I used to play poker. “Used to” because I no longer have people to play with, and I don’t particularly like playing it online. There is something about getting together, sitting at a physical table, and playing cards. Call me old-fashioned.
I started playing poker back in high school when I just turned eighteen years old and I was legally able to play. At first, I played together with my schoolmates during lunch breaks, which, I must admit, was technically not allowed. But after a while, we decided that we would like to play bigger and longer games. And so we started to gather at homes where parents permitted their young kids to play cards. There were not many of those but at least two or three places we did find.
I was not great at poker. I did not win huge sums of money. But I did win and did play enough to make me like the game. Therefore, I started to look for specific literature, watched poker YouTube videos, and read poker-themed forums. Back then or more than 10 years ago, there were many such forums, and people in Latvia just began to look for and to read articles about poker. So the exchange of information happened swiftly and you did not have to google for long periods of time to find something interesting and up-to-date.
One such place was our national sports news website. And it recently published a section dedicated to just poker. Namely, it had listed poker alongside hockey, football, and various other sports. Furthermore, this section had a sponsor – PokerStars. Back then and even now one of the largest and most well-known poker brands in the world.
Either because the moderator of that section did not have enough time or because PokerStars just wanted to advertise themselves, they published a competition. The rules were simple. Write/translate poker-themed articles. Post these articles on the forum, the best ones will be published on the website. Top content creators will receive prizes from PokerStars. The main prize is to be a poker chipset.
Tempting? You bet. And since I really wanted to have my own poker chips I participated. I don’t recall how many articles I ended up producing, but it was a lot more than the second place had. I wanted to leave no doubt as to who should get those poker chips. I won.
Either during this “hobby” or after a colleague of my mother’s noticed what I have done. She read some of my translations and said that I was reasonably good at it. Of course, she did not say that I was great. But I was good enough to maybe consider applying to a university where people study translation. I did not previously cross my mind. Since back at school I was never particularly good with my mother tongue. Yes, I knew English, I studied German as well, and only recently I started to really understand all the grammatical peculiarities of Latvian. Also, this university was quite far away from my hometown so that meant living in dorms.
I ended up going to study translation. Even though the beginning was difficult, I graduated and then continued to study for a Master’s as well. And later on, well, if you have read something here and if you have seen my LinkedIn profile, you get the idea of what and where happened next.
And it was all thanks to those poker chips and my willingness to get them. A remarkable turn of events led me to where I am today. I still have those chips. Once a classmate of mine even tried to buy them. I refused. I am grateful to myself that I did so.
I would really like to resume playing poker somewhere. While currently living in Brussels I have not yet found or even begun looking if there is a community or a place where one can freely come and play. Luckily, my beautiful girlfriend also likes to play cards.
Kind regards,
Olaaf
