An Emotional Game I: Greed
I should first state that the nihon kiin ranking system is overrated. This is no major issue - I was only happy to find out that shodan is still as renowned as in any other ranking system. In any event, rank does not matter. It plays into this narrative, but my assumptions of Rank correlation between any two systems is not the point written.
In all of my games I suffer an amount of greed. This much is becoming more and more obvious to me. This is the first emotion under discussion. It is incorrect to rely on the reading ability of one’s opponent. My first game at the kiin was against a 2-kyu. I registered as a 3-kyu and therefore had black. My opponent’s first mistake was at move four, and subsequently at moves six and eight. Once I had the beginnings of a grand moyo the game was over. In this game it was my opponent’s greed that pounded the final nail. He played some big yose in another part of the board which allowed me to make a killing move.
In game two, I nigiri with a 1-kyu and took W with komi. In this game the problem was my own greed. I should have connected the large portion of my group and allowed my opponent to connect out in gote. At least luck was with me: I made a ko with my dead group and took equal compensation elsewhere. My middle game technique was good and his yose very poor, allowing me a win by about 10 moku before komi.
In my final match, a no komi game as Black against a 2-dan, I played a perfect game (for me) and my opponent played as a chicken with her head cut off. After two large kills, yose was completed before she announced her loss (though the Japanese took some time to understand).
Affording no disrespect for my opponents, in all of the games, except perhaps the second, the element missing was fighting spirit.