Mr Ron Bleeker from Germany (originally from the Netherlands) with his answer
“You have moved around a lot, problaby even more than me! I am a Dutchman living in Germany and moved 9 times.
What I have found where you lived is:
– Keighley, Skipton, Yorkshire (born 11-12-1987)
– Lucca, Italy (2001)
– Ennis, Ireland (2003-05)
– Enniskillen, Northern Ireland (2005-09)
– Melbourne, Australia (2009)
– Wellington, New Zealand (2009-10)
– Reading, England
– London, England
But I probably missed something…”
It contained the most accurate information from all our readers but did not have it all. Here is Gawain’s answer of where he has lived previously:
Born at a hospital in between Skipton and Keighley but my parents were actually living in Skipton at the time.
We then moved to Ampleforth, a small village in the North Yorkshire Moors when I was only a few weeks old.
We lived there for a couple years until moving to Ripon, a small market town (actually a city as it has a cathedral). After that we moved to Guisborough, another market town in Cleveland. It’s pretty close to Middlesbrough and was the reason I started supporting them (they got promoted to the Premier League the first year I followed their results)! It was here I started playing chess too and Guisborough was my first chess club.
I started at ACJS (the prep school to Ampleforth) when I was seven and we moved to Gilling, a very very small village where the school was based. I lived here for five years or so – the longest I’ve ever lived in one spot. After finishing at the school we decided to up sticks and moved to Lucca, a beautiful walled city in Tuscany, Italy. We lived there a year and a half before moving to a remote converted barn in Scarperia, up in the hills near Florence.
When I was sixteen we headed back to an English speaking country and lived in Ennis, Ireland for a couple years where I completed my schooling. After that I decided on a gap year and during that year my parents moved up to Enniskillen in Northern Ireland. I headed back to England and rented a house near Reading with Tom (also our current flatmate).
I met Sue while living there and quite quickly moved to the antipodes. We spent a few months holidaying before living in Melbourne for three months. Then back to New Zealand and we settled in Wellington for a fantastic year. In June 2010 we came back to Europe and lived near the Oval cricket ground before settling down where we are now.
Some funny ones which I may have edited for security issues include
Sherab ” Gawain lives at “actual address”, and prior to that he lived in Sue\’s heart, which was located somewhere in Auckland, New Zealand. Prior to that he lived in Australia? briefly. But whether it be past, present or future he forever belongs in my collection of lovers :)”
or
James “Hi Gawain, regarding your contest/question: you spend most of your time located at g1 or g8 (respectively.) c1 or c8 are both summer cottages in rough and tumble parts of town. You spend a lot of time traveling between these residences and e1/e8, like a world traveler who spends half of his life in the airport.”
To all readers who have entered, better luck next time. I know this question was a tough one to answer but hopefully I’ll have more giveaways in the future with the classic coming up I’m thinking of getting a couple of signed books but will see. For Christmas a couple of years back, our 3 good chess friends from in NZ (Shout out to: Ross, Bill and Alan) received the tournament programme with all the players signatures and it got Ross onto hunting down chess autographs (sorry Lin). Hope your wives (or husband) won’t kill you if you get more chess paraphernalia.