Impressions from the WCCC 2016

29 July
We arrived in the Serbian capital of New Belgrade (Novi Beograd, often and further in this article just called Belgrade) as one of the earliest WFCC participants. Upon the registration I was handed a special bag with a personalized WCCC ID and a noteblock with double-colored pen.

30 July
I used the second day, prior to the official start, to get myself acquainted with some people and the hotel "Metropol Palace" in Belgrade. Unfortunately we used the Miloseva Kuzina (with some Serbian letters) restaurant too late, missing out a few days of great breakfast (four scrambled eggs, french fries, two small blocks of cheese and three tomato slices for together 350 RSD ~ 3 EUR). So I usually would have some bakery items from across the hotel and water or when the congresses got late some coke from the kiosk nearby.

The official opening of the WCCC was held by the Serbian organizers, but was not too spectacular. There was a kind of domestic demonstrator attack on the mayor of Belgrade where someone had thrown toilet paper on him some days ago, leading him to not show up. Instead we were greeted by one of his replacements. Luckily, the prepared movies about the Serbian chess events of the past (sadly only in Srpski) and some drinks saved the evening.

31 July
Yours Truly attended the 15:00 (3:00 PM) opening session of the WFCC on the Sunday of 31 July 2016. Much to his delight, the German team, apparently bernd ellinghoven, had forwarded his request for a small change of titles giving (permanently instead of for life, in accordance with the practice of giving posthumous titles) to the WFCC. The sad news was heard that among other famous men such as the space hero Valentin Rudenko and the national German hero's nephew Wichard von Alvensleben also the never-tiring humorous publicist and prolific chess composer Fritz Hoffmann had died. The e-mail news had been sent a few hours after the departure of Yours Truly to Belgrade and so was left unread until the return, so this was a kind of shocking but mainly sadness inducing news to us.

The evening saw a "quick composing" of which we would like to (re-?)produce a good twomover we composed, but unfortunately the award is not yet online. We believe that the twomover should be in the award, unless it was found to be anticipated.

1 August
The participation of Yours Truly in the Open Solving Tournament was unsuccessful. We solved one twomover and one study, for a total of 11 points. Martin Minski's original (which we can not reproduce here for that reason) proved difficult to solve. With more time we could have solved a selfmate in three in the second round, but we spent all time looking for a point in a study that simply had none.

The Studies committee met under the good leadership of Yochanan Afek in the afternoon, whereupon unfortunately it was decided the "Study of the Year" contest was not successful to promote chess composition to the general public. Yours Truly reeived a great offer by Afek, which we accepted. If this will fall onto open ears on the necessary third party we will have a great possibility to promote endgame studies soon. More will be given on this in about a month.

 In the evening lectures were held. Avni and Afek talked about studies, and Yours Truly could have been seen crying by a close observer as Afek prior to his lecture talked about his personal relationship to the dearly missed Milan to which Afek dedicated the complete WCCC. Yours Truly wants to believe that the ever kind spirit was attending the lecture himself.

2 August
The day was mostly used for activities related to personal contacts with other composers. The lectures at the evening were with the exception of that by a newly crowned Honorary Master of Chess Composition, not interesting to Yours Truly. Misha's hour long lecture where he demonstrated his solving tourney organizing program might have been a bit too long, as bernd ellinghoven canceled his lecture afterwards. It is without a doubt that the program is great, but we believe there is not a large audience that is interested in such demonstrations.

3 August
As the day before, we mostly got personal contacts up. The evening saw an OTB match of the hosts vs. guests - or rathre the WFCC against the Serbian olympia team. Who could win such an event? Well, of course the WFCC - a lucky John Nunn scored 1.5 points out of his two games! A photo of John Nunn will be uploaded later, when we got to processing them all. Of course it was also his suggestion that was the best one at the committee meeting a few days before...

4 August
Just no! With the excursion that was tiring to Yours Truly, he regret not listening to Yochanan Afek on this topic who warned against the heat in Novi Sad where Afek attended the chess olympiad 1990. Oops!
Out hero of the day was Alexander "Stop the bus!" Bulavka who was worried about Yours Truly. Thanks!

5 August
After the "business as usual", the afternoon until the late evening saw the prizes being given for tourneys etc.
One Darko Hlebec won some study awards while Yours Truly left without any. Not even for the twomover. Oh vey!

At the evening the Yacht proved to be an interesting experience, but for the future we would like clearer markings on which food is vegetarian. Some bread, cheese and potatoes saved the meal.

6 August
After the offficial end of the WCCC, the never tiring Brank Djurasevic helped Yours Truly with one request we had. The evening saw Yours Truly visiting Darko Hlebec's house, where his family provided a nice talk.

7 August
Upon leaving Belgrade, we had enough of the city, mostly due to the extreme noise and heat. The travel back home took all day since for reasons far beyond our imagination planes fly the route Munich - Belgrade, but not Berlin - Belgrade.


