<There were years when I met Bert Enklaar almost every day. We attended the same lectures in mathematics, then went to the coffeehouse opposite the zoo where we talked about the sense and meaning of mathematics, literature and chess. According to my memory, conversations with him were often about sense and meaning, but it seems likely that most time was spent on down to earth subjects like the King’s Indian or the Fajarowicz variation of the Budapest gambit which he loved for many years with little recompense. After that we went to our lectures again or more often straight to the chess cafe on Leidseplein. Once or twice a week we met at our chess club. In 1963 both of us joined the Dutch team for the first time. We went to Birmingham for a match against England and at a London railway station we discovered that Kennedy had been shot. Bert was gravely shocked and I found that strange. We made our debut in the Dutch Championship at the same time, in The Hague 1965, and we gained the same number of points. Some people had difficulties keeping us apart and it happened more than once that I talked to a chessplayer and after some time discovered that he thought I was Bert Enklaar.>

rest in peace, IM Enklaar..

Ree,s usual masterly storytelling.

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