Archive for January, 2007

Some quick background for those who don’t know this already: I was a nationally competitive debater in high school and college. In a lot of ways, I credit debate for making me the person I am now: confident, smart, socially conscious, well-read, and ethical. Debate helped me in school and helped me get into a good college. While in college, I started volunteering with, and then working for, Chicago’s Urban Debate League, a non-profit organization that starts debate programs in public high schools in Chicago.

After graduating from college, I turned down an offer of a full-time job with benefits (not a wise thing for a kid with a degree in philosophy to do) in the urban debate field so that I could be with my girlfriend in Boston. I missed the debate league, though, and so along with a friend of mine, I started a similar one in Boston. Two years later, six schools and about sixty students participate in our debate competitions.

Anyway, last Saturday we put on a series of public debates at Faneuil Hall, an historic building in Boston where Samuel Adams argued for revolution, William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass argued for abolition, and Susan B. Anthony argued for women’s suffrage. I was obviously very excited to have my students become a part of the tradition of great debate at Faneuil Hall, but there was a lot of preparation to be done getting them ready to debate in front of an audience (generally, a single judge is the only witness to their debating).  Read the complete post...

No Vendar Flores

I didn’t get to bed until 4AM last night, but I suck at sleeping in and wake around 9. For once there is no rain, and I am really not bummed about busting on day 1 of the tournament, since I now have two more days to tour Barcelona. I haven’t yet been to La Sagrada Familia (The Holy Family), a 19th-century cathedral designed by Barcelona’s homegrown architect Gaudi and probably the city’s number one tourist destination, so that’s where I’m heading today. I eat breakfast and make for the train station, about four blocks from the hotel.

Cultural Fact 7: In the US, one often sees signs prohibiting certain activities in public places, with two of the more common ones being “No panhandling” and “Do not step on grass.” The Barcelonan equivalents seem to be “No vendar flores” and “No futbol”.

On my way to subway, an old woman approaches me with a fistful of flowers. I try to shake my head and wave my hand at her to indicate a lack of interest, but she is shaking her head right back, as though there is something I don’t understand. “No, no, es Fiesta.”

“Um,” I stare blankly as she forces a stem into my palm. I know this isn’t free.  Read the complete post...

I show up early at the casino to make sure I have time to register, and who should be next to me in line but Yurian? We’ve got time to kill, so we get lunch along the waterfront. I let him choose the place, and he selects what is essentially an overpriced fast food pasta place. So much for Europeans having good taste in food. At least he speaks some Spanish and is willing to be pushy about getting the check.

Level 1: Blinds 25/50

The 1 seat is late to arrive, and loses a big pot almost immediately after sitting down. He raises in late position and calls a re-raise from Gustav in the BB. The flop comes down Ace-high, Gustav bets 2000, the guy raises to 5000, Gustav shoves, and the guy angrily mucks, claiming he had KK. Well played, sir. Gustav shows an A.

The next big pot, Terrance raises to 150 from the CO, and Ann re-raises to 300 from the BB. The flop is K85, Ann checks and calls a bet. The turn is an 8, Ann checks, Terrance bets 1500, Ann raises to 3000, Terrance calls. The river checks through, Ann shows AJ, and Terrance’s KQ is good.

Ann picks up a few small pots with no showdown, but in every instance she has made small bets or raises relative to the pot.  Read the complete post...

Once again I awake to pouring rain, but yesterday the precipitation tapered off by mid-afternoon, so I don’t stress about it and just go downstairs to see what our free breakfast buffet looks like. My understanding was that the continental breakfast you get at an American hotel (coffee, juice, pre-packaged pastry) was so named because of breakfasts provided at hotels on the European continent, so I don’t have my hopes up, but whoooooooooowheeeee are my expectations ever exceeded. The Hilton spreads a top-of-the-line meal with delicious fresh-squeezed juice, all kinds of meat and smoked fish, fresh fruits, several kinds of yogurt, varied croissants and other pastries, and even American cereals. And it is all free, all-you-can-eat.

Very little makes me happier than a huge, delicious breakfast, so I am already in a good mood when I take a seat across from a Norwegian guy who looked to be in his late 20’s or early 30’s. We exchange pleasantries, which includes sharing Stars screen names, and when I tell him mine, he starts to laugh. “You were at my table, in the satellite I won,” he says. “I kept stealing your blinds.”

