On the plane from Leningrad to Washington, a group of teenagers dressed in custom-made suits embroidered with the coat of arms of the Soviet Union sat in the front row of the plane, and they were the same team members who passed the selection and were sent to Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, to participate in the 22nd International Mathematical Olympiad in Science. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 info And Seryosha also went with him as a member of the staff of the participating delegation.

Seryosha was brought in only three days before departure, and when the head of the delegation introduced him to the children, they could hardly believe their eyes. Children at this age are in the time of hero worship, and Seryosha is a hero who has been mentioned on TV lately, and soon these children became one with him. There were exceptions, though, and a thin teenager didn't seem to be very interested in him, and from the moment he got on the plane, he was busy with his own business, writing and drawing on paper. And next to him sat Seryosha, and the two had sat together for so long without speaking.

The bored Seryosha pressed the pager on the seat, and after a while, a sweet stewardess came over, and when she saw Seryosha, she immediately asked in surprise: "Are you the combat hero who came back from Afghanistan?" ”

"Yes, that's me, it's my honor to be remembered by a beautiful lady like you!" Seryosha said with a smile.

"Ahh It's incredible, you must take a picture with me when you get off the plane, what do you need now? The stewardess asked softly with a sweet smile on her face.

"A vodka and a yogurt for this man next to me!" Seryosha replied. After the stewardess confirmed all Seryosha's needs, two drinks were brought up in a short time, Seryosha put the yogurt in the hand of the young man next to him, and then picked up the glass and took a sip of wine.

The boy was startled by the yogurt that appeared in front of him, he looked up at Seryosha, said thank you, and then continued to bury his head in the matter at hand. Seryosha glanced at the manuscript on his desk with squinted eyes, on which were drawn areas that were distinguished by lattice and diagonal lines. There are also some letters and formulas written on it. Seryosha was stunned for a long time but didn't understand, and he couldn't help but ask: "Are you doing geometry problems?" ”

The boy raised his head again, took a sip of yogurt, and then replied, "Not at all!" ”

"Can you tell me about it?" Seryosha asked, feigning interest. The boy began to become cheerful as if a switch had been flung, and he placed the manuscript on the table in front of Seryosha and began to explain to him what he was doing. At first, Seryosha could still understand it, but later he began to feel that he was listening to heavenly books. He could only roughly tell from his knowledge in college that the things at hand belonged to the category of topology and graph theory.

After the young man excitedly finished talking about the problems he had studied, he asked Seryosha a few more questions, but unfortunately Seryosha could not answer any of them. The young man finally understood that Seryosha didn't know how to pretend to understand, so he asked angrily: "Are you a mathematician?" ”

"To be precise, I dreamed of becoming an engineer, I only knew a little bit about engineering mathematics, and if you were willing to talk to me about harmonic analysis (engineering mathematics applications), I would still be able to say a thing or two." Seryosha said with some shame, although he was once a top student who was admitted to Moscow University, but in front of this kind of real genius, Seryosha was instantly turned into slag.

"And what are you going to do with us?" The young man asked sincerely, and Seryosha carefully observed his eyes, and there was no contempt for people in his eyes. It seemed that he simply didn't know himself, so Seryosha responded: "I'm here to serve you, to make sure you have fun in the United States!" ”

The boy drank all the yogurt, and wanted to bury his head in the question, but was stopped by Seryosha. Seryosha didn't want to have no one to talk to along the way, even if he was a nerd, it was better than nothing. He pulled a deck of poker out of his pocket and asked the boy, "Would you be interested in playing two games with me?" ”

Seryosha thought that he would be rejected, but who knew that the young man unexpectedly agreed, and warned Seryosha: "You can't win me in anything!" ”

"Will it be at 21 o'clock, we can bet on something, if you win and go to the United States, how about I treat you to hamburgers and ice cream?" Seryosha actually likes to fight landlords the most, but the two of them obviously can't play. So I thought of 21 points, if you do your own banking, how to say that the winning side will be bigger.

"Can you tell me about the rules of the game?" The young man asked with a puzzled expression.

So Seryosha briefly described the rules of 21 points, A can be a point or eleven points, 2-10 is the value of the card, and J, Q, K is 10 points. You can add one card at a time until the player blows or no more cards are played. After everyone needs to show all the cards, the dealer is less than 17 points to continue to play cards, and finally if the dealer exceeds 21 points then the dealer loses, otherwise the player loses, in order to add some fun, Seryosha also added double bets, five dragons, straight flush, and blackjack and other bet doubling rules.

The boy only listened once and memorized everything Seryosha said, Seryosha opened the poker, began to skillfully shuffle and distribute, and after the first card was dealt, Seryosha began to wait for the boy to bet.

"Don't follow!" The boy threw the cards on the table without even looking at them, and when Seryosha saw that it was actually an A, he hurriedly said: "Don't you want to think about what if it's a blackjack (exactly 21 o'clock)?" The boy replied unhurriedly, "The probability is too small, why don't we continue?" ”

So Seryosha began to continue to deal cards, the first few rounds, the boy did not want cards at all, Seryosha in front of him gradually increased the chips, but each time he could only earn a little. As the game deepened, the boy no longer folded in the first round, but slowly began to bet, and opened a straight flush and a five-dragon in succession, Seryosha's chips went down by more than half, and after two more rounds, Seryosha began to owe the boy chips.

"I lost!" After a few rounds, Seryosha had to take the initiative to admit defeat, because I don't know when Seryosha didn't win. The battle at the table had become a math game for the teenager, who could tell how much he had won with each hand, and even those sitting in front and behind couldn't help but pay attention to Seryosha's hand. It's a shame for an adult to be blown up by a middle school student.

"God of Gamblers! What do you call it? Seryosha stretched out his hand to the boy and asked with an embarrassed expression.

"Grigory-Yakovlev Perelman, what do you call it?" The young man asked as he reported to his house as he reached out and shook Seryosha's hand.

"Sergei Ivanovich Ulyanov, it's nice to meet you, you can call me Seryosha!" Seryosha introduced himself.