Jr. High School Nationals Begin in San Diego

Arrived in San Diego last night (Thursday, April 26th with my whole family.  The Jr. High School Nationals are being held here, and I'm playing in the K-8 Championship Section.  It's being held at the Town & Country Resort, which is very close to Sea World.  The resort is very big.  Our room is in the Regency Towers which is farthest tower from the playing hall, but it's a very short walk, and the room is not that noisy. We checked in, checked out the playing hall, and looked in on the blitz tournament going on.  Then we went to dinner with the Beilin's.  We went to a very modern restaurant at the Fashion Valley Mall.  The restaurant was called Stacks and you use iPads to order your meal, order refills, and pay.  I think the Beilin's are going to implement this system at home in the bay area.  I can't wait to see Natasha's reaction to the new program.  The mall is very close to the resort.  We drove but it is a very short walk.


Today the first round was at 1:00 p.m. against and 8th grader from Texas named Shota Kaieda.  Here I am sitting at Board 5 waiting for him to arrive.  The biggest disappointment was that IS 318 from New York switched sections to K-9 at the last minute.  The top two boards were now in another section and Team Kennedy with Neel Apte, Kesav Visawanda, Udit Iyengar, Pranav Srihari and myself, were really looking for a good team match against them.  Since they changed sections at the last minute we were not able to switch into the K-9 Section.  I won my first match in less than 90 minutes and was able to rest up for my next match at 7:00 p.m.  All the team Kennedy also won, as well as Allan & Vignesh.  Blake lost.

My brother and my dad went to Sea World.

Here my brother is at the Shamu show, and on the other side he is at the Sea Lion Show.  They got to do the whole park, while my mom worked on her homework and I played chess.



Here I am with my very good friends, Allan Beilin from Atherton, and Blake Wong from Coalinga.  Although I only see these guys at chess events, I really enjoy spending time with them.  Why do I look so short in the middle of them.  That Blake has gotten so tall, they must really have good food in Coalinga...(Moooooo).

My second match was with Edgar Santoya a seventh grader from Texas.  I won this match in about 2 and half hours.  Allan & Kesav also won their matches.  Right now, Neel & Udit are still playing.  Tomorrow we have three matches at 9:00 a.m., 2:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m.   I better get a good night sleep which is very difficult with my little brother in the room.  He wakes up very early and makes noise all night.