Go with the Flow

by Cho Hunhyun

  By contrast, I had only one goal on my mind. Never let it be an easy win for anyone. I’ll hang on and finish the final round. To that end, I had to win the fourth round. When Nie Weiping and I were sitting face-to-face to play the game, I could tell that he was under as much pressure as I was. He was not the same confident man whom I saw at the dinner reception. We were evenly matched. But I realized, whoever had the unwavering focus until the last was going to be the winner.

  I used the same opening strategy that I had used earlier in the second round, hoping to stand a chance to win by not repeating the same mistake as before. Nie Weiping and I took turns moving our stones, advancing at a controlled pace. It was a tight game and we were both very nervous. Every move made by the Black seemed to gain the upper hand, but only to be quickly reversed by the White and vice versa. It was going to be neck and neck for a while.

  An opportunity finally came for me to give it a go. By the time there was barely any empty space had remained on the board, Nie Weiping made a small but critical mistake and I didn’t hesitate to finish the game. After tallying the scores when the game was over, I was declared the winner: I won by one point.

  I managed to stay and continue on to the fifth round! I was more excited about nothing else but this. To me, giving up was more shameful than being defeated. The last thing I wanted was for people to see me, the grandmaster of Go in Korea, lose grace and dignity in a game against a top player in China. I was now back in the game. The previous four rounds didn’t mean anything anymore. The fifth round was all that mattered now.

  The historical match began. Nie Weiping started to work his way outward, building castles in the center of the board, while I focused on attacking the periphery, gouging out corners. Nie Weiping was gaining on me fending off every attack. Halfway through the game, I got distracted and I couldn’t figure out my next move. Nie Weiping would never miss a chance like this: He kept striking back, cornering me. His fatal blows were by a hair’s breadth away and I was frantically trying to keep my head above water. Was he going to finish me off after dragging me around? A small voice in my head sweet-talked me to give up and take a rest since I had done everything I could.

  Suddenly, I looked up and saw Nie Weiping’s face. I quickly snapped out of it. Nie Weiping was completely immersed in the game. Whenever he placed his stone on the board, he seemed to even forget breathing. We both needed to win. He was under as much pressure as I was, even with his heart condition. It wasn’t any easier for him, if not far worse. Yet, he persevered, holding his own against me.

  Wake up. It’s not over yet. Stay focused. And keep thinking. I said to myself.

  I let my mind walk into the forest of my thoughts. Slowing down, taking one step at a time. I was beginning to get my breathing rhythm back and felt comfortable once again. Everything around me disappeared. Everyone was gone; Nie Weiping and the staff members. Feelings of anxiety, nervousness, and even my ambition to win vanished. There was just the two of us left: Go and I. At that moment of absolute relinquishment, I was able to see very clearly: the perfect point to place my stone!

  I heard the timekeeper’s 10-second countdown from a distance. One, two, three, four, five, six…. I got back my sense of reality. When the timekeeper said seven, I placed my stone with confidence. It was the 129th move.

  That move changed everything. I began to take the initiative. Nie Weiping was busy to ward off my attacks. Soon, there was no place for him to run away. When I made my 145th move with certainty, Nie Weiping dropped his head and placed two stones on the board. He was resigning.

  “Hunhyun won!”

  I realized that I had finally won when Korean cheering squad in the viewing room burst out shouts of victory. Ah, I won. I won!

  On that day, Korean Go catapulted to the top of the world. It was a historic event for the Korean Go community. Riding on the momentum, Korean players won the next three straight Ing Cup championships; the 2nd, 3rd, and the 4th Ing Cup. Korea gained dominance in international Go over a short period of time.

  The final round of that Ing Cup is still much talked about. In particular, people still wonder about the 129th move which put me back into the game. “How did you come up with that killer move with only 10 seconds left to save yourself?”

  “I have no idea. I still don’t know.” My reply has always been the same. All I did was to surrender myself to the forest of my thoughts. I didn’t find the answer. My thoughts led me to it.

  Every Move Counts

  The game of Go is akin to life. The feelings of joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness that we experience as we go through life are evoked while playing Go. In this sense, this particular board game can help us put all the complex and intricate issues of our real life into perspective. Tackling these issues will not be easy, but there can be no knots that cannot be untied.

  Playing Go is a process of finding answers. When a player sits in front of the board, the first thing to do is to plan out the game to win. The player, however, must not expect the plan to always work because the opponent is essentially doing the same; planning elaborate schemes and strategies to win. For this reason, interception is played out constantly on the Go board. Players are cornered by unanticipated moves; to save themselves, they must pursue every avenue to survive.

  In this respect, every single professional Go player is a master in problem solving. To Go players, every problem in the world is bound to have a solution. We are trained over and over, from an early age, to challenge ourselves with seemingly impossible problems but we have always found the way out. It does not always have to be me. There is always someone else who could solve the problem. Problems are bound to be solved as long as the player has the tenacity to grapple with them until they are solved.

