The Wolf And The Lamb Shall Graze Together...

On Friday 2nd April we were able to have two mahjong tables in action at Kodama mahjong parlour with seven people playing. Noda, David and Jaime were joined by Kenyon, who made his 2010 debut. Tonight was also Ladies Night, with Hatsue-san and Aimi-san in attendance. The seventh player was Nobu who beetled in just as play had started, but not to late to take the fourth seat at the Ladies' table where Noda was holding court and resisting all attempts to elicit from him a gentlemanly promise not to clean up at the ladies' expense...

David thought it might not be such a good thing to let a wolf play among the lambs, but as Jaime sagely noted, it was better to have the the wolf lying down with the lambs of another sheepfold than to have him graze together with us in our own...

Table 1: Noda, Hatsue, Aimi, Nobu
Table 2: David, Jaime, Kenyon

After a couple of games we drew lots once again for tables: The situation was that Noda had built up a commanding lead at the expense of the ladies.

Table 1: David, Kenyon, Nobu
Table 2: Noda, Jaime, Hatsue, Aimi

By the end of the evening Noda was approaching +200 points while Hatsue suffered two Yakitori games and was in minus triple figures. Aimi had also suffered severe losses but was able to recover some ground in the second game.

Meanwhile, Nobu, who had been holding his own, suffered at the hands of Kenyon, who finished the evening in the +90s. David also took advantage of Nobu's generosity and in one case Nobu obliged David with a 5-Character when he had deliberately opted for a tricky Kanchan wait (4_6) on a Oya Riichi with only two 5-Character tiles left in play....

Noda +75, +27, +6 = +108
Kenyon +24, +22, +20, +28 = +94
David -15, -3, +49, -12 = +19
Jaime -9, -19, +3, +37 = +12
===
Aimi -90, +62, -9 = -37
Nobu +12, -69,* -16 = -73
Hatsue +3, -92,** -34** = -123

* Chombo
** Yakitori

So, at the commencement of the second quarter of 2010 the Grand Accumulated Results Table looks like this:

Name	Played	Chombo	Yakitori	Score
Noda	33	0	2	+465
David	38	1	2	+154
Kenyon	4	0	0	+94
Aimi	5	0	0	+26
Ray	4	0	0	-1
Neil	6	2	0	-9
Hide	10	0	0	-68
Jaime	28	0	1	-108
Hatsue	6	0	2	-205
Nobu	16	3	2	-348

David Hurley
Japanese-Mahjong.com

Has Nobu Found His Bottom?

Two weeks ago Nobu achieved his first positive result for 2010 by finishing on +1 for the evening. The result was achieved by finishing "second-and-in-the-black" in the first and third games.

There was a moment in the opening game when the gap between Nobu and Jaime narrowed to fewer than fifty points as Jaime found himself in the middle of yet another "opening game disaster" complete with a Yakitori grilled and served on his plate at the end of the game.

Apart from Nobu's first game result, the first two games were a one-way street for David, who began to harbour hopes of knocking Noda off the top spot again.

Indeed, Noda did the honours in that regard in the third and final game of the evening, but the loot flowed Jaime's way as he made his customary "end of evening recovery" to get back from -81 to -25 for the evening and keep some space between himself and Nobu.

So, Noda stays on top (just)... but the question is, has Nobu found his bottom? If so, will he be able to get out of it?

David +54, +49, -12 = +91
Nobu +13, -22, +10 = +1
===
Jaime -64,* -17, +56 = -25

Noda -3, -10, -54 = -67

* Yakitori

David H.
Japanese-Mahjong.com

Jan 2010 - Noda Breaks 3 Yearly Records In Two Weeks!

A quick glance at our 3 player mahjong scoreboard for 2010 will show that Noda is registered as having achieved the highest score so far this year, the best result AND the worst result after just two evenings of play.

• Higest score = Noda +124
• Lowest score = Jaime -89
• Best result = Noda +124
• Worst result = Noda -96
  

Friday January 15th

The first game took place on January 15th amid the smog of cigar smoke as David and Jaime puffed away in celebration of David's birthday.

