbul's Ataturk Airport, South African holidaymaker Nic Hodgson has been describing scenes of great frustration at the airport today.

"Absolute disgraceful service from Turkish Airlines. Now 2.30pm Saturday and not one announcement about what is happening," he says.

The largest airline in the world that they market as the best airline in the world and this is the scene at a lounge desk, where we managed to find one staff member. There have been no announcements and nothing posted on any airline electronic board so thousands of passengers in the terminal are completely without information about when and if their flights may resume.

Nic says the Cape Town office of the airline told him that as the coup attempt began all Turkish Airlines staff were sent home.

We did not see one staff member at all throughout the night and until well after 10am this morning. The commercial side of the airport is back up and running smoothly and in the Lounge, where we escaped to during the stampede last night and while jet aircraft flew overhead, there is not one staff member serving any drink or food and there is nothing to eat after more than 12 hours.

excellent coverage Nigel! You are one of the few true remaining western pioneers of world chess.

very entertaining reading. Best of luck in your remaining games.

Nigel's first post in this thread stated that he was denied access to social websites, but in fact his brief Twitter messages have been appearing daily.
He wrote on Twitter about round six that
My 14 year-old #chess opponent of yesterday, Aryan Gholami, looks exactly like an Iranian #HarryPotter , sans forehead scar.
Nigel was better early, but they halved and he began round seven today on 5/6.
This afternoon he was Black to GM Pouya Idani, 2560, Iran No2 and a former world U18 champion. It was level early, then Idani catastrophically miscalculated a d4-d5 central break. The outcome was a pawn down, queens exchanged, a black knight at d3, an active black b file rook, and united passed black b and c pawns. The computer meanly assessed that at -0.9, but after a brief further melee Nigel emerged a piece up and has advanced to 6/7.
His TPR is now above 2750, he leads the individual classification, and he has advanced to No 84 in the live world rankings, admittedly still only 7 points above the drop zone but on the credit side within 2 points of David Howell.
However the 16-year-old Maghsoodloo, who Nigel singled out for praise earlier in this thread and who gave him trouble in round one, is only half a point behind on 5.5/7. The pair have broken a point clear of the field.
Tomorrow Nigel plays Iran's No1 GM Ehsan Ghaem Maghami (2569) against whom Nigel won six-game matches in 2003 and 2013.
Overall Nigel is going great guns so far, displaying Indian summer form and heading for perhaps his best result since he won at Isle of Man 2014.

Some kind Iranian installed some software which enables me to bypass the censorship. Unfortunately it makes an already slow Internet connection even slower. I can't always get online.