a great lake

As we flew west , looking south at one of the "Great Lakes", this prominence was visible on the map in the sky magazine found in the seat pocket. Do you know which great lake this is ?

black hills ?

Check out the texture of the mountains at the bottom of the picture. Be sure to CLICK the picture to see bigger version, and maximize your browser.

This was taken from plane at 31,000 feet during Boston to San Fransisco flight "out west" somewhere west of the great lakes. is it perhaps the black hills of Dakota ???

world's largest go game ?

You know those circular irrigation systems they use for watering large fields of crops ?

And of course some of the circles are green if the field is in use and being watered, and a different color (some kind of brown) if that field isn't being used that particular year.

And you know how out in the mid-west United states the roads are laid out in almost perfect lattice work ?

Well, combine all of these, and you have the ingredients for the world's largest go game. Hmmm, calculate the size of the baord for a 19 x 19 .

Here's some pictures from the jet at 31,000 feet of the makings for such a game.

pair go

Every year on Thurs. eve at the congress, we have a pair tournament which is male and female on each team, with the top table competing for a free trip to Japan to play in the The Japan Pair Go tournament.

Wanda graciously continues to agree to be my partner every year, even though she could pick one of the high dan players to maximize her chances to win the trip to Japan.

Each year we play the same pleasant polite Japanese couple in the first round. In the second round this year, we competed against a pro player whose partner was Anake, who perhaps is a photo model, as she was dressed exquisitely every day in a different kimono.

Please CLICK on the pictures to see a better view.

One of these pictures shows a general view of the pair tournament.

another view from Rainier

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my BEST photo taken from Mt. Rainier

I just kept shooting photos, but this particular one I think came out fantastically. What do you think ? (PLEASE CLICK on the picture to see it MUCH BETTER, and maximize your browser too).

my youngest opponent

Xin was 8 years old at this congress (2005) .

(CLICK on the pictures for much better view !)

She was my youngest opponent. I managed to win the game but it wasn't easy. Lots of possible traps to fall into along the way.
NOTE: If the game doesn't automatically come up, please first install the KGS client software and say "yes" when it asks whether sgf files should be associated with KGS .


Her mom recorded her games. Although the mom spoke no english, she and I developed a nice repoire, often trying to connect throughout the week. For instance, every day after the morning game we would each give each other a thumbs up or down signal to ask whether I and her daugther won that morning's game.

Mt. Rainier, the trail, the views

Mt. Rainier was so wonderfully beautiful. The views of sharp peaks in the distance. The snowy summit of Rainier itself (which the local indian natives call Tahoma and want the name changed back to that!).

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From Paradise visitor's center at about 5500 ft. altitude, the walking paths go up to about 6100 ft. altitude, which is above treeline (which means climactically, trees can't grow up there, just like in the arctic tundra region).

So instead of trees, we have wonderful alpine wildflowers. Growth is very slow up there, and takes years to re-grow damaged land, so it's really important to stay on the trail and not "bush whack" .

I was happy to hike with Tina and her friends. Tina is one of our strong young players (about 5D strength), and will be going to Stanford this year (2005) .

The views were so beautiful on the trail, all I could do was keep taking pictures.

Yes, that's snow and ice glaciers clearly visible from the trail. You can't hike up to that part without a guide, however, which takes two days and $1500 .

On the way down, we saw a deer munching in the flowers. It was quite tame, pretty much ignoring us as it dined.

On the way to Mt. Rainier

Here are pictures taken during the bus ride to Mt. Rainier.

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Things to look for in the pictures:

o A sign to "Paradise" which happens to be the name of the visitor center

o Picture of Tina'a friend Jun-yi in the bus zonked out during the long 90 minute ride to the mountain

o When we stopped at the vista, notice the dark blue bird on the sign ! What kind of bird is that ???

o Pictures of people approaching the bird to take its picture. I was worried it would fly away before I got to it, but it turned out to be quite tame.

o Some pictures of the view from "Paradise" (the visitor's center)

dye ? paint ?

On the way to the congress, as we were landing in San Fransisco, just minutes before landing, when we were already quite low, these fields or pools of vivid colors were suddenly below us.

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What do you think they are ? Dye ? Paint ?

mudcake burl pictures

As I spoke with Stephanie after dinner one night at the congress, I noticed this tree outside the main building at Pacific Lutheran U that had a burly growth on it looking like mud.

I walked towards it, shooting some pictures as I walked (while talking to Stephanie on the headset of my cell phone):