  That tenacity is empowered by thinking. ‘Thinking’ is an abstract concept that includes many qualities necessary to solve problems; staying optimistic about finding the solutions; willing to see the problems through to the end; employing every means- knowledge, common sense, logic, creative ideas- to solve the problems. I refer to this type of thinking as, the ‘Go masters’ way of thinking’ because this is how a Go master thinks.

  There is no problem that cannot be solved. Clues may not be visible right away and the problem may seem to get worse at every attempt to solve it. But, there is always a solution to a problem as long as one has the will to solve it. Even with utmost endeavors, if the ideal solution is out of the reach, take the second best solution. If the second best is not feasible, take the third best solution. Of course the solutions do not necessarily result in what one hopes for. Along the way, one may be forced to make concessions, compromises, or give up and move on to other plans. But, in one way or another, these are all part of the solutions.

  It is imperative, however, that the initiative has to come from oneself. So many people choose to walk away from the problem instead of attempting to tackle it head-on. Rather than making real efforts to figure their way out, they give in prematurely to the stress of anxiety and takes on the devil-may-care attitude, leaving things to their own course. It would be the same as placing one’s stones on random points when feeling completely stuck in Go.

  Professional Go players never act in such a way. They fiercely carry on to come up with the next move knowing that the overtime countdown is going to begin soon. They make every move count until they are forced to resign, and even when they know, by intuition, that they are going to lose the game. Whether the move is deemed as the best, a good one, a bad one or an overreaction, all move made by the player is the outcome of intensive thinking.

  In Go, there are goals to achieve, logics to apply and rules to abide by. This aspect of Go makes professional Go players strategists. A player must have a strategy, be tactful, and read ahead before placing the stones. Every move must count.

  There is a winner and a loser in Go. A player must come up with every possible move to win no matter what. Whether it be on the brink of a cliff, caught in a trap, and pay an arm and a leg
for one’s own mistake, a Go player must do one’s best until the end.

  Essentially, we are all playing our own Go to make it through the day. If we have placed one stone a day, how far have we come today? Are we still in the opening or have we made it to the middle of the game? Or have we made the very last bet in the game? No matter where we are, our game is not over unless we have filled the entire board with stones, or until someone resigns. There is always hope, no matter what.

  The real problem is when the determination to navigate out from trouble is lacking, or when one chooses to quit thinking. Excuses, such as ‘there was nothing else I could do,’ or ‘I didn’t have any choice,’ are unacceptable in Go. Opportunities as well as mistakes all derive from oneself. Winning is electrifying while losing is bitter. But every victory or even failure resets the learning curve. The strength to think is the only beacon that helps one get through life. Along the journey, we learn more about ourselves and discover happiness.

  Whether it be on the brink of a cliff, caught in a trap, and pay an arm and a leg for one’s own mistake, a Go player must do one’s best until the end.

  The Empty Triangle

  People called me a Go whiz. From the age of five, I have been in and out of Go clubs, offering advice to my father on his moves and beating most of the adults who played in those Go clubs. Passing the Professional Qualification Tournament at the age of nine, I became the youngest professional Go player in the world.

  I remember how whenever I placed a stone, the spectators opened their eyes wide in amazement and let out an exclamation. “How does this boy come up with such an extraordinary move?” Wherever I went, people called me Go prodigy. In retrospect, I was not a genius nor a master of Go. I was just being myself- a free thinker.

  Adults who played Go were under the heavy influence of the Japanese pattern back then. Pattern in Go means the standard sequence of placing stones which has been time-tested to be the optimal to attack or defend. In Go, stones are placed according to certain formulas and patterns. But, I could not have known them. I was only a child. All I knew was that I wanted to win. I wanted to win so much so that I started to think of any move and every move that seemed to make sense- refreshingly odd moves that grownups would never in a million years come up with.

  Later when I went to Japan and was introduced to the pattern for the first time in my life, I was embarrassed because it was only then that I realized how untamed my moves had been. Without knowing the basics of Go, I had played it like a bull in a china shop. I learned the importance of knowing the basics as I was brutally crushed over and over by Japanese Go students.

  However, once a player has a solid foundation in the basics, it is necessary to go back being an unleashed horse. The game is over at the moment the player decides to play only by the patterns. How can a player win when the moves are so obvious and can be easily anticipated by the opponent? Go is a mind game, ideas of two players fighting against each other. A player must think differently to play effectively.

  At the Ing Cup, I pulled off the ‘empty triangle,’ twice in the first round of the semi-finals. Empty triangle is formed when three stones of the same color are arranged at a right angle. It is known as a bad shape because it reduces efficiency and the chances of not being captured. The general practice was obviously to avoid bad shapes. But I didn’t see it in that way. I believed that an empty triangle itself was inefficient, but could be the lifesaver depending on how the stones were laid out on the Go board.

