I had been looking forward to this tournament for months. It would be the first time I will be able to play someone else in Go in real life. I had desperately craved the chance to play on a goban and seeing my opponent face to face. I can remember pulling up to the place it was being held at,a church, and feeling a little nervous. I had to sniff myself just to make sure I smelt OK (first impression are everything) but of course because I was rushing to get out the door I forgot to put on cologne but at least I remembered to put on deodorant.

The church is hot and they have only like 5 fans spaced apart. But that’s OK I don’t mind, the only thing I can remember is that I was wearing a light blue and was praying that no sweat leaked through the shirt (Spoiler: it didn’t). At the time of the tournament I was 18 Kyu. So my first opponent was the only other 18 Kyu there. I believe her name was Mary she was nice but my opponent none the less. So I took my seat on the opposite side of her. We did the standard way of deciding who was what color in an even game. This process is called Nigiri, its where one player grabs a handful of stones in their hands and the other player calls out odd or even. If the player guessed right they get to choose and if they choose wrong the person who drew the stones gets to choose.

I chose wrong, so she took black but I wasn’t to upset I just was there having fun and boy I wish I came into this tournament trying to win because this was a weak player I should have won but instead I was rushing, I didn’t take my time and read out things and that cost me. I lost, she won by resignation because I made so many mistakes, but it was the first game I and I thought I could turn it around…at least that’s what I thought at the time.