by Huang Shaolong (formerly Professor of Nankai University)
After living at my uncle's house for more than half a year, at 12 years old I went to Hong Kong from Guangzhou with my parents to continue my schooling. In terms of Xiangqi, leaving my uncle's guidance and coming to the new unknown city, where will my chess destiny go? It seems that one can only rely on oneself to strive in the vast ocean of the game of chess.
In the 50's of the 20th century, Hong Kong had a more vibrant style of Xiangqi life, with activities set up in playgrounds, teahouses, and even the radio stations, and many newspapers also publishing chess columns. At that time, the Xiangqi masters were mainly Li Zhihai（李志海）, Su Tianxiong（苏天雄）, Li Zijian（黎子健）and Liang Qingquan（梁慶全）.
Li Zhihai is originally from Xinhui County, Guangdong Province, a graduate of the first vocational school in Guangdong Province（广东省第一职业学校）, he had excellent intelligence, often went to Xiangzhen Teahouse（祥珍茶楼）to play Xiangqi in his spare time, and the owner Lu Hui（卢辉）at first gave him odds of one whole Knight, but after two or three months, he only let him have the first move. Li Zhihai's ability improved significantly. In 1947, Guangzhou held a city-wide chess tournament, and 18-year-old Li Zhihai made his debut on the big field, with plenty of vigour and spirit, he defeated veteran players Wu Wenying（吴文英）and Su Xiuquan（苏秀泉）one after another, winning the championship and becoming a sensational player.
Soon Li Zhihai visited Lu Hui and asked to be his formal apprentice. Lu Hui said: "Where did I hear that winning the championship yet asked for an apprenticeship?" But seeing Li Zhihai's repeated requests, he laughed and accepted. Later on, Li Zhihai came to live in Hong Kong, he won the Hong Kong Xiangqi championship, wrote many chess books, gave lectures, and toured Southeast Asian countries, he was triumphant and famous.
Su Tianxiong was a veteran player, who had already made a name for himself in the Guangzhou chess circle in his early years, and later went to Hong Kong to further his skills and opened a special chess column in the newspaper, and at one time became the leading player in Hong Kong. Originally from Guangdong's Dongguan, Li Zijian had studied Xiangqi under Zeng Zhanhong（曾展鸿）, and once defeated the famous Hubei player Fang Shaoqin（方绍钦）, shocking the Hong Kong chess world. Liang Qingquan was originally a rookie in the Guangzhou chess scene, and he also became one of the famous players when he came to Hong Kong.
When I came to Hong Kong as a child, I didn't know anything about the Xiangqi background, I didn't know anyone, I was only guided by my interest of the game, and wherever anyone played, I liked to be there. In the vicinity of Sham Shui Po Secondary School, where I studied, there was a half-blind old man who used to play the game on the side-road. He called out the move, a child helped moving the chess pieces.
Every day after school, I would squat there for more than half an hour, watching and guessing by myself, I learned a lot of the game and the endgame tactics.
The players were ordinary chess fans with limited skill, so the old man can win regardless of whether he played Red or Black, giving people a sense of mystery. One day, when no one was playing, my classmates on the side encouraged me to play with the old man.
When the old man saw that I was a child, he let me play first move. After 3 games, I won two and drew one, which was really unexpected, and the onlookers applauded. When I got home, I thought to myself, I can win against adults, how amazing, and I naturally felt more confident.
Later, when I studied the endgame compositions, I learned that these compositions were recorded in ancient text books, as long as you are proficient in practice, you will be able to deal with these games on the spot. The composed endgames by these itinerant Xiangqi players have many illusions and hidden traps to confuse people.
If you can't think deeply and can't uncover the game's mystery, you will often be misled and be defeated. At first glance, the old man seems to have superb chess skills, but in fact, he is familiar with the ancient text books and understands all the endgame variations.
The game of Xiangqi inspires people, and some complex problems of the game will also be encountered in life likewise, one only seeing illusions with just a first sighting, and dealing with them without sufficient consideration is often wrong, so we should analyze more and think twice before acting.
Soon I was transferred to Xiangjiang Middle School（香江中学）for the third grade of junior high school, and many of my classmates in the school liked to play Xiangqi.
Among the classmates, Chen Wenxing（陈文兴）was quite fascinated with the game, and even on Sundays he would ask me to go to a small park to play chess for half a day. Chen Wenxing was a chivalrous character, competitive, he liked to attack when playing, and after playing dozens of games with me, his strength had increased greatly. Chen Wenxing and I formed a good friendship, and no one would have thought that more than 30 years later, we would meet again. Soon the school held a Xiangqi tournament and I won the championship.
One day the class put up a wall-newspaper, the class teacher asked me to be the editor, and also asked the students to contribute. I put a chess game in the entertainment column, entitled "Novice Chess and the Greedy Pawn", if the Red Rook in the game takes the Black Pawn casually, the game will become a draw, but if it spare the Pawn then Red can win. The name of the game is very interesting, although the value of the Pawn is small, greediness is often seen among the newcomers and novices. That's not how life is! One shouldn't envy other people's gains, however small, otherwise one will be known as selfish.
I think that the way to improve in chess is go out into society and seek more playing opportunities. One day, I happened to find a chess column in an evening newspaper, edited by Su Tianxiong, which contained an endgame puzzle each day. I liked that very much, so after school I went to the news-stand at the entrance of the teahouse, flipped through the chess column for a minute or two, and immediately went home to write down the chess game diagram, and tried to work out the answer. I do this every day, and after accumulating the puzzles over time, I have unconsciously learned many classic and skillful attacks and checkmates methods.
