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THE GO PLAYER'S GUIDE TO
JAPAN : Ben's Cafe
by Peter N. Nassar
5k
While there's no shortage of go
clubs around Tokyo (there are at least a dozen igo salons, or go-kaisho, in each
of Tokyo's 23 wards), perhaps none are quite as unique, or as English-friendly,
as Ben's Cafe in Takadanobaba.
Ben's Cafe
sits on a quiet backstreet near Waseda University, a college district just north
of downto wn Tokyo. With poetry readings at night, amateur art on the walls, and
a diverse array of young student faces in the crowd, Ben's Cafe looks like a
typical American coffeehouse, except that the art on the walls are drafts of an
upcoming manga series, the poetry is all being read in Japanese, and tucked
underneath the stereo equipment is a large stack of go
boards.
During a visit last summer, I
arrived late at the Sunday morning lesson, having gotten lost on my way from the
train station (most of the streets in Tokyo do not have names, so either get
very specific directions or go with someone who knows their way around). When I
finally arrived, Kazunari Furuyama - better known as "Kaz" - was in the middle
of a go lesson in one corner of the cafe. Kaz is a former insei (or "go
apprentice," as he prefers to describe it) who has been giving free lessons
every Sunday morning at Ben's Cafe along with Rob van Zeijst, another former
insei. Rob began teaching go at Ben's Cafe in 2000, the same week he began
writing his weekly go column for the English newspaper, "The Daily Yomiuri". Kaz
joined on about a year ago, and the two divide the teaching duties along with
Rob's brother-in-law, Remko Popma. Kaz writes original works on go theory for
his website, targeted specifically for amateur players; these highly popular
pieces run on a regular basis in the AGA E-Journal under the title "Important
Fundamental Matters", and they form the basis for his weekly lessons at Ben's
Cafe, as well.
Dressed in white slacks
and an Oxford shirt, Kaz is relaxed but focused as he speaks. The students -
four Japanese, the rest Westerners -- are looking intently at handouts Kaz has
distributed. The Japanese are well-dressed, particularly the women, while the
Westerners are casually dressed. Kaz alternates his explanations in Japanese and
English.
The handouts are go problems
that Kaz has composed, consisting of tesuji for making life and good shape. In
each one, Black is to respond to a move by White to avoid a snapback and
subsequent atari. At first I am confused, because it appears as if the same set
of problems are on both pages. Then I realize that on one page, the initial
moves by White are different. "The first page consists of kyu-level problems,"
Kaz explains to me later over lunch. "The second page shows dan-level problems.
First, in the kyu-level problems, I show my students a basic shape that Black
can make, and I run them through this sequence about half a dozen times, in
different applications, all over the board. This way they learn how to create
the shape and also how to maintain it if White comes in and tries to cut it up.
In the kyu-level problems, White's approach moves are vulgar, in fact they're
often the wrong move, but beginners can understand it, and they can understand
how to respond to it as Black. Once beginners are familiar with that shape, I
take them through the dan-level problems, and now they see it why this move by
Black becomes a tesuji. It's like with mathematics; you can't solve the more
difficult problems without first understanding how the easier ones work." The
late Kageyama Toshiro 7P took a similar approach in his book "Lessons in the
Fundamentals of Go," and Kaz is expanding these fundamentals to specific shapes
for cutting, connecting, and fighting in
go.
Back at the cafe, Kaz shows shows off
his wonderful sense of humor. Kaz builds a shape on the board and plays it out;
White ends up with a strong position between two weak, disconnected Black
groups, all because of a simple error black made early on in the tesuji. "I call
this the 'Romeo & Juliet' shape for Black, because both sides for Black end
in tragedy."
Kaz's fingers blur as he
creates another shape. "This tesuji for White is what I call a 'chopping-onions
tesuji'; because after White ataris, you cry and cry and cry." He translates
this for the Japanese students, and they laugh with
him.
After the hour-long session is over,
we break up into groups to play. Kaz hands out record sheets so we can record
our games and he can comment upon them afterwards. I am secretly excited because
I get to test out a kitschy multi-colored recording pen I bought as a souvenir
from the Nihon Kiin earlier in the week. My opponent is Arakaki Yoshitsugu, a
2-kyu particle accelerator engineer who is visiting from Ibaraki, nearly 2 hours
outside Tokyo. We play two even games, switching colors in between. Over the
course of the next hour, another dozen students arrive, a mix of Japanese and
non-Japanese, beginners and experts. Kaz and the cafe staff handle the chaos of
shuffling chairs and go boards as if they deal with it every day, while Yoshi
and I continue with our game. I los e both games by resignation, but I don't
mind. I have learned a lot, and it feels good just being
here.
Afterwards, Kaz comes over to our
table and reviews our first game. He is encouraging as he shows us where we
might have been able to make stronger moves. Then, he shows us more tesuji
applications, one of Kaz's strengths, which is to show a simple example and then
show various applications to help you recognize how simple shape or tesuji can
be useful to various situations. Yoshi and I try to work through them under
Kaz's tutelage. "Excellent," he tells us as he quickly sets up another
application on a different part of the board, and we try again, emboldened by
his lessons and his positive encouragement of our
progress.
"Schools in Japan force you to
learn or force you to memorize, but they don't teach you to love learning," Kaz
tells me later. "What I wanted to do was teach in a way that would allow people
to enjoy what they were doing." When I leave the cafe later that afternoon,
there are still dozens of people playing go. It appears that Kaz's labors have
more than paid off.
Ben's Cafe: 1-29-21
Takadanobaba
Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, Japan
Ph:
03-3202-2445
Link to Ben's Cafe website: http://www.benscafe.com/en/index.html
Link
to Kaz's website: http://www.joot.com/kaz/index.php?lang=en
Link
to Rob van Zeijst's "Daily Yomiuri" column: http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/columns/0001/
Teachers:
Rob van Zeijst, "Kaz" Kazunari, and Remko Popma. Free lessons each Sunday,
11A-1P
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