by Cho Hunhyun
They were less obtrusive when I was still playing at a certain level despite the errors. A week after my hopeless defeat at the 2001 Wangwi Title Match, I won the 14th Fujistu Cup World Go Championship. In the following year, I played against Changhyuk 9P and finished runner-up at the LG Cup World Baduk Championship. Fortunately, I won the next tournament, which was the kt Cup and the Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance World Masters Baduk. In 2003, I also made it to the finals of the Wangwi Title Match and the Kisung Title Match where I finished second. I was commended for performing at par with the younger players in my 50s.
But I am only human after all. How could a mortal being defy the test of time? I began to head downhill in 2003. My name was no longer heard in both local and international tournaments. I was rarely mentioned in anything related to Go that people assumed I had retired. I was still playing tirelessly, just not in the high-profile tournaments.
Winning is a mysterious thing. It feels like yesterday that I was fiercely competing to be the champion even if by half a point. My mind was sharp and my skills honed but they did not last forever. After all these years, I realized that youth is the best ammunition. The time comes when the experiences and the know-hows an old man had accumulated over time lose their edge to the energy and the ambition of a young man. Youth wins, therefore, youth is ominous.
Perhaps that is life and the law of nature. In the end, the elderly king is forced to abdicate to pass the throne to the younger and stronger prince. Eio Sakata 9P, the “razor” and the “fighting spirit” who won championship titles 64 times in Japan in the 1960s, lost both the Meijin and the Honinbo titles to Rin Kaiho, who was his junior. The night he lost to Rin Kaiho, Eio was said to have lamented over a drink.
“I was just starting to get to know the real Go at 40, but it is over now. What a sad ending.”
This sad drama of Go is constantly replayed as if governed by the law of nature. Master Shuko had to give up the Kisei Title to Cho Chikun who, in turn, later failed to defend the Oza and Kisei Titles against the Taiwanese contender, O Rissei. I lost all of my titles to my student, Changho, and Changho lost his to his junior, Sedol. Sedol is now facing tough challenges from his junior players.
Time is unkind and heartless, as they say and I agree. It is sad to see how things change with time. But it is only natural that time flows like the four seasons that alternate. There is no reason to feel hurt by the fact that it leaves no room for human intervention. Everyone gets to be young once in their lifetime. We get to enjoy it to the fullest so there is no reason to be jealous of the young. Those who are at the height of their youth today and boast of being young will lose it, too, one day.
The end of youth does not mean the end of life. Life replaces youth with many perks. As for me, I feel liberated from the pressure of having to win which allows me to play more at ease. The moment I admitted that I could be defeated in any given game, I was able to free myself from the fetters of my obsession with winning. Winning was the source of my pride and my identity but it also imprisoned me. Living under unbearable pressure to always win for decades can be torturous. Fortunately, Mother Nature lets time to flow so that it can put an end to our long ordeals and free us from the shackles. Therefore, we must not be sad. We must celebrate with joy.
I look at Changho with mixed feelings. I am sad that he is growing feeble, but I hope he appreciates the relinquishing process. Changho seemed to have skipped his childhood to go straight into playing professional Go. It had always bothered me that he did not get to live a single day as an ordinary child. Chagnho was always surrounded by grown-ups who were 10 to 20 years his senior without having any friends of his own age. Living away from home, he did not get to be spoiled by his parents.
Changho is free now. He is liberated. He met his other half and got married. He does not need to be too serious, fighting with those who are much older than he is. He can continue playing with those in their 20s or 30s, give a big smile if he wins and let out a deep sigh if he loses. He can finally be his age.
I am living my age, too. Like any man in his 60s, I often go for a stroll in my neighborhood, water my garden, and play golf with my Mihwa. I am filling up my calendar with everyday activities I missed out to play at Go tournaments. I would be happy to be a grandpa if my children were to get married now and have their own kids.
But I have not entirely given up on competing. That may be the one thing that I will never give up as long as I live. Age and physical frailty cannot be an excuse in the world of competition. The moment I start making excuses for my poor performance, my life as a fighter will end. I believe I can still win as long as I continue to train to stay in good shape and to stay focused. One can win or lose by a small margin, even by half a point. So it is not a long shot for someone of my age to win. I just need to try a little harder, that is all.
In fact, I have proved that I can still win in the first BC Card Cup World Baduk Championship held in 2009, when I entered as a wild card and made the semifinals. It was the first time I competed in the semifinals after winning the kt Cup and the Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance World Masters Baduk 7 years ago. Although I lost in the BC Card Cup to Gu Li by half a point, I was thrilled as if I was stepping on a thin layer of ice. I missed the thrill.
In 1981, the then 56-year-old Master Shuko had an interview after he won five times in a row in the Kisei Title Match. Master Shuko said, “My brain is ever more agile at 50. I am strategizing with a perspective as broad as the ocean. I am also reading sequences with more precision like a well-calibrated measuring instrument. Watch me. My intellectual ability will continue to soar with the force and the freedom of a charging buffalo in the wilderness.”