Youtube videos, provided by Julia Vysotska and the WFCC:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCK2tO_SLX1FvCV7RuSxbLhA

The godsent hero: Wichard von Alvensleben's uncle

(The informations from this entry are taken from Wikipedia, thereby this article can't be used as a source. All the links are in German language.)

The German Go master and chess composer Wichard von Alvensleben (11.vii.1937 - 2.v.2016) had a relative of the same name who can be named a tragic Christian hero.

The officer Wichard von Alvensleben (19.v.1902 - 14.vii.1982, referenced in the rest of the article under this name) was born into the German noble family "von Alvensleben".  He was an officer of the German Army "Wehrmacht" in World War II, and injured in 1941. At the arrival of the Red Army, which was known for committing atrocities against German civilians, including mass rapes of German women, in Tankow his wife Cora committed suicide on 29.i.1945 to not fall into their claws.

It was just a few months later, on 30.iv.1945, in the final days of World War II in Europe, that as an officer of the Wehrmacht he freed a train by the German "Schutzstaffel" (SS) and "Sicherheitsdienst" (SD) with 139 special prisoners that were supposed to not survive. The prisoners had been collected from the concentration camps (KZ) Flossenbürg, Mauthausen and Buchenwald into the KZ Dachau. The special command of SS and SD escorted them in a train to the place of most likely their death. However, the prisoner Oberst Bogislaw von Bonin managed to contact a Wehrmacht office in Italy. Hauptmann Wichard von Alvensleben then managed to free the prisoners, which included the former Austrian chancellor (1934-1938) Kurt Schuschnigg and the French prime minister Léon Blum who in 1946 became prime minister for the third time, fhe former Hungarian prime minister (1942-1944) Miklós Kállay, to name only the three most prominent prisoners. Especially in Germany the theologist Martin Niemöller would be one of the most famous people who were imprisoned. On 4.v.1945 the prisoners were given to American troops. Wichard von Alvensleben was imprisoned, but freed soon after. Only almost two decades later the story became known to the general public.

Wichard von Alvensleben wrote a letter to Martin Niemöller in 1964, saying that this was not a mere coincidence but the work of otherworldy powers that by the Christians are called "God".


Further information on EN-Wikipedia (note that these are not permalinks and the content can change over time):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wichard_von_Alvensleben (the officer)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transport_of_concentration_camp_inmates_to_Tyrol
(here is a permalink as it lists all the prisoners plus the two voluntary travellers)

A love story from Belgrade

Now this is a story I think I wrote down in my book Weltenfern but I would like to repeat it here, a bit differently, seeing that the WCCC is upcoming.

When I first arrived in Belgrade in 2013, honoring my deceased friend Milan, I was greeted by one special composer, the thriving with life experience and strong spirit Milomir Babić. I was instantly in love, not with the man of course, but with his generous offer - a self-made schnaps for a warm welcome and the difficult STES study.

Milomir Babić

STES World Championship 1997, 2nd place

White wins

 Easier to solve, of course, is the following more recent study.

Milomir Babić

Euxinus Pontus 2010, 1st honorable Mention

White wins

I will leave both for the readers to figure out. Well, not really, the solution to the first study will be posted in the comments.

More tourney announcements

After the posts in German language in the past days, let us hopefully return to the "business as usual". This time we have some tourney announcements, starting with one for a problemist who died in 2009 in a terrorist attack or school shooting, depending on what information you believe. The following announcements were sent by Vidadi Zamanov who asks to reprint them, a wish we fulfill here. Speaking of great Azerbaijanian authors, the composer Ilham Aliev, unrelated to the politician, also has recently written a book "Şahmat yaradıcılığım" which from what we understand can be ordered at bestechi@mail.ru


Mejnun Vahidov -70 MT, 2016
(27.07.1946- 30.04.2009)
The Azerbaijan Chess Composition Commission announces an International Composing Tourney “Mejnun Vahidov-70”' memorial tournament for twomovers and threemovers (free theme).
M.Vahidov was a co-author of several themes in chess composition, like, the Azerbaijan
(Vladimirov) theme (1977), the Azerbaijanian Novotny (1981), the Bakunian Novotny (1985) and others.
Section: #2 (twomovers) and #3 (threemovers) - (free theme).
Judge: #2- Anatoli Stepochkin (Russia) and #3- Alexander Melnichuk (Russia).
Send to: abdullaev-elmar@bk.ru
Closing date: 31. 08. 2016. The award – 2016.

Sabuhi Huseynov - 65 МТ, 2016
(29.03.1951 – 12.10.2000)
The Azerbaijan Chess Composition Commission announces an International Composing Tourney “Sabuhi Huseynov-65”' memorial tournament for twomovers (free theme).
#2 - Judge: Anatoli Stepochkin (Russia) .
Send to tournament director: Vidadi Zamanov vidadi_zamanov@mail.ru
Closing date: 31. 08. 2016. The award - 2016.

