Stalemates

Chess is a part of my childhood that I had always never acknowledged. I know the rules, I know some moves, yet I never took to liking the mind sport.

I'll admit that I never got into chess since any chance of me developing a liking for the game had been continuously nipped off the bud by two factors: 1. my brother who taught me the rules never intended me to like the game (in other words, he seemed to have just wanted someone he could always beat); 2. I don't really like the underlying principles upon which the adversaries battle.

Yeah, I got discouraged right off the beginning since my older brother just wanted to keep beating me at it (I supposed it was because he was, in turn, always beaten by his classmates back then). =P Don't tell me I'm just sour graping or something, but I do hope everyone realizes that beating someone up to encourage them to be better is VERY MUCH different from beating them just on a whim.

Nonetheless, factor 2 is the more important factor. I just don't like chess. Period. But why, you ask?

While chess is a great strategy game (which should surely suit me), it is but a continuous battle of sacrifices for the "greater good." I never had been one to believe that principle, and so I shunned away any prospects of honing my strategy skills for chess. Plain and simple, I don't like sacrificing even just pawns to get the objective - that is, to kill the enemy's king.

Another thing I don't like about it are stalemates (or standoff, whatever you may prefer calling draws). Real life just won't allow a tie in any of it's true contests. In the long run, stalemates in the real world are nothing but periods of inactivity wherein both sides are just re-formulating their strategies.

But then again, you may be wondering why I'm writing about something I don't really like. Well, aside from the fact that the other rules of chess have practical uses in real life, the show I'm quite hooked onto these days, Code Geass, is pretty much a complicated game of chess.

And yes, the latest episode I watched, episode 13, shows just how ugly a game of chess can get (in terms of sacrifices, that is). Yeah, yeah, I'm a Shirley Fenette fan deep inside, and I don't like her being killed off just like that. And being taken out of the story just because there was a stalemate in her feelings for Lelouch doesn't make things any better.

I don't like chess. I don't despise it, but I just don't like it.