NOT too many 13-year-olds get to see the world for free. Not too many 13-year-olds get to bear the Philippine flag in international tilts. And yes, not too many 13-year-olds return to our humble land proud to have bagged the top prize.
But Brena Mae Membrere is such a teener. As cliché as it may sound, she has been there, she has done that, and she is just 13.
Brena, who has just turned 13 on February 16, has just been transferred to the Girls Under 14 Group (U14G) from the Girls Under 12 Group (U12G). She is one step closer to becoming a national women's grandmaster when she competes in the All Women Chess Championship come August or September this year.
Their home is bedecked with 49 gold medals, eight silver medals, and unnumbered trophies, all courtesy of her many winning tilts here and abroad.
As a player in the U12G before, Brena has been earning accolade after accolade from competitions here and abroad. She has been one of the youngest Filipino delegates to, among others, the 2007 World Youth Chess Championship in Antalya, Turkey in November; the 2004 and 2006 World Open Chess Tournament as part of the Milo Checkmate Team, both in Pennsylvania in July of those years; and the 4th Asean Age Group Chess Championship in Brunei Darussalam in December 2003, where she bagged the gold.
In the same competition, among Brena's co-delegates was Wesley So, now 14 years old, and the youngest ever Grandmaster in the world.
Winning Streak
This chess player genius has defeated people much older than she is, including a Maryland University chess coach. The game, which happened in Philadelphia in 2003, lasted for three full hours before then eight-year-old Brena was declared the winner. After that, the coach offered Brena a scholarship at Maryland University.
Brena, a freshman high school student at Notre Dame Institute in Aringay, La Union, has in fact been offered scholarships by universities abroad, including Maryland University and the University of Texas in Dallas.
Given this outpour of support early into her college education, Brena doesn't seem to need to worry about her future, and so do her parents. In fact, Brena can choose to forego college and go all-out into becoming a celebrated chess player here and abroad, but this young girl remains grounded.
According to Brena, she wants to take up Medicine, hopefully in the University of the Philippines. Asked why she doesn't want to be a full time chess player, Brena said she won't always enjoy what she has right now, so she has to make something else -- something more permanent for herself.
Groomed since childhood
At a time when most four-year-olds were still learning to do away with drinking milk from the feeding bottle, young Brena was already being groomed to be the chess champion she is now.
Being the second of three children, Brena was taught by her older brother Brien the rudiments of the game. Brien, himself eight at that time, never really enjoyed typical rough outdoor games like basketball.
According to their proud mother, Merlie, Brien was a bookish kid who delved into poetry and essay writing, and yes, chess.
When Brien got a chessboard for his eighth birthday in October 1997, he taught four-year-old sister Brena, who has since been constantly improving, becoming a brilliant tactical player.
But before her undefeated streak came her very first loss during her first formal chess competition: five-year-old Brena, who was still in preparatory school, against a high school student.
Far from discouraging Brena from pursuing chess, this defeat has in fact made her better, said mother Merlie.
A year after that, six-year-old Brena finally got her first taste of victory. She was in kindergarten when she joined an interschool chess tilt, which she won with flying colors. She went on to the provincial level, and went undefeated in all of her seven games, making her the very first provincial chess champion of La Union.
Brena's father, Bernie, is all praises for his little girl: "She's really amazing, because at the young age of six, she was already defeating 12-, 13-year-olds."
Big Break
Brena was in second grade when one of her biggest breaks came.
Then National Women's Champion Cheradee Camacho (another young chess champion from Caba, La Union, who was then in fourth grade) needed a teammate for the provincial meet in La Union's annual sports event.
Brena was recommended, but there was also another hopeful, a sixth grader.
Camacho's mother Rosalinda then asked the two hold a tryout to see who will be Cheradee's teammate. And yes, second-grader Brena defeated her sixth-grader opponent. From there, she went on to bag the championship in the provincial and regional levels of the local sports event with Camacho.
Also in second grade, she started getting formal chess trainings from Pines City Academy of Chess trainer Brix Domondon.
Together with her was Kyla Joy Camacho, another chess champion. And upon reaching 12, Brena became a national chess champion through the Milo Checkmate event.
She has at several times also been under the tutelage of Eugene Torre, Asia's very first Grandmaster.
All in the family
All three Membrere kids are into chess. The youngest, 11-year-old Merlene, is also a champion in La Union's regional sports event, IRAA.
Added Brena's mother, "I decided to let them all learn to play chess because I wanted them to maximize their mental capacities."
She explained playing chess is one way of doing so, since the game requires extreme mental skills from the player.
Considering her three children are excellent chess players, has there been any competition among them?
"None. They support each other," said their mother. The three siblings remain each other's best supporters and chess buddies at home.
Meanwhile, parents Merlie and Bernie remain their children's biggest cheerleaders, accompanying them in their chess competitions here and abroad.
Her mother's constant reminder to young Brena is to always focus on her game, something Brena has so far been doing excellently.
She added that Brena has been trained to be independent. She immersed herself in heavy training months before a competition through in-house tournaments, but two whole days before the tournament itself, Brena left the company of the chessboard for a while.
Far from being atypical, Brena enjoys what other kids her age does -- she is very much interested in gadgets and computer games, and is fond of watching cartoons, her favorite being Dragon Ball Z.
Brena is also into table tennis, which serves not only as her pastime but also as an additional training for chess.
Explained her mother, playing table tennis requires the player to be exceptionally watchful of what his or her opponent is doing, which is much the same with a typical chess game, where quick thinking and unmatched strategy do the trick.
As if these are not enough, Brena also is an active student, writing for their school paper and remaining in the top three of her class.
Now preparing for the World Youth Championship in Vietnam, Brena is doing a series of round robins under the tutelage of International Master Rudy Cardoso.
Other upcoming competitions lined up for her this year are the Asean Tournament to be held in Subic and the World Open Tournament in Australia.
For someone as young as she is, the world is full of possibilities. But since Brena is not your typical 13-year-old, we can expect bigger and therefore better things from her in the years to come.
