MANILA, Philippines – Who says that you cannot dream or have goals when you’re a senior citizen?
For the Philippines first ever Fide Master, Adrian Pacis, if there is one more thing he would like to achieve in life — the title of Grandmaster.
“Yes, it is possible,” he said to this writer. “Hopefully, when this pandemic is over, we can compete in these competitions that will allow you to gain the title. But in the meantime, I am playing with the Negros Kingsmen in the Professional Chess Association of the Philippines and I hope to help my team in any way that we can.”
Pacis’ goal is also to inspire other elderly folks to not give up and pursue their dreams. It is also a warning to Generation Z and millennials to take to heart the adage that “youth is wasted on the young.”
As a youngster, Pacis’ father introduced him to the game of chess at age 14. But chess competed with rock and roll for his attention.
At a very young age, Pacis joined a rock band named Banda Pilipino alongside a man named Dante David, who would go on to become known as Howling Dave — that famed disc jockey of DZRJ.
Pacis handled lead vocal duties and performed cover songs of Grand Funk Railroad, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin and other 1970s band. When his older bandmates went abroad to make a living the young Pacis did not follow as he was a minor.
He then met Pablo S. Gomez, who was known as a komiks and movie script writer, and Pacis appeared in several films for Sampaguita Pictures albeit as an extra alongside Fernando Poe Jr. in “Alupihang Dagat” (1975), “Tatlong Kasalanan” with Boots Anson-Roa (1976), and “Mrs. Eva Fonda, 16” with a young Lito Lapid.
However, all this got to Pacis’ head and he took for granted the opportunities afforded him. After three films, he was cut loose by an angry Gomez, who was grooming him for more and bigger roles.
Moving back to chess, Pacis did very well. In fact, he was the first chess player to ever be conferred the title of Fide Master in 1980. Along with the best of Philippine chess, Pacis competed in two chess Olympiads — one in Malta in 1980 and the second in Manila in 1992, and the World Junior Chess in 1978 in Austria.
After winning the Marlboro Grandmaster Chess Classic and its grand prize of US $3,000, then FIDE president Florencio Campomanes wanted Pacis to go to Europe and work to become the next Filipino Grandmaster, following Eugene Torre.
The young Adrian insisted on staying home in Quezon City and spending his earnings, to which an angry Campomanes dismissed him, “Bueno, bahala ka sa buhay mo. Gagapang ka!”
“I regret these misses,” Pacis humbly admitted, referring to his stunted film career and his fallout with Campomanes. I do. There are all these ‘what could have been’ scenarios playing in my head. It is a painful lesson not to take things for granted.”
For now, Pacis is happy to be competing with the Negros Kingsmen. “Online chess is a challenge. But I will adapt soon and help my team,” he said.
Pacis has won one of his four board assignments thus far.
More to helping Negros win a championship which as of this writing is 2-0 in PCAP’s southern division, there is one more goal Pacis would like to attain.
The title of Grandmaster.
The motivation?
There’s two. To fulfill that vision of the late Florencio Campomanes had in him back in the 1980s before they had a falling out, and to do this for himself. “I have to finish what I started a long time ago,” he simply said.
Pacis, on the senior board for the Negros Kingsmen, returns to action Saturday against Toledo and Surigao.