There was also a tabloid, edited by someone with the pen name "Canglangke"（沧浪客）, which published every week an article on the Opening, which I loved to read, and bought it with my pocket money. It broadened my chess horizons, let me know that the Opening had a certain discipline, and for the first time I knew about the theory of the Central Cannon, the Screen Knights, and the Counter-Palace Knight, these theoretical knowledge was used to guide the actual game and was really effective.
On another occasion, I went with my mother to visit a relative, and his house was connected to a cable radio broadcast called "Li's Voice"（丽的呼声）, which included a Xiangqi program hosted by Hong Kong champion Li Zhihai, setting up a puzzle and answering listeners' questions. At that time, the chess puzzle was called "Sounding in the East and Striking in the West"（声东击西）, I wrote down the chess diagram and went home to study, came up with the answer and sent it to Li Zhihai, and sure enough, it was the correct answer and I got the puzzle's prize. It was the first chess prize in my life, and I was overjoyed.
As time went on, I learned that there were four major champions in Hong Kong, in addition to Su Tianxiong and Li Zhihai, there were also Lai Zijian and Liang Qingquan. It would be nice to be able to see them perform in person! Sure enough, I heard from my classmates that there was a chess performance in Liyuan Playground（荔园游乐场）, so I decided to watch it in the evening. I saw two people playing the game, a large chessboard was erected next to them, and the demonstrator put up the chess moves made by the players for everyone to follow and enjoy. After inquiring that one of the players was Li Zijian, I was very excited, and I was reluctant to go home until I saw the ending. When I went to watch chess again, I had a newer experience. When the players showed their skill, the audience shouted and cheered. When the players came out with a strange or weird move, the audience questioned and argued among themselves. And when the attacking player missed a winning opportunity, the audience sighed and regretted it very much. I have become a part of the audience, and my emotions have naturally fluctuated too, as if I can't help but go with the flow in the ocean of chess, sharing the joys and sorrows of the chess world with the fans, I have really become a chess fan indeed.
As my chess skills improved, I was eager to ask professional chess players for advice and try out how good I could be. But as a 13-year-old kid who doesn't know anyone in the chess world and doesn't have enough money to pay for tuition, this was not easy to say! When I was in a dilemma, a marvellous thing happened, and the good luck beckoned to me.
One day I went to Liyuan to watch Liang Qingquan's challenge demonstration, the challenger playing Red opened with an attack of Five-Seven Cannons and Transverse Rook, and Liang Qingquan held the Black pieces and also used the Rook to counter-attack, and it was the turn of the Red side to move after 10 rounds of the game. An old man sitting next to me said to himself, "If the Red moved the seventh file Pawn up, then it will have the advantage later if it crosses the river." After listening to this, I thought for a while, and felt that there was something wrong with his words, so I explained to him in a consultative tone that, if the Black side attacked the Rook with the Cannon, after 8 more moves, with Rook and Cannon both exchanged, the Black side will have the advantage. After hearing this, the old man felt that my analysis made sense, and said that such a child who could figure out the variation ahead of 8 moves, that was so impressive and praiseworthy, and invited me to have a meal with him and talk further about chess at the end of the game. We don't know each other, the elder person was in his 50's, it's strange that Xiangqi had brought us together and we became a pair of unforgetful friends!
The man's name was He Leru（何乐如）, originally from Nanhai County, Guangdong Province, who was a clerk in a small company in Hong Kong at that time. After we played a game, he found it difficult to cope with my style, so he thought that my chess had a promising future, he enthusiastically took me to meet and play with professional players, and also told me that if I lost, not to worry, he would pay for my tuition fee. He first took me to Xiaoqingwan Restaurant（霄萁湾餐馆）to find Wu Zhaoping（吴兆平）to play chess, Wu Zhaoping was a famous player in Guangzhou in the early years, with a strange chess style, fierce in attack, known as the "Tongtian Sect Master"（通天教主）, good at playing handicap and letting the opponent the first move.
When I saw Wu Zhaoping, he was already a player of over half a century old, and he began to let me odds of two moves ahead, and I won games more than I lost, so we changed to normal first move, and the results were more or less balanced. He Leru then took me to the Causeway Bay Chess Academy, to find Hong Kong's first-class player Bai Leyi（白乐奕）. When Bai seeing that I was a child, he proposed to give me odds of a Knight, in less than an hour I won two games in a row, then the odds was downgraded to two first moves, but also I came out the better side, and finally he let me have first move, this time then I lost more games than winning. In the past half a year, He Leru has created a practical chess practice environment for me, this way of playing Xiangqi, I have to work hard, and the other party also needs to show real quality and skill, so in the end I have gained a lot of practice. Later on, when I returned to Guangzhou to continue my academic study, He Leru often sent chess games material for my reference, and the friendship between chess players was deeply touching. It's a pity that his financial situation was very basic, he lived a difficult and poor life in his later years.
I often met people who helped me all along, and I didn't realize at that time how helpful it would turn out in days to come. Just like the players in the game, some of their moves are lurking in their far-reaching power without themselves realizing it. A few years later, when I remembered it's time to find out Mr. He Leru and to tell him that I wanted to repay the kindness of his acquaintance, it was too little too late, because he had already passed away.
After my school study in Hong Kong for two years, although I had left my uncle's guidance for a long time, I was able to rely on my own initiative to break into the chess world, and met the help of a lot of kind chess friends, and dared to challenge professional players, willing to delve into the theory and practice of chess skills and knowledge, and as a result, my Xiangqi improved greatly.
It turns out that the fate of life is in your own hands. It's like a game of chess, as long as you don't make mistakes, you can be invincible, and once the opportunity did appear, you should seize it and proceed accordingly to the very end, and so to be successful.
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Source: 个人图书馆
发布者：象棋残局解析
Dated: 2023-02-22
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