  At that first round of the semi-finals, I had an epiphany. What could potentially be a good empty triangle caught my eyes. I was convinced that what I was about to do was going to be a clever local move; to make a paired move above and below the empty triangle that would cut off my opponent’s group of stones. Any professional Go player trained in Japan to play by the set shapes and principles would not have chosen to place the stone there. But, I did not care about shapes nor rules. I only wanted to win so I dared myself to make the move.

  That day, experts on Go spoke about the “beginning of the Korean approach,” which I deeply appreciated. It meant that Korean Go started to take its own course, breaking away from the standards established by the Japanese Go. Ever since that round, Korean Go did grow and prosper by breaking one by one the rules and the taboos defined by the players in Japan. Korean players began to play differently when they started to think differently. It got them as far as playing at a higher level than the Japanese Go players, the former world champions.

  The Korean pattern, which the Japanese players have begun to notice, is different from the Japanese pattern in many ways. The Japanese pattern looks elegant with shapes forming simple lines. On the other hand, the Korean pattern looks bizarre. The shape cannot be called a pattern by any means. In the beginning, Japanese players scoffed at it for lacking sophistication, but they began to panic when the Korean pattern took them down too many times to call their defeats coincidences.

  Korean players have even invented new way-outs the Japanese pattern never had. This achievement has brought tremendous shift in paradigm in the Go world. Japan has always pursued aesthetics in Go and its leadership in international Go meant everybody else accepted their way. The game of Go was about training oneself for self-discovery and enlightenment, and observing code of behavior and courtesy for good play. Then, the Korean Go came along, challenging to put all patterns and courtesies aside. Since then, Go began to be perceived as a competitive brain sport. A strong instinct for survival and the thirst for victory engendered an inventive way of thinking.

  Who changes the world and makes history? History has shown us over and over that it’s those who question the status quo and make the fierce attempt to fix the problem. Likewise, Go survived 4,000 years during which patterns have been continuously developed and discovered. It would not have made this far if it were not for the players who wanted to find out the ‘why’s and the ‘how’s of the established patterns.

  Don’t be afraid of thinking differently and applying them in real life. No matter how small it may seem, it can playout in so many different ways- may it be a small change in one’s personal life, or a change for the better for everyone in this world.

  The Cage-free Swallow

  Every player has a different ethos, which shows during a match. Their personalities and mind set determine the tone of their moves and the flow of the match.

  I have been told that I play like a swallow performing an airshow: tactical, unexpected aerobatic maneuvers with speed. My style has earned me the nickname, ‘swallow Cho.’ My only student, Lee Changho, is a ‘Stone Buddha,’ because he is steady and unflinching, even at his opponent’s provocative moves. Among other top players in Korea, Seo Bongsoo is known as the ‘weed’ for his wild play; he doesn’t mind getting into a ‘mud fight’ on the board. Yoo Changhyuk is deemed to execute the best ‘colorful offense’ in the world. Every successful professional Go player has a distinctive style and approach.

  How a player chooses to see the world is what determines the style and approach of the play. It is also how they choose to live in the real world. So a match between two rivals is a clash of two different sets values. In this sense, Go is more than a game; it epitomizes the player’s perspective on life and philosophy. This is precisely why after being around for 4 thousand years, it continues to be a popular game played both on and off-line.

  Unfortunately, the creative potential of Go doesn’t seem to be able to keep up with its popularity. Go styles have become so homogenous that a player with a distinctive approach is hard to find. I have to admit that nowadays, rookies have very strong foundation in Go and they play very well. But, wait a minute. Their styles ring a bell. I have seen someone else play like them before. I could not help but feel they were emulating veteran players, or were following the pattern others had created. At around mid-game, when the momentum is there and the spectators have been waiting long enough for a jaw-dropping move that could either make or break the game, the anticipation i
s quickly disappointed by a normal, obvious move. Go fans have started to complain that the game has become unexciting. What happened?

  According to my observation, much has to do with how Go is taught in Korea nowadays. Children go to private Go classes after school to learn how to play in a short period of time. The teacher spoon-feeds the rules and the formulas and the students are expected to learn them by heart. The goal is to make them play the game and to please their parents with quick results. Go programs are structured in such a way that they leave very little room and time for children to think about the next move on their own, and deprives them of the freedom to imagine a new move. They are expected to place stones according to the formula they have memorized, which turns their match into a test to see who digested the most information, instead of a battle of ideas.

  Training students in this way is only one of many conditions unfavorable for nurturing creative problem-solvers in Go. One can hardly expect anyone with a unique approach to come out of it. Students maybe trained for multiple choice questions, but never for essay questions. Learning to merely reproduce knowledge and skills is akin to molding machines programmed to produce individuals who think alike, at the expense of nurturing individuality. I find it very disturbing that most Go programs in Korea for young players are skewed to short-term goals.