Best word forward

Scrabble wunderkind has the right words for a winning game, writes

The scene at the 2016 ASTAR Scrabble Challenge International (ASCI), University Malaya. obviously thinking of his next wordplay. It’s a serious game for him even though it’s not quite the same kind of linguistic jousting he normally faces during competitions.

In 2013, the-then 9-year-old Ariff won his first competitive game at the ASTAR Scrabble Challenge International (ASCI), the country’s largest Scrabble event for students below 18 years. He was the youngest contestant in the competition which included participants from neighbouring countries of Indonesia, Singapore and Thailand.

“I didn’t realise it was a big competition,” admits Shahrir. “He was the youngest at that time. I enrolled him for the Beginners category and Ariff soon found himself competing with Form 4 and 5 students. He didn’t care. He just played his game!”

First word in

What’s a word? Scrabble has been bound up in that existential question since the game exploded into prominence more than a half-century ago. You could go through several lifetimes and never hear the motley collection of abbreviations, archaisms, Greek and Hebrew letters in everyday speech.

“I once led a game by playing the word ZAXES,” Ariff tells me matter-of-factly. “It got me 62 points.”

ZAXES — A hatchet-like tool for cutting and punching nail holes in roofing slate. I’ve never heard of it, and would probably never use it in a lifetime of conversations.

But to Ariff, words come easy to him, even strange-sounding obscure words that are almost never used anywhere except for