Haapsalu is a small seaside town in Estonia. Ottomar Ladva a young GM is from Haapsalu and still lives there. Other notable sportsman from Haapsalu is the tennis player Kaia Kanepi. I played my first chess tournament in Haapsalu back in 1979. This summer there was a chess festival in Haapsalu during the famous White Lady event. Shortly after the chess festival the city council people approached to me with the idea to open some kind of chess academy in Haapsalu. I was taken aback with this offer, today the chess in Estonia is not very popular any more. Still it was not just one time emotional burst and finally last Wednesday the opening event took place in the local Sport center.
The city mayor Urmas Sukles himself was present and also the initiator of the plan the head of city council Jaanus Karilaid. I gave to the chess aficionados short introductory lecture about chess and its benefits to children. After that we had friendly chess games. I managed to beat Mr. Karilaid, but some youngsters had the chance to play with each other. The academy is going to have chess gathering once a week. Every month I am going to visit the Academy to give consulting to the children and to the educators as well. Very nice initiative from the Haapsalu city and I hope we are going to open more Chess Academies in Estonia in the future.
Jaan Ehlvest
