Checkmate for Parthiephal
Dayaan Parthiephal, a Durban North resident, has been chosen as one of three girls to represent South Africa at two auspicious chess tournaments.
IT has only been three years since 13-year-old Dayaan Parthiephal started playing chess professionally. Now the young athlete has been chosen as one of three girls to represent South Africa at two auspicious tournaments – the Common Wealth Chess Tournament in India in July, and the African Youth Chess Tournament to be held in Zambia in December.
“It is exciting. This will be the first time I will be travelling outside of the country. I am also feeling nervous, as I don’t know what to expect. I am just hoping to make my country proud and to feel good about my performance,” said the Durban North resident.
At the moment Parthiephal, who is a pupil at Northlands Girls’ High School, is balancing her chess practice with her exam studies. “I am a very sporty person. So, although I practice chess everyday, I am also involved in soccer and touch rugby. I also try and balance all of these things with my social life. I make a point of spending time with my friends,” she said.
When asked what advice the young chess player had for other enthusiast she said, “A good chess player must be able to accept when they have lost a game.” She insisted that it was the best way to improve your chess skills, as she had learned the most from the games that she had lost.
Parthiephal added that there were also loads of knowledge and information available on the Internet and in local libraries.
According to Parthiephal the love of the game has done more than simply giving her the opportunity to travel and represent her courtly, it has also sharpened her logic skills, improved her maths and memory as well as her ability for foreword thinking.