Son of a bitch! This is the guy I described in my first e-mail, who had me and another big stack to his left and kept raising the button with impunity. I smile. “If you ever had raised me, I would immediately. Anything,” he tells me.  Read the complete post...

The Rain in Spain

When I wake up, it is morning, and we are about to land in Barcelona. I meet up with 10K-in-Clay, whose real name is Dan, and his girlfriend, Danielle (Dan and Danielle… cute, but maybe a little too cute). Dan is a 19-year old Canadian about to play his first live event. This is only my second one, but I try to share a few things I learned from my first one. Danielle is his age, friendly but quiet. They knew each other from high school but now go to different colleges. I’m quite sure that no teenage daughter of mine would be jetting off to Spain with her poker-playing boyfriend, but I hear Canada is a pretty liberal country, so more power to them.

After collecting our bags, we pass through customs without so much as turning a head and go to find the cab stand. I had heard that precipitation on the Iberian peninsula is localized primarily in the flatlands, but no sooner have we gotten in the cab than the sky opens up and pours down rain drops the size of golf balls onto our little vehicle. The driver, who seems not to speak English, is on his cell phone and has his window cracked. Since his cab is moving forward, the rain is coming in at an angle, landing not on him, but on the seat behind him, where yours truly happens to be sitting. I have no idea how to communicate this to him, and don’t want to distract him further from the road, which already seems not to be his top priority, so I just sit there and get wet.  Read the complete post...

I take a short flight from Boston to Philadelphia, then a long one from Philadelphia to Barcelona. 2p2’er 10K-in-Clay is on this flight and has told me I should be able to recognize him because he’ll be with his purple-haired girlfriend. I introduce myself briefly, agree to split a cab with them in Barcelona, then board the plane.

While waiting to take off, I flip through some Barcelona books I bought or took out of the library, and learn some interesting facts.

Cultural Lesson One: Barcelona is a city of thieves. All Barcelonans should be presumed to be pickpockets and petty criminals until proven otherwise. No belongings should be allowed out of my sight, and anything slightly important or valuable should be stapled to my person so that it cannot be swiped by teenage hoodlums on mopeds.

Cultural Lesson Two: Barcelona loves [censored]. Seriously. Taking a good [censored] is practically the official sport of the city. At Christmas time, a typical creche in Barcelona will include the standard figurines for donkeys, three wise men, Mary, Joseph, baby Jesus, and also an unknown peasant taking a squat in the manger.

New Vocabulary Acquired: “Cafe solo” = strong black coffee, no milk or sugar

“Comte” = check, as in the bill from a restaurant.  Read the complete post...

I qualified for EPT Barcelona largely by chance. After having a great time and cashing at the WSOP, I had the desire to play more big live tournaments and the bankroll to take some shots at them. Unfortunately Poker Stars runs most of their satellites on weekends, and I rarely have the opportunity to play weekend tournaments, as these are the only times my girlfriend is not working and I generally try to keep them free. But for whatever reason, there was one Saturday that I did have free, and so I decided to play all three of the EPT satellites running that afternoon (Barcelona, London, and Baden) at ~$500 each. Each was paying a seat to just over 1 out of every 20 participants, so between the 3 of them, I felt I had between a 33%-50% chance of winning something.

I didn’t make it too far in the London or Baden events (which would have been my top choices), but made it to the final two tables of the Barcelona one, with twelve spots to be paid out. Unfortunately, my stack was the shortest of the 18 remaining players, but I had the chipleader to my immediate left, and he was (correctly) playing very tight, so I was able to steal from him a few times, then won a coin flip, won another big pot with Aces, and suddenly I was in 3rd.  Read the complete post...

I get back to my room about 2AM Friday night, exhausted from another long day of poker, but there are no more days off, and I need to be in my seat at the Rio and ready to play at noon on Saturday. I wake at 9AM, head down to catch the Poker Stars shuttle around 10:30, and see several people in Poker Stars shirts standing in the taxi line. Seems Stars is no longer running the shuttle, so I split a cab with them to the Rio and we all head down to the hospitality suite for coffee and muffins. We are talking idly when a bearded journalist interrupts us to introduce himself, “Hi, my name is Jim McManus, and I’m covering the World Series for the LA Times. I’m writing a piece on bluffing in poker and bluffing in the Middle East, and I was wondering if any of you could share some stories about big bluffs you’ve been involved in so far in this tournament.”  Read the complete post...