My good friend Leonard passed away in mid-July 2016.
I last saw Leonard on 28 March 2016. We met at the TeaRoom in Chinatown to listen to some AI expert talk about neural network, Monte-Carlo simulation, crazy stones and whatnot. The Go craze brought on by the Lee Sedol vs Alphago match had made us wanting to learn more about the game and the machine. We had dinner afterward and Leonard ordered a few large-portion dishes. I was happy to see him enjoy his food. We talked about how some strange moves by Alphago caught everyone off-guard, speculated whether KeJie was up there enough to take on Alpha’s next challenge. We laughed at how Lee Sedol was speechless after losing the second match and how relieved one felt after seeing him won the one-and-only precious game for the honour of humanity. We also talked about Lionel Messi. Leonard felt sorry for him that he couldn’t add the World Cup to his medal list and that made Messi a slightly under-achiever when compared to Pele and Maradona. After dinner we walked to his car and when we passed by some wine bar it reminded me of our time in Paris. I asked him if he still recalled the guy he ‘played well’ with (a codeword we understood between us as playing chess for money) in quartier latin many years back. Of course he did. Those were our most care-free days and we always had a good laugh talking about it. As always, when I didn’t drive, Leonard was kind enough to drive me home. In his moyen-de-transport (old car) We talked about the carnage in Paris, the radical islamists and how LKY had foreseen the problems many years back, and had suggested the only solution is through the effort of their own moderates. We talked about the delisting of NOL and how indecisions to buy big ships or small ships were already ringing warning bells about the company. Leonard invited me to join in some jam sessions with his NUSS band, but I felt I didn’t know enough people there it’d be a little intrusive. Then we reached my home. I bid him goodbye and that was the last time I saw him.
A week before our last meetup, we were at the Singapore Weiqi Clubhouse in Bishan Community Centre. Again it was for listening to analysis by Go experts on the Alphago vs Lee match. I witnessed for myself how popular Leonard was in this tight community of Go enthusiasts. So many of them knew Leonard by name (Peng Yeow in Mandarin was how they addressed him), eager to talk to him and show warm camaraderie. After the talk, Leonard stayed on for a while talking to a young chap about the enormous advantage in memory capacity machines had over humans. We then proceeded for supper at a nearby food court. We were both happy and sentimental about Alphago’s victory. After Deep Blue’s win over Gary Kasparov in 1997, if one continued with using the same brute-force approach in chess-programming, we thought it’d take at least another 50 years before machine could finally beat human in Go, given its many order of complexity over chess. So when Alphago came along it was so exciting to both of us. During those 5 games, Leonard and I followed the moves live on internet and commented via sms. I still kept some of these chat messages in my phone.
Those were our last two precious time together before he left us.
Last year it was music that brought several occasions for us to meet. The French Alumni annual dinner was an especially memorable one. Leonard had messaged me beforehand that he would ‘Sing Well’ on that day. Boy he didn’t disappoint. “Mes deux amours” was a beautiful rendition with his typical humorous jeux de mots. “My Way” told the story of us taupins only we could comprehend. He made the evening a huge success, for I couldn’t remember an Alumni dinner as enjoyable as that last one.
I also watched him and his band “The Silverstone” played music at the Guild House a few months back. He was the Bass Guitarist keeping the tempo with mathematical precision. As usual in a group he was that jovial one keeping everyone’s spirit up with his friendly and playful sense of humour. I’d always enjoyed the company of Leonard, a most unpretentious friend. We talked about fun facts on Mathematicians and Physicists, Technology, Go, Computer Chess, Gödel’s undecidability theorem, Turing’s machine, our old days in France and Singapore, human stupidity and a whole lot of stuffs. The conversation never gets into arguments or gossips or bitterness. It’s always for a good laugh. Leonard is simple in spirit, deep in thoughts and kind in person.
I missed him very much and that’s why I wanted to record some memories of him here.
figkid 