Those two had spent the previous couple of hours in Kemby's along with Noda, Ray, Tim (and his new Kindle), Don, Alex, Tim. The cigars had been procured from the upstairs bar, which really deserves to be better frequented as one of the few cigar bars in town. A worrying sign was that the number of cigars available was considerably fewer than the range of cigars on offer on the menu...

Don accompanied the mj players back to Kodama and was present at the brief prize-giving ceremony in which Noda was awarded a natty Saint Andrew's golf tin containing a divot tool and ball place markers and Nobu was awarded a chopstick rest in the form of a DUCK. (There are five more chopstick rest ducks available for award ceremonies for the years 2010-2014.)

David presents Nobu with the 2009 3PMJ DUCK!

The air was thick with chatter and smoke, so it is no surprise really that Noda started the year as strongly as he finished the previous one.

The amazing thing is that David managed to get into double figures on the beer front, go through two cigars and end up in his favoured position of "second and in the black".

Noda +33, +91, --, --, -- = +124
David --, -14, +36, -14, +3 = +11
===
Ray -2, --, +3, +21, -23 = -1
Nobu -24, 0, -22, --, -- = -46
Jaime -7, -76, -17, -7, +20 = -88

Friday January 22nd

The second evening of play was a much quieter affair as far as the peripheral activities are concerned and all the activity was focused on mj play.

Noda, David and Jaime got through six games in the evening. David ran away with the first game at Jaime's expense. Noda threatened to take over in the second but was contained.

We changed seats. Noda moved into the unoccupied seat to his left and David and Jaime switched places. David continued to do well, but the real focus of play shifted as Jaime recovered from the minus 90s and Noda languished and even got caught with his Yakitori on the table, the first of the year!

The score sheet was left at Kodama, but the final reckoning was as follows:

David +97
===
Jaime -1
Noda -96**

** Yakitori

David Hurley
Japanese Mahjong

Noda Marches On As Foreigners Sink In The Mire

This was not a good night for foreign players! It was probably all the fault of the Poor Little Cypriot. When Noda was on his first hand as Oya the PLC moved off Tempai to try and build a pure bamboo hand, a tactic that backfired and that went against every principle of play when Noda is Oya!

While the PLC did indeed end up with 13 Bamboo tiles in his hand, he was still one off Tempai when Noda went out. Worse still, Noda went on to rack up about eight or so hyaku tembou, and by the time he relinquished the Oya the PLC was in hock to the tune of about 30,000 points. It was thoroughly deserved, and the score for the first game tells the story: Noda +116, David -116, Ray 0!

The second game saw one of the recoveries of the year, however, as the PLC found himself with a Suuanko-Tanki wait on 3-Coins, but also with the option of going out on 2 or 5-Coins. Ray threw the 3-Coins and handed the PLC a much needed 65,000 points, which could possibly be the record single hand score for the year.

Hide arrived in time for the third game, and it turned out that the foreigners' fortunes, such as they were, had peaked. Ray never got past zero, and the PLC never got that far, -14 being the best cumulative score of his evening.

Noda won the third and fourth, and called it an evening on a healthy +209, a score which ensured that he had broken through the +1000 point barrier in style.

I'm sure that Ray and the PLC would have been happy to have called it a night at this stage too, but Kayo had arrived and not yet had a game so they stayed and both continued on the downward slope as Hide won the fifth and Kayo the sixth games.

The result was that Ray took the "worst result" from Jaime by racking up a total score of -193. It was a bit harsh really, when you consider that 65 of those points came from one discard!

The Grand Accumulated Results Table is beginning to look rather embarrassing as the top four players are all Japanese and all in the black. All the foreign players are in the red, and the only Japanese player down there with them is the rookie Nobuhiro, and he is moving up the table by default as the foreigners drop below him one by one...

Not only that but Nobuhiro is an improving player who is expected to record a positive finish any time soon...

Noda +116, -3, +59, +37, --, -- = +209
Hide --, --, -10, +13, +38, +11 = +52
Kayo --, --, --, --, -9, +45 = +36
===
David -116, +102, -5, -14, -16, -55 = -104
Ray 0, -99, -44, -36, -13, -1 = 193


David Hurley
Japanese Games Shop