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November 20, 2005 (Year of the Rooster)
Column #241
Japanese. More from the 3rd China Majiang Championship and Forum in Beijing 3 weeks ago.
As tough as the Chinese players were, the top team honors went to two teams from Japan. These are the folks of the Japan Sports Mahjong Association. They weren't at the 2002 World or Hainan 2003 or OEMC 2005, so it seemed to me that they came out of nowhere to win 1st and 2nd place. Nice folks.
Masato Chiba seemed like a changed man. Quiet and reserved in Nijmegen, he was outgoing and jovial at CMCF (where he ranked 77th).
Japanese TV will show footage by Kaori Tanaka (seen here with world champ Mai Hatsune, who ranked 58th).
For complete pictures and story of the 3rd CMCF, go to http://www.sloperama.com/CMJC/index.html.
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© 2005 Tom Sloper. All rights reserved.