I learned the rules of Go a few years ago, alternatingly getting excited and bored with it, mostly bored until about a year ago when something clicked and I started playing more seriously. Along the way I discovered these forums and started lurking here. (World class forum lurker here...
The Malkovitch games have really helped keep my interest in Go, when I was 20-15kyu I would read those threads as a form of entertainment. These days I actually look at the diagrams :sigh: Thank you all participants for that, especially Magicwand.
I don't have any real life opponents around here, though I do own a board - Go players in East Africa where are you? - I am trying to teach a few people around me, but I don't think I am a very good teacher. My current strategy is to teach atari-Go and the word atari - because hatari means danger in Swahili. I had one very memorable afternoon with my five-year-old nephew by playing a stone and saying a simple reason for it (I attack you here, I make my territory here, I run away here etc etc) and he would reply with his own reason. It was actually a reasonable game - while it lasted.