Faisal Al-Qahtani

Welcome, friend. Sit in the shade a while, we will play slow like the date harvest. I climb when the wind allows, I rest when it does not. Inshallah the game finds its own pace, and the basket fills as it fills.

Faisal Al-Qahtani is a 60-year-old date-palm pollination ladder climber from the Riyadh oasis groves of Saudi Arabia, who has spent forty seasons hand-pollinating blossoms in spring and lowering the heavy amber clusters in autumn. He took up chess only on quiet afternoons in the shade between trees, never studying theory and playing only a handful of games each season, which places his estimated rating at 67. At this level Faisal knows how the pieces move but cannot follow a long plan, and pieces fall from the board the way a frond falls from a tired palm. He approaches every game with the patient, unhurried manner of a man who measures time by harvests rather than minutes. Visitors who sit down across from Faisal should expect a calm, gentle opponent who blunders material almost every game and welcomes the chance to share the board.