Nicola Mitic Of Serbia has been an insei in Japan for some time now. He qualified for the winter qualifying tournament in Tokyo and play began last weekend. He is currently 1-1 as shown on the results page (Japanese only). Play continues with a game each Saturday and Sunday until November 19th. Wish him luck!

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Dave Sigaty
"Short-lived are both the praiser and the praised, and rememberer and the remembered..."
- Marcus Aurelius; Meditations, VIII 21

He has to have a top 2 finish from the group of 16 players to qualify.

I'm guessing that as a non-CJK person he only needs a 50%+ score. That is how Antti made it last year.

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Dave Sigaty
"Short-lived are both the praiser and the praised, and rememberer and the remembered..."
- Marcus Aurelius; Meditations, VIII 21

Unless of course the Nihon Ki-in decide Antti has used up their recent "easier pro places for foreigners" quota. That would be rather harsh on Nikola though, plus I think Antti was the first Western pro since Hans Pietsch 16 years ago so hopefully there's a backlog of any such quota that's accumulated.

Btw talking to Dusan (6 dan), Nikola's older brother, at the Gold Cup he said Nikola's judgement/theory/direction was still kind of similar to Dusan's and he still made silly mistakes, but his reading was now much better, for example some tsumego that took Dusan 2 minutes Nikola did in 30 seconds.

There was nothing on that page that indicated whether B or W means a win or a loss. Care to enlighten?

Based on HnG ( and UI design ), I guess = win ?

Not a good start from him, I'm afraid.

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La victoire est un hasard, la défaite une nécessité.

Clear is win, filled black is loss.

Ah yes. Forgot to refer to the great HNG for info.
Thanks! The white flag is 1 way to think about it, but then again black could also be seen as a black mark on your record so I was kinda on the fence.

I'd say like oren: white is a win, black a loss.
If I remember correctly, in HnG, Hikaru puts a white mark on his hand so that victory be with him.

So it seems Mitic is doing quite well at the moment (even if it still is really soon, there are 6 players with a 3-1 result).

Sorry Ed. I checked last year's honsen and the white is indeed a win and black a loss so you're wrong. Nicola is doing pretty well considering he was 1 or 2 classes behind Antti when he was in A class.

shoryuu, why sorry ?

Maybe ( = loss, = win ) is a national standard ?
From kindergarten all the way to pro ? Anyone knows ?
Otherwise, it takes up very little room to include a simple legend.

This needs a legend no more than a tick and a cross do in English. It's standard in all Japanese life.

The white/empty circle is maru and may be filled in the sense that a teacher may put the circle round the correct answer. The solid-circle failure mark can also be a cross or even a tick and is called batsu, or peke in some dialects.

The signs can also be used for yes-no in conversations. You cross your arms under your chin for no/wrong and put your arms round your head for yes/right. Little kids play a maru-batsu game like this.

If you are a foreigner in a conversation in Japan and sit with your arms crossed you could be taken as sending literally the wrong signals. And if you say "Oh my god!" and wrap your arms round your head in despair you may be misinterpreted.

In go, I suppose you could say that all White's moves are correct and all Black's are batsu

To get to this point Nicola went through a qualifier for outsiders and lower-ranked insei.

http://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/player/saiyo ... _godo.html

Interesting how outsiders blazed through and took the first four spots. Nicola has the first rank among insei at 7/13 (!) with a tie-breaker.

The last rankings for classes A-D that decided who got into the tournament:

http://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/player/insei ... 16_09.html

Seems like Nicola was having some consistency at the top of the B-class.

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La victoire est un hasard, la défaite une nécessité.

Because I had to correct you? Just being polite.



Anyone knows whether you can apply for all the different branch applications? Eg. Chubu,Tokyo and Kansai Branch? At least you have 3 separate chances. I know the girls usually do at least 2 different ones (eg. Tokyo and Girl's qualifier). And there's also Kansai Kiin's one.

shoryuu, I was asking for clarification, just like you.
And, just being polite.

Nicola Mitic now on 4/6, tied with many others with only one player on 5/6.
Still going steady.

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La victoire est un hasard, la défaite une nécessité.

Nicola is 4 2 -- 7 candidates have this score.

Only one candidate has 5 1 -- the current best score.

9 more rounds to go.

Nikola now on 5 3 ... still in tied second place with five other people. 7 games to go.

_________________
La victoire est un hasard, la défaite une nécessité.

Nikola now on 5 5 , middle of the pack. Interestingly the three best players are on 7 3 , so no really dominant player. As a reference, the two winners last year were on 12 3 .

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La victoire est un hasard, la défaite une nécessité.