Master Shuko won the Kisei Title Match 6 times by 1982, and he and I advanced to the semifinals in the Ing Cup in 1989. Master Shuko also won the Oza Title in 1992 when he was 68. Masao Kato redeemed himself by beating players in their 20s and 30s and winning the Honinbo Title at the age of 55 in 2002. Masao had been long forgotten in the world of Go after he won the Oza Title in 1993. He proved that youth was formidable but not invincible.
Young people should make the most of their youth, but refrain from being overconfident about it. They must be humble. Youth is a blessing. It is what makes the young great. The dilemma, however, is that it does not last forever. Youth is transitory. The young must be ambitious and must have the will to climb up the ladder to achieve their dreams. But they must also eat healthy, regularly exercise, and train their muscles and mind to relax. In this way, they will be prepared to enjoy a healthy and happy life as they age. Another source of happiness would be to work harder to beat the young once in a while. Never mind if winning is a long shot. The process of working towards a goal is itself meaningful and delightful.
The Healing Mountain
Hiking is part of my daily routine. I would not call it a full-out mountain climbing. Rather, it is walking the trail on a nearby mountain that requires simple preparation, such as putting on a T-shirt, a pair of cotton pants, a pair of boots and wrapping a towel around my neck. My destination is the Bukhansan which is just across my house. I have been mountain hiking every day since 1991, when Changho moved out and we moved to live nearby the Bukhansan in 1991. The only time I missed hiking was to participate in competitions. I have been hiking for over the past two decades.
In fact, I had begun to hike before we moved. I found hiking to be stress-relieving, especially when I was under a lot of pressure to play well. So I decided to start a hiking club with a few close friends who were older than me.
Every Sunday, we used to meet at Jongno 4-ga, downtown Seoul to go to the Dobongsan. We spent the entire day on the mountain, rain or shine. We also made the effort to go to faraway mountains semi-annually or annually, like the Jirisan, the Seoraksan, or the Wolchulsan. As time went by, unfortunately, our hiking club was dissolved for inevitable reasons, such as health issues or relocating away from Seoul. We, too, moved around that time and I started to hike alone.
O
ne-man hiking could get lonely compared to the boisterous group hiking but it had its own benefits. I could be flexible about when I want to go hiking without bothering to make an arrangement with other people. I could hike in the Bukhansan and save time without having to travel to another mountain. I could walk on my own pace; take a rest whenever I got tired or speed up as fast as I could when I feel like it. Sometimes, I could be ambitious and climb all the way to the top, on other times, I could make a quick trip halfway.
But the best part of hiking alone lied in that I could have some time to myself. Of course, I could be alone in my own house, but it felt completely different when I was walking alone in nature. I was able to block out any unwanted noise.
When I was just starting to hike alone, I had so many thoughts in my mind; I was thinking about my tournament schedule, an unresolved move, and games I had won or lost. I was distracted so much so that I had headaches. But, amidst being out-of-breath and breathing heavy, there came a point when all of the thoughts vanished from my mind. The anxiety of losing and all the trivial things of the daily life were dismissed. I reached a point where I was no longer conscious of myself. In the end, I could only feel my two legs climbing uphill.
I could not explain how, but focusing solely on climbing made me find inner peace. I was sweating and out of breath, but it was not painful. I felt lighter and refreshed.
In retrospect, hiking everyday helped me build the physical strength and the endurance to not only play in over 100 games a year but also do well occasionally even in my 40s and 50s. If you think of Go as a mind sport that entails just sitting through a game and thinking, you are terribly mistaken. Physical strength is critical to stay focused until the last move is made. Physical strength is the basis of everything.
Hiking has also allowed me to make a habit of emptying out petty thoughts from my mind, which helped me to perform better and improve the quality of my life. Taking my mind off the goals and the duties, and relieving stress for an hour a day have the effect of broadening the scope of my perspective. I cannot rise above all, but I can deal with setbacks, distress, and tough times more gracefully.
When the society we live in continues to move forward and urbanization and globalization go on, we are more likely to become disconnected from Mother Nature. Human beings were designed to walk, move, and work, but we have evolved to work by sitting still for a long time inside a concrete building. We turn to various wheeled means of transportation to move around instead of walking with our own legs fussing over how busy or tired we are. We are affected by the environment we have created without realizing its effect on our mind and body. Why do we suffer from chronic digestion, gastrointestinal disorder, and short temper and fatigue with no specific reason? Why do we feel tired even when we are working sitting at our desks all day long? The answer to these questions is because we spend too much time sitting down. That is all we do instead of walking and running.
Someone who works sitting at the desk needs to make time to walk. Securing time to discard unnecessary thoughts while walking and sweating is a good way to refresh oneself.
It does not have to be hiking. I chose to hike, but it could be jogging, swimming, or playing soccer. The point is to keep the mind and the body in balance with each other. The mind and the body are not separate. They supplement each other and are one. Walking has become more important today because the mind is overworked by heavy workloads, the heavy and extensive use of computers and smartphones. Make the effort to walk at least on weekends, if including it in the daily routine is not feasible. Take a walk to a nearby park or a mountain. Walk until out-of-breath and feel the worries and distractions disappear.