2nd Ali Tebrizi Shatranji (14th-15th century) MT, 2016
The Azerbaijan Chess Composition Commission organizes an International Tourney of
Composition for studies of the Ali Tebrizi Shatranji (14th-15th century chess player).
Theme: free. Judges:
Studies - Judge: Muradkhan Muradov (Gobustan, Azerbaijan).
H#2 - Valery Barsukov (Russia).
Send to: abdullaev-elmar@bk.ru .Studies please send PGN files.
Closing date: 31. 08. 2016. The award - 2016.

[DE] Hitler und Erdogan

Der Vergleich, den die ARD verbietet, der aber nötig ist, da Erdogan selbst Hitler als sein Vorbild benennt.

Adolf Hitler
Geboren: 20. April 1889 in Braunau am Inn
Schwerste Straftat vor der Präsidentschaft, Urteil: Putschversuch, 5 Jahre Haft
Führer des Staats: Deutschland (Präsident 1933-1945, mit weiteren Gebieten, etwa Österreich 1938-1945)
Absolute Machtergreifung: 1933
Ausschaltung von Gegnern: 1933 nach Reichtagsbrand
Todesstrafe: 1933
Völkermorde: Juden (völlige Vernichtung gemeinsam mit Großmufti von Jerusalem beschlossen), Homosexuelle, Sinti und Roma, alle Nichtarier nach Definition der Nürnberger Rassengesetze
Gesamtzahl der Toten: 6 Millionen Juden, 56 Millionen Kriegstote (Hauptschuld gemeinsam mit Stalin), weitere zivile Opfer durch Völkermorde
Anklage: Hitler entzog sich der Anklage durch Suizid
Gestorben: 30. April 1945 in Berlin (56 Jahre alt)

Eccep Tayyip Erdogan
Geboren: 26. Februar 1954 in Istanbul
Schwerste Straftat vor der Präsidentschaft, Urteil: Anstiftung zur Gewalt, lebenslanges Politikverbot
Führer des Staats: Türkei (Präsident seit 2ß14)
Absolute Machtergreifung: 2014
Ausschaltung von Gegnern: 2016 nach vorgeblichem Putschversuch
Todesstrafe: 2016 geplant
Völkermorde: Kurden
Gesamtzahl der Toten: unbekannt, mindestens 5359 Kurden zwischen Juli 2015 und Mai 2016, mindestens 265 Tote durch vorgeblichen Putschversuch
Anklage: Der deutschen Staatsanwaltschaft liegen Anzeigen wegen Kriegsverbrechen und anderem vor.
Gestorben: Leider noch nicht (62 Jahre alt)

[DE] Skandal: Bundeswehr erteilt Schießbefehl gegen Flüchtling! (Satire)

Es ist der größte Skandal der Bundeswehr seit mehr als 12 Stunden! Der Flüchtling Recep E. (62) floh mit seinem Privatflugzeug nach Deutschland, als das Unglaubliche geschieht: Nur wegen der Gefahr, dass E. in ein Kernkraftwerk fliegen könnte, und weil gegen ihn Anzeigen wegen Völkermordes und Kriegsverbrechen vorliegen, wird sein Asylantrag im Eilverfahren abgelehnt und Schießbefehl erteilt.

Foto: Recep E. (heute 62) bereitet sich auf seine Flucht vor, indem er den deutschen Gruß lernen will, verwechselt diesen aber mit dem römischen Grüß. Kann mal vorkommen.

Militärflugzeuge des Typs Eurofighter sollen an die Südgrenze Deutschlands geschickt worden sein, um einem Terroranschlag zuvorzukommen. Daraufhin soll E. nach London weitergeflogen sein, wo er offiziell als "Ziegenficker" gilt. Es ist noch umstritten, ob dies als Schuldeingeständnis gewertet werden kann, dass er tatsächlich Ziegen vergewaltigt hat.

Schließlich kehrte der Flüchtling reumütig nach Istanbul zurück, wo er nach einem Militärputsch die Macht übernommen hat und weitere Massaker gegen Kurden und die eigene Bevölkerung vorbereitet. Nur den Diktatorengruß muss er noch üben (siehe Foto).

[ADULTS ONLY] German card game on Kickstarter

As a Pagan, I believe in the complete liberation of the spirit, including sexually, and so I would like to advertise (I did not receive any compensation for it) in the following card game Yours Truly has backed.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/703192222/orgasme-sex-turned-into-a-card-game/posts/1622640

It is an adults only card game (although according to German laws minors would be fine to play it under supervision of their parents - but then as a minor in puberty, I don't think you would want to play it with your parents) based on sexual themes. Now if 6,000 backers come together, an expansion pack will be produced. Without that I wouldn't even make this post, but I want that pack. :-)

There are also some Kickstarter exclusive cards.
Unfortunately, the price is IMO steep. 20 Euro for 60-70 cards is quite expensive. I am not certain anymore but my Siedler of Catan card game I got around two decades ago was cheaper, I think.

Anyway, have a look if you're interested in a humorous sexually themed card game. Of course, not in Bavaria or the United States because it would probably be banned there faster than you could say "Texas Ranger". :-) No, that was a joke, look anyway if you're from there.