Flying from Khartoum to Cairo after the second trip to Sudan, and it started as a single game.
Then the best of three.
Then a match that lasted until we landed in Cairo. She was good. Damn good, and my chess muscles hadn’t been given a workout like that for ages.
She was flying home to Copenhagen with her older sister and mother, having spent a month or so in Sudan with relatives, and she and her sister were like two bottles of coke, left in the sun, shaken then opened. They zeroed in on us as the only two westerners on the plane, and well, we were worn down. But in a good way.
After transfer in Cairo, we flew on to Amsterdam where we parted company. As we exited the plane and headed for our connecting flight to London, I looked for them to say goodbye but they had been taken off into a secure glass cubicle by Dutch Immigration, presumably to answer questions about their travels and destination.
They cut a sad picture as they stared out at the disembarking passengers, more so because this little one seemed oblivious to the reality of the situation. In the air we had been equals, though I know I never played chess as well at her age. On the ground, a different story.
Asteroid Impact 2010