The Distracting Factor
The mobile phone is considered a necessity in today’s fast-paced digital world. Everyone has to have one regardless of age and gender. It has evolved into smartphones that allow us to do more than just make phone calls or send text messages. We check our emails, play games, and carry out business transactions on our smartphones.
But I don’t own a smartphone, or a feature phone, or a credit card, or a driver’s license. I don’t have a driver’s license because I never learn to drive a car. In Korea, people get their drivers’ license in their early 20s. As for me, I did not have the time to get one because I was busy competing in tournaments. In my 30s, I became used to having Mihwa give me a lift. Today, it is my daughter who gives me the ride as Mihwa often does not feel strong enough to drive anymore. I never owned a credit card because I never needed one. Mihwa always made sure I had cash in my wallet. I never got into trouble because I was short of money.
People are amazed at how I can get by without a phone. But I have my own way of keeping in touch with people for important things. First of all, I rarely have the need to make a call. I don’t meet a lot of people and when I do, I prefer not to make any adjustments. When people need to make any changes, they can either look for me at home or in the Go club I have often visited. Mihwa receives my messages when I am not home. When nobody’s home, people call Mihwa to get in touch with me. It does take time to get messages delivered this way, but even so I have never once missed an important message. Once I was in China for a tournament and I was having lunch at a restaurant. The restaurant told me that I had a call and I was amazed that someone could locate me at the restaurant. It turned out that the person who called got a hold of my wife, who relayed his message to the Go club, which called the hotel I was staying at find my whereabouts. An important message is bound to reach the person it is intended for one way or another.
I do not mean to say that a mobile phone is unnecessary. Life without a mobile phone could be inconvenient but we can still get by. We still met people and sent important messages before the mobile phone was invented. Moreover, we were careful about what we said and we valued promises because it was not easy to get in touch with each other. By contrast, setting up appointments have become so easy and convenient today that people feel it is ok to change their mind all the time. Deep thinking and prudence have lost grounds in the age of digital civilization.
One day, I asked my daughter about the difference between a smartphone and a feature phone. My daughter said that the smartphone allowed her to check her emails in real-time, send group messages, share her stories with people around the world, and make friends. It was certainly amazing what she could do with a smartphone. But I could not help but wonder, ‘Why we choose to live in such a way?’
There is no real reason other than the fact that we have the technologies and the devices that allow us to live in such a way. Without the means, we would not have thought they would be possible nor necessary. How many emails in our inbox require immediate attention? How much of the text messages we exchange are absolutely necessary? How many times have we realized that it was unnecessary to rush to look up a particular information on the internet?
What is more problematic is that we end up running out of time to do what really matters. We run out of time to concentrate on our work or to mediate. The smartphone, the noise from the T.V., the radio, constant chatter, floods of advertisements, and rumors about celebrities distract us from concentrating and meditating. As a result, we no longer have the time to contemplate to the point that we cannot stand silence. So we call or text our friends when we don’t have anything important to say, play loud songs, and turn up the volume T.V.
Turn off the mobile phone and the music for at least 10 minutes a day to have undisturbed time to yourself. One does not need to be thinking of huge ideas. Just let the mind take a rest with eyes closed. Everyone needs a quiet downtime to face our inner selves.
The mind cannot think of creative ideas when it is already filled with other thoughts. The mind can brainstorm creative ideas when there is room, or when one has zoned out. Setting some time aside every day to meditate without being distracted will help an individual to be more patient, relaxed, positive, and creative.
I have had to cut off many things from my life to focus on playing Go ever
since I was a child. I did not watch the T.V., nor read the newspaper. I also limited my use of phone to a minimum. In this way, I was able to secure ample time to learn Go on my own. I had created a noise-free environment for myself that allowed me to do deep thinking.
We are constantly pressed for time and have become used to leaving things unfinished. We may have brought it upon ourselves by creating an environment that intrudes into our lives; the text alerts, the music, the noise from the T.V. and the constant calls from our friends that claims our time.
On Solitude
One of the questions reporters used to ask me all the time was, “How do you deal with losing?”
Unfortunately, I don’t have the answer simply because all I did was to endure them. There was no such thing as a ‘secret recipe.’ And time healed.
But I may have an answer if the question is rephrased to, “what did you do after you were defeated?” I chose to be left alone although it was nearly impossible when I had to be at competitions back-to-back. I tried to secure some time alone as much as possible. Sometimes, I spent hours away from my family. I spent time alone in silence and took a break from everything. I found it to be very healing. Then I was ready to walk out the door and face the world again.
Being in solitude is a choice an individual makes voluntarily. The difference between being in solitude and self-isolation is that unlike self-isolation, choosing to withdraw from the crowd allows one to have an honest talk with one’s inner self. Therefore, it is not entirely painful nor meaningless.