Scrabble World Championship Update: Isaan Thai schoolboy moves into the lead!

[webfact]

Scrabble World Championship Update: Isaan Thai schoolboy moves into the lead!

 

Tarin Pairor

 

Fifteen year old Thai schoolboy Tarin Pairor was sensationally leading the World Scrabble Championship in India on Friday. 

 

After 21 games at the WESPAC event in Goa the Year 10 student at Plookpanya Nakhon Ratchasima School had moved into pole position. 

 

Breathing down his neck is the formidable presence of Nigel Richards, the undisputed greatest player of all time from New Zealand. 

 

Nigel beat Tarin by a mere 8 points earlier on Friday but the amazing Thai boy regrouped to defeat the Day 1 and Day 2 tournament leader Jesse Day of the United States. 

 

 

There are eleven more games to go today and tomorrow with the top two then taking on each other in a best of seven head to head to decide the World Champion. 

 

Tarin has only been playing the game for two years and if he were to get to the final it would represent the biggest shock in the near three decades long history of the world championships. 

 

Two Thais have won the title before but no one as young as fifteen has been in this position competing at the top echelon of the world's favorite word game.

 

-- © Copyright Thai Visa News 2019-10-18

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[graemeaylward]

Did he win? I can find no follow up!


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[graemeaylward]

Just discovered that he finished 22nd! No wonder it disappeared from headlines :-) Still he did beat the World Champion in one game. Not bad for a 15 year old who has only been playing for a couple of years. Keep it up young man.


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[Doge]

Can someone please post a diatribe about the horrible state of Thai education? This positive vibe is not in line with farang common wisdom.

 

Great job lad!

[Orton Rd]

10 minutes ago, Doge said:

Can someone please post a diatribe about the horrible state of Thai education? This positive vibe is not in line with farang common wisdom.

 

Great job lad!

You really think he is good at a board game because of the Thai education system? NO he has a good memory and logic skill in spite of the Thai education system.

[DLock]

57 minutes ago, Doge said:

Can someone please post a diatribe about the horrible state of Thai education? This positive vibe is not in line with farang common wisdom.

 

Great job lad!

You don't seriously give any credit to the Thai education system?

 

I think this is the result of a bright, self motivated kid with good parents and a thirst for knowledge and competition.

 

He will do well in life.

[josephbloggs]

1 hour ago, Doge said:

Can someone please post a diatribe about the horrible state of Thai education? This positive vibe is not in line with farang common wisdom.

 

Great job lad!

I'm waiting for the first "with the world's most dangerous roads you think there'd be more important things to report on" type post.  Any minute now...

[keysersoze276]

You would think in a country with the world's most dangerous roads, the media would have better things to report on. 

[Fex Bluse]

On 10/21/2019 at 9:28 AM, josephbloggs said:

I'm waiting for the first "with the world's most dangerous roads you think there'd be more important things to report on" type post.  Any minute now...

People are grasping at straws when they feel the need to puff out their chest on account of a stupid scrabble competition. 

 

It's about as silly an "accomplishment" as one could think of.

 

Maybe Thailand can become an intellectual, innovation powerhouse on the back of this scrabble accomplishment.

[Fex Bluse]

@Doge @josephbloggs

 

Further to my above post, if countries that are actually doing important things in the world (unlike Thailand) started posting news stories about every international competition they placed highly in, the news would be OVERLOADED with such stories.

 

Can you imagine if countries like the US, Germany, Singapore, Japan, UK did this?!  There would be hundreds of thousands of stories.

 

The fact that a scrabble placement is big news in Thailand is a perfect reflection of the poor state of education and lack of accomplishment in Thailand.

 

[cornishcarlos]

On 10/18/2019 at 8:06 PM, webfact said:

the world's favorite word game.

 

Without a doubt.... I've lost count of the number of my friends that play scrabble on a regular basis !!!

[keysersoze276]

40 minutes ago, cornishcarlos said:

 

Without a doubt.... I've lost count of the number of my friends that play scrabble on a regular basis !!!

Without a doubt, the world's most favorite word game Is HANGMAN

[wgdanson]

14 minutes ago, keysersoze276 said:

Without a doubt, the world's most favorite word game Is HANGMAN

My favourite WAS Countdown until Rachel got up the duff!    LOL

[djayz]

On the one hand, I take my hat off to this young chap. As previous poster(s) have stated, he's self-motivated, skilled and hopefully has a bright future ahead of him. 

However, when I read stories like this I ALWAYS have one of those "What the duck?!?! moments". The Thailand the majority of us know simply isn't reflected in these kinds of articles.

It's almost sad that when one Thai does achieve something remarkable, he/she is catapulted into the limelight as being an "example of our great, gifted and unique people"; when in fact they are one of the very, very few here who actually strive to achieve anything worthwhile. 

Good luck young chap. I sincerely hope the village idiots in Isan won't pull you down to their level. 

[josephbloggs]

3 hours ago, Fex Bluse said:

@Doge @josephbloggs

 

Further to my above post, if countries that are actually doing important things in the world (unlike Thailand) started posting news stories about every international competition they placed highly in, the news would be OVERLOADED with such stories.

 

Can you imagine if countries like the US, Germany, Singapore, Japan, UK did this?!  There would be hundreds of thousands of stories.

 

The fact that a scrabble placement is big news in Thailand is a perfect reflection of the poor state of education and lack of accomplishment in Thailand.

 

And there we go, I knew you'd oblige.

Who said it was "Big News" or that Thailand is puffing out it's chest?  I only saw it on here, posted to get people like you frothing at the mouth.  Yeah, imagine if places like Singapore did this hey....

Their national newspaper no less:  https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/education/scrabble-champ-has-the-words-to-beat-em-all

 

I can't be bothered to Google for the other countries but, guess what, people do report on Scrabble championships.  And it is kind of big news when a CHILD in a non-English speaking country beats the world champion ADULT from an English speaking country and he deserves credit for it.  Not that we could expect you to ever acknowledge that a Thai could deserve credit for anything, much easier to just put the whole country down for daring to report it.  What a sad cynical way to go through life.