My Interests & Hobbies
Allow me to tell you about my hobbies:
I like to teach very much! It started from a very early age when my parents (who have been coaching from 1970) were helping me to improve my chess skills. I started the first serious session of lessons when I was 13 in one of the high-schools in Tel-Aviv (Israel). That session was very successful and I understood that my ability to teach is very high and I should continue with it. Later on in Budapest, where me and my parents opened a chess academy, I taught for 5 years. My students’ level ranged from beginners till titled players with a rating of up to 2500. Most of them were coming to play in the famous “First Saturday” events and very many gained rating or made title norms! The best student was Tomi Nyback from Finland who had an IM title and 2475 rating and came to play in “First Saturday” GM tournament of Mr. Nagy. Tomi was studying the very important middlegame and endgame collection created by my parents back in 1992 every day for 3-4 hours. He finished the tournament with big success – he fulfilled his last GM norm!! And also now in Athens, Greece I have many students online – on ICC and playchess.com. If you would like to improve your level, contact me, I will be glad to help you!
As a professional chessplayer I travel a lot. So far I have been to more than 30 countries and hopefully will travel even more in the future!
Sports – I like to jog, play table-tennis, sometimes I go to the gym and I can make a bridge!
One of my favourite ways of having a rest is to make candles! I have all the necessary materials (shaped moulds, different fragrances, parafine, etc) from a special shop where we often go to. I make all kinds of candles : small, big, medium, star-shaped, round, pyramide-shaped, rose-shaped, with one or more colors! We like to give them to our friends. Maybe we should think of opening a candleshop…J!
Another way of resting is playing with the rabbitsJ They are very friendly and are always happy to run around!
We also have other inhabitants in the house! One is a turtle we found on the street some years ago and the other is a black guinea pig! You can view the photos of all the pets on the Photos page!
Also of course I love to read. Besides all the chess periodical literature (which is another story) I like reading Russian books. Among the ones I love most are Bulgakov’s “Master and Margarita”, Pasternak’s “Doctor Zhivago”, Anna Akhmatova’s poems, and many many more!
I like different kinds of movies, from action to romantic and we often go with Sotiris to the cinema to see the new ones!
I also love to listen to music! Because my father is a professional pianist, I was listening to classical music, Italian, French, Russian, and many more songs from a very little age! Of course I also like Jazz, R&B, Soul, Pop, etc.