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Meet Lina - community builder, creative, and one of our Good Mates.
Through her work at Lawson Flats Chess Club, Lina is the caretaker of a welcoming, IRL social space that's bringing people together - one game at a time.
I have a love of design, music, and community events - especially DJ events. I am 21, Mexican-American… I’ve been in Australia now for a few years and am currently finishing my undergrad degree.
I’ve been hosting Lawson Flats Chess Club and other social chess events for over a year now. LFCC is all about making Chess accessible, and rejecting any stereotype around chess, or what a chess player looks like.
But honestly, it’s more club than chess. Meeting people face to face in a digital age can be difficult, but Chess Club is the perfect ice breaker.
One weekend I was playing chess in a Melbourne bar (The Rook’s Return), and the way strangers came together for a few games was super charming. Bar tenders digging up extra boards, menus torn for makeshift chess pieces… Everyone was really getting into it. Chess was a big thing in staff culture when Lawson Flats opened too. There was a lot of boxing and chess after work with the chefs. If only we knew about chess-boxing!
This kind of community is craved right now. It’s a social event where people are really meeting each other face-to-face. It can feel like technology is encroaching into everything social these days, and so anything analogue holds a lot of novelty.
Any preconception about chess is completely gone when people arrive. There is every kind of person, and I love that! Also, bringing DJs in changed the game (literally). People in Perth are very supportive in the music scene. Some people come for the music and stay for the chess.
Empowering young women to do anything is a great feeling. I’ve still never seen so many girls playing casual chess in the same place.
Ms Chess is doing it in Melbourne, too. I’ve met young women at CHESS CLUB who were referred by Hosna Eqbal, who started Ms Chess. That's a great feeling, to see how far the community reach is.
Maleik Njoroge, who is behind Migrant Chess Club (also in Melbourne) is a great person to have met through chess too. He is really making chess culturally significant for young people.
In my opinion too, you learn a lot about someone playing chess. People are making friends and that's cool, but my favourite thing is hearing “I met my girlfriend through chess club.”. That blows my mind.
Sometimes people say things like “it’s my dream to host a chess event, but I can’t.” but I don't think there is anything stopping them. I want the people who show up to walk away with their own community building plans. More chess clubs, the merrier.
My big inspirations currently are LA Chess Club (Los Angeles), and CLUB CHESS (NYC). Their events can be pretty unconventional, and they’re huge. I want to bring the best parts of chess and clubs to other kinds of social events. There are 100 people showing up now, but I'd love to see 1000.
How you spend your day is how you spend your life, right? Doing small things for yourself and other people can have a huge impact that you just can’t predict.
Follow Talina @1.800.lina
Follow Lawson Flats Chess Club @lawsonflatschessclub
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