ANYTHING BUT GADGETS
At the Millennium Cup in March, duking it out a few rows away from Wee and Toh were division three competitors – which included primary and secondary school students.
More young players are coming on board these days, with inter-school tournaments gaining traction and the university – mainly NTU – scene still going strong, Purnomo said.
In recent years, a YouTube channel run by American Scrabble grandmaster Will Anderson, with over 50,000 subscribers, has also led to Singaporean viewers reaching out to the local association, he added.
“He has a lot of non-Scrabblers who discover it by following chess or something else, and then they get interested,” said the 46-year-old.
The Scrabble Association, Singapore now has 128 members ranging from primary school age to more than 70 years old.
Younger people make up the majority of new joiners, and occupy most of the novice or intermediate divisions. The top division is occupied by seasoned adults with one or two special “phenoms”, Purnomo said.
The game is also a co-curricular activity offered by several primary schools in Singapore.
The youngest players start by memorising two- to three-letter words and forming what they call “burgers” – multiple words stacked together either down or across.
Thirteen-year-old Isaac Goh discovered the game at a school CCA fair, while in Primary 3. The students manning the booth had invited him to try scrambling and unscrambling tiles to make anagrams.
“I thought that was quite fun so I just joined the CCA,” Isaac said. His mother bought the family’s first Scrabble set soon after.
“It’s not very complicated for me. Simple, easy words; you just put down some, and then after that you get a score,” he told CNA while waiting for a training session to start.
Participating in inter-school competitions and winning matches has motivated him to improve. To him, 50 per cent of a match is decided by luck, while hard work and preparation make up the other half.
His mother Michelle Goh admitted that she initially leaned into her son’s interest with an eye on the Direct School Admission (DSA) scheme. Just one secondary school in Singapore – Maris Stella – takes in Scrabble players under the DSA, which lets students use talents in areas such as sports and music to get into schools ahead of examinations.
Upon seeing her son warming up to the game after winning his first trophy in P4, she thought it would be good to send him for coaching and even overseas competitions for more exposure.
“He doesn’t mind if I send him for more lessons for this. To me, anything that’s away from gadgets is a healthy type of pastime,” said the mother.
Isaac, who ended up enrolling in the Singapore School of Science and Technology, is still at it.
After participating in the tournament in March, he has been attending Scrabble training sessions once a week throughout the June school holidays.
He hopes to break into the top 10 in Singapore for his age group, to earn a shot at playing in the World Youth Scrabble Championship in Kuala Lumpur in August.
The school to international circuit pipeline is not new. Singapore’s second, third and fourth-ranked players all walked this path.
Toh, Singapore’s No 2, started playing in Secondary 2 before joining the school team, competing locally and globally and eventually joining the association.
Three years after his first tournament, Toh won the World Youth Scrabble Championship in 2007.
These days, the 34-year-old tries to play two to four major competitions a year, and will be taking part in the upcoming world championships in Ghana.
“I’ve been playing for some time already, at this stage it’s about joining the ones I want to join. I’m not as hardcore serious about the competitions nowadays, but I do still try to join and meet up with friends. It’s always a good experience to play overseas,” said the full-time public servant.
Toh laughed and said he was sure his world ranking would drop soon, after placing 10th in a recent tournament in Malaysia.
