Your opponent is glancing in different directions. His eyes pry away from the chessboard, looking left and right. You gulp nervously, a little bead of sweat trickling down your forehead, your brain doing a hundred different summersaults. The opponent slowly gets up, walking with calm and ease to the water fountain, with seemingly the most time in the world, as you take frantic looks at the chessboard, analyzing the next move you could make without putting you in peril. You move your last remaining pawn. Press down on the chess clock. Your opponent comes back, hastily looks at the board, and glides his Queen toward that black square. Checkmate.
Chess, quite an intricate sport. Some people know the basics, like me, and could possibly put on a close to decent match. But even fewer people know how to really play it. Openings, middle game, endings, tactics. And when they do play, they are transported into a completely different world, where the soul of chess shines above all things else.
