Wednesday, August 3rd, 2016

I was awakened at 7:30 by the sound of a sledgehammer.  They finished the sidewalk work on the building next to us and now they are working on the street corner nearest to us.

At the health club I was able to use the leg extension machine again.

I received a call from Abel.  Teresa explained to him that I’m playing in a chess tournament this week.

I left the apt at 5pm for my 6:30pm chess game.  (There were some dark clouds so I took my large umbrella.)  I took the metro bus and got a little nervous when it didn’t take its usual turn a block from the metro.  I think I have about a 30 minute cushion so I should be alright if he’s taking me on a joyride first.  He ended up circling the Renault plant and still dropped us off at the usual spot for the metro.

I just missed a train and waited 5-10 minutes for the next one.  I got on and while not crowded I didn’t get a seat.  At Aguacatala Station a lot of people got on and just about filled the car.  At Pablado Station not everyone who wanted to got on the train and it was packed.  My hand was holding a handle but it was a struggle to continue because of the mov.  At the following stations more people crammed themselves in.  I found myself on the wrong side of the car by the time we got to the San Antonio Station.  I had to literally push and shove to get out with a few other people in front of me.  

I transferred to the west line and got on with no problem.  Again people were crammed in, I didn’t have anything to hold onto but there was not possibility of falling because there wasn’t any space too.  You mean some people here go through this twice a day?  (Teresa told me later it’s because of the flower festival but they wouldn’t be taking a line that takes them away from Jardin Botanico, would they?)

I had less trouble getting off at the Estadio Station because of so many others getting off.  I saw lots of people getting off buses wearing red clothing and walking in the direction of the stadium.  That was my first clue that Medellin was playing a soccer game tonight.

I arrived at the chess league site at 6:05.  They put up a list of 97 names but mine wasn’t on it.  Because of people crowding around it wasn’t easy to get to and see the list.  There was another list of who is playing whom and I wasn’t on that list either.

I went inside to ask the secretary why I wasn’t on the list.  A young man told me, in English, that more names would go up in a few minutes.  I went back out and did a count of chess boards.  I saw 7 rows of 18 chess sets which makes 126 times 2 players per board means they are expecting something like 252 players.

While waiting for the second list I noticed a separate table with a blind man playing.  He fingered the pieces on his board, and had a braille like writer for recording his moves.

They put up a second list of 150 more players and I wasn’t on that list either.  I went inside and was surprised that at 7pm they were still taking new registrations.  I went back outside and bought a café con leche and pan de queso.

An additional addendum finally went up and when the crowd thinned I saw I was finally on that list.  I was playing the black pieces on board 81 against a man with a rating of 1695 – about what I thought my rating should be.  We finally started playing at 7:30.

He opened with e4 (aka P-k4) and I tried unsuccessfully to play my usual white opening as black.  He put a lot of pressure towards mating my king.  I managed to open up most of the pawn cover for his king but couldn’t make any more headway.  I resigned on move 45.  During the game I heard some commotion a number of times from the Stadium – Medellin must have scored.

On my walk back to the metro station I saw on TV sets that Medellin was winning 4-0 against Val (whoever that is).  I stopped and bought a bag of freshly made potato chips for 2,500.  I think I just beat the main crowd coming back from the Stadium as I even managed to get a seat.

At the Envigado Station I hemmed and hawed about whether to take 15 minutes to walk back to the apt. or to sit in a bus for 5 minutes waiting for it to leave, take a 5 minute bus ride, and walk another 5 minutes back to the apt.  I did the former but even though it was a cool night I was nearly sweating after the walk up the hill.  Next time I’ll take the bus.

I arrived back at the apt. at 10:30, had a bowl of cereal and went to bed at 11:15.

T-shirt of the day: Good vibrations.