Playing chess in Hanoi, Vietnam

Not exactly, but you know. This is Xiangqi or Chinese chess. These two guys were very concentrated playing a game at a corner shop in Hanoi's Old Quarter.
Actually this is a place in which it is quite difficult to get concentration due to the noise, the swarm of motorcycles and the frenzy of the business activities.
Taken in Viernam in December 2007

Sarajevo, people playing chess at Liberation square

5 October 2008. Beside the Orthodox Cathedral in Sarajevo. People are playing chess (and kibitzing). If you ever go to Sarajevo you'll most likely find some saralijas playing at Trg Slobodenja. We have already brought the territories of the former Yugoslavia to Chess Images, but this time the picture is somehow nicer.

Kotor chess club (sign)

I took this shot in Montenegro, in the beutiful town of Kotor. It is a sign beside the entrance of the local chess club. It says "Kotor chess club" (Шах Клуб Котор). I could peek inside and indeed all the chess clubs in the world are very similar.

What I like about it is that the town can be recognized thanks to the logo. The main gate through the walls within it. Actually there is a steep mountain behind the town. Ther Rook is invented or at least exaggerated. I would say the Knight is the most typical chess piece and that its mission here is representing chess as a tower is a quite more ambiguous element.

Chess underwater

Impressive pictures by Barry Brown. Anna Zatonskih playing submarine chess against Robin Swinkels in Curaçao.

I can't see the chessboard with so many fish on it.
Seen here.

Hellers - Hansen, Malmö 1987

This tactics example comes from Chess Today. I like the pattern a lot, as it is not so usual. White starts the sequence with a fine move.

Sensual chess (2)

See the first "sensual chess". Not a lot that I can say about this image. Please observe the lady is playing with the Black pieces and she left you unarmed. I hope that bottle of Southern Comfort on the floor does not prevent you from getting a revanche.
Alekhine died around a bottle, we don't have any news that a similar queen was around.

Chess matryoshkas

I was always attracted by the matryoshkas, those Russian nesting dolls. I've never been to Russia myself (yet), but I remember seeing quite a few of them at shops in Prague's Stare Mesto (Old City).

Today I came accross a few chess matryoshkas in Weburbanist, the post is called "gaming matryoshkas" and it is worth having a look to the non-chess-related ones.

Regarding our game we have 3 sets here and in each of them one minor piece is missing (the bishop in the first one, the knight in the other two). It looks as if the set is decorative. We would need a big matryoshka to make the 16 chessmen each side needs to play a game, and also there would be problems as each pawn should be smaller than the previous one.... also, the colour is ambiguous.

The fact that the Knight or the Bishop are always bigger than the Rook draws my attention, as if inconsciouslly I assumed the hierarchy of points must be respected.

Y ahora te mato la dama

And now I'll kill your Queen!. This is a simple vignette, looks like taken from and old book. Again chess as a metaphore of the war. Where is the fun? Probably in the fact that it is ridiculous to wear a uniform to play a table game, or maybe showing intense emotion, the small cannons have some charm here. It is a pity that the cannon is not a piece in Western chess (it is in Chinese chess, though). In total I would say this comic strip is not funny, but it is charming.

"Chess" shop in Ginza, Tokyo (Japan 2007)

For this one I need looser standards as it can be argued that this is not a chess image at all. Many Japanese productions (literary works, cinema, tv) revolve around their vernacular games (shogi, go) or just use them as one more element within a bigger plot. It is not uncommon for the translators or adaptors of those work to use the word "chess", to help Western audicences understanding.This is more appropiate in the case of shogi that in the case of go, as shogi belongs -as chess does- to the chaturanga family of games.

This is a game shop in Ginza, a shopping area of Tokyo. A place in which you will feel like an ant, like many times in Tokyo. It is a wonderful occasion to link the videos of the famous Shibuya crossing.

Yebisu beer chess ad (Japan 2007)

Another of my travel pics, taken on a Tokio train in March 2007. Yebisu (ヱビス) is a beer brand that belongs to Sapporo Breweries. One must take into account that whereas in the Western world the use of chess in advertising is quite common, in Japan the game is quite exotic so I think I came accross a gem. Probably the Western culture is better known in Japan than the other way round, but I think that trying to visualize the effect that go or shogi would have in a Western audience helps to understand the idea.

Also beer is or used to be an alien element in the Japanese culture. When I go to a Japanese restaurant I never see Yebisu in the menu. Asahi seems to be the standard Japanese beer abroad. Looking for a better quality pic, I discovered a game called Beer Chess, which I would not recommend.

El Che en Colonia

Also in Cologne, not so far away from the Grünfeld pub, there is a tobacconist who sells Cuban habanos. We have already talked about Cuba in Chess Images, when we received the visit of Fidel Castro.

In this German tobacco shop we found his revolutionary colleague Ernesto "Che" Guevara, also a chess fan. In front of his image, a chess set, including what I would call "Napoleonic" chessmen.

Allons enfants de la patrie, hasta la victoria siempre.