At Philippines

Hello everyone!

Long time no blog!

Haha... at the advice of our great pros Jack and Kelvin, I shall resume blogging over here!

First up, I will just bring you a hand randomly shuffled by me.

I was holding this hand (assuming no interference)

AKQJ109
AKJ875
void
6

Partner opens 1D. You called 2S, as a strong jumpshift, promising 16+ and 5+ spades. Parnter calls 3C. What do you respond?

1. 3H, part of 4th suit forcing?
2. 3S, insist on your own suit.
3. Give up! 3NT!
4. Quantitative raise to 4NT. Or asking for keycard, depending the way u play it?

If one bids 3H, a 4C/4D bid will come next and 4NT may come to find aces/kings. As for a 3S bid, your partner would be unlikely to give up and bid 4C/4D, propelling one to a final 4NT ask, or perhaps a stop in 4S? (Heart suit surprisingly not shown at all!) 3NT? Unless you are so pro and know that a disaster might be coming? I would prefer 4NT directly though! (it makes little difference here... haha)

And after all the keycard asking, your partner bids his 2 aces and 1 king. And you decided that maybe due to communication problems, 6NT will be a sensible spot. However partner may decide he has much more values than promised as he is holding:

x
void
AKQxxxx
AJxxx

Well it seems a 7 that could not be avoided and doomed, where 6NT is the best possible contract with 12 top tricks... what a interesting hand! (Of course it is because my deck was new and little shuffling has been done... :-) )

More updates soon after the Open Pairs (if my p lets me blog more!) Maybe pictures! And anyway the Filipinos are very friendly in their reception! We even got some 'garlands'... haha... Great thanks to them!