Chess Festival in Thăng Long-Hà Nội

February 25, 2010 5:03 PM GMT+7

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The tradition festival of chess is often held at Vua Pagoda on Thịnh Yên Street, Hà Nội

The statue of Đế Thích in Vua Pagoda looks like a king wearing an imperial rope and a crown. Besides being a place of worship, the Pagoda also has a chess board and a stele house at the three-entrance gate where the traditional festival of chess competitions is held from the 6^th to the 9^th days of the first lunar month. Every year the Pagoda’s Festival attracts a lot of people who also come to watch chess contests and encourage the contestants. As the local custom, any player who wins the chess tournament three years in a row has his name engraved on the stone stele and is awarded a chess set after it has ceremoniously sat in the Đế Thích Shrine for a month.

Two members of the Vietnamese Chess Association who have been awarded this special honor are 93-year-old Lê Uy Vệ, who played chess for over 80 years and won the chess championship in 1939, 1940 and 1941, and 80-year-old Nguyễn Tân Thơ who played chess for 64 years and won the chess championship in 1953, 1954 and 1955. According to Thơ, in the old days chess competitions were held in early spring at Đồng Nhân Temple, the Đống Đa Mount Festival, Văn Miếu–Quốc Tử Giám (inner Hà Nội), the Phú Ninh Festival (Gia Lâm), Cổ Loa Temple (Đông Anh) and at the Chèm Communal House (Từ Liêm).

A human chess competition at Vua Pagoda in Hà Nội

There are different kinds of chess competitions, such as Cờ người (human chess match), Cờ bàn, Cờ bỏi, Cờ treo and Cờ quạt. In Cờ người, the ground is marked as a chessboard with men standing for red pieces and women standing for black pieces, who are controlled by the players in the rhythm of drumbeats. In Cờ bàn, a table is used as the chessboard and the pieces are made of wood or ivory. Cờ bỏi is played on the ground on which boards are planted as the pieces. In a Cờ đèn match, the chess pieces are lanterns hung on strings over the chessboard and the players usually recite a verse in Kiều tale before moving each piece. In Cờ treo, the large chessboard is hung high so that the viewers can see and comment on the moves. In a Cờ quạt match, each move is controlled according to the movement of the fan which is folded after each move.

Playing chess after working hours at Ngọc Sơn Temple in Hoàn Kiếm Lake (Hà Nội) is a pleasure of many gentlemen

A set of chess consists of 16 red pieces and 16 black pieces, each of which has a name. The moving of each piece must follow special rules. When the supreme piece is defeated the game ends. The best players have the ability to anticipate their opponent’s moves.

Over the years, the chess festival has been held solemnly as an international competition at Vua Pagoda, attracting many outstanding Vietnamese chess players from all parts of the country. From these competitions, chess player Nguyễn Vũ Quân became a Vietnamese chess champion for three consecutive years, 2007, 2008 and 2009, glorifying Vietnamese chess throughout the world.