|
|
 |
|
Traditional Games
Games play a critical role in fostering and maintaining ethnic and group identity, acquiring physical and intellectual skills, learning cultural knowledge, and developing and negotiating social relationships. Traditional Games run Saturday and Sunday, 12 noon - 6 p.m. Bingo will have a different schedule, see information below.
Backgammon is a board game for two players. Each player has fifteen pieces that they move between twenty-four points or triangles, according to the roll of the dice. The objective is to be the first to move all fifteen pieces off the board. It is a fast paced game that challenges the skills of the players. Backgammon may well be one of the oldest recorded games. It is believed to have originated in ancient Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq) and archeological evidence of this or very similar games dating to 3000 BC have been found in Iran and Egypt. Today, backgammon is still played widely in the Middle East and traditionally men play in coffee houses. Recently, there has been a move to play backgammon over the Internet, the antithesis of the social context of a men's coffeehouse. Variants of backgammon are, however, popular with young and old all over the world. Woody's Oasis in East Lansing is one context where friends gather on a regular basis to play backgammon and to visit. They call the game shesh besh (meaning the six (shesh in Persian) and five (besh) throw of dice); tawli (table) is another name for the game. A distinctive feature of the game played by people from the Arab world is to call the throw of the dice in Persian, rather than in Arabic. -- Yvonne Lockwood, fieldworker Bags Bags is a popular activity in the Midwest, especially among college students and at such events as tail gate, block, and graduation parties. Students see this bean-bag-toss game as a recreational outlet and a way to invite new people into their social circle. At Michigan State University, the game has been growing in popularity ever since Kevin Bucci brought it from Illinois to East Lansing in 2005. Bucci, his roommates, and friends often play for hours at a time in the front yard of his house, where "it is more social" and passersby can join in. Two wooden boxes set about 30 feet apart serve as targets. Four play at a time, two on a team. Each team, standing behind one set of boxes, takes turns tossing bean bags toward the opposite box target. Points are scored for bags that get in the hole (3 points) or land on top of the box (1 point), until the winning team reaches 21. Some simply watch the action, others rotate in and challenge the winning team to a new game. -- LuAnne Kozma, fieldworker Bingo Friday, August 11 from 7:00pm-9:00pm
Today there is a proliferation of daily lotteries, full service casinos, virtual bingo and other games of chance and recreation readily available on the Internet. Despite these options, on any given day throughout America, one can find scores of individuals playing the simple game of Bingo at house parties, senior citizen centers, fraternal organizations, veterans' halls, churches, and other places of local gathering as well as on Native American reservations. The legality of the game--with roots usually traced back to a sixteenth-century national lottery in Italy--and the regulation of its stakes vary from state to state. In Michigan, bingo for charitable gaming was legalized in 1972. The overwhelming number of games are staged by churches or charity organizations and tend to have modest stakes and draw from local neighborhoods. Bingo on Native American reservations is more commercial and played for higher stakes in order to draw players from distant places. In this game of chance, a caller announces randomly selected numbers. Players match those numbers to those appearing on cards that contain a unique combination of numbers printed or electronically represented within a five column by five-column matrix. When players match and mark off--usually with an ink dauber--all the numbers in an agreed-upon pattern goal (i.e. five down, across, or diagonally; an inner square; a center cross; two lines, etc.) or all of the numbers (full house, blackout, or cover-all), they shout "bingo" and win prizes. The Federated Polish Home, founded in 1929, is one of the first Lansing area organizations to offer Bingo. Ed Kowalski and Steve Zelski, along with 3 other co-chairmen, started the games in 1975 to provide entertainment to members and help raise funds for the organization. At one time and with no competition, the organization had up to 200 players at a time and provided dinners in the hall prior to the games. Today, about 25 individuals still meet every Monday night. Many arrive when the doors open at 4:30 p.m. to set up and then play cribbage, rummy, and other card games until the Bingo game starts at 6:00 p.m. Although most players have been coming there so long the cashier knows what games they want to play without having to say a word, the atmosphere is relaxed and beginners fit right in. -- Bill Matt and Marsha MacDowell, fieldworkers http://www.homepokergames.com/bingohistory.php
Buck Euchre Buck Euchre is a fun, fast game, with lots of different possible plays, but not so complicated that one can't spend plenty of time socializing. The play of the cards is similar to Euchre but aspects such as bidding are similar to other games, like Hasenpfeffer. Other aspects specific to the game are: (1) each player starts with 36 points and must get down to 0 to win; (2) players must bid to get out of the game; (3) highest bid calls the trump suit; and (4) all cards (Ace to 9) are used in play. The game is popular in several areas of the Great Lakes and it became a favorite of Lansing resident Tom Donaldson and his cousin Tom Hess who learned the game from John Burton, the resident advisor of the residence hall they lived in while undergraduate students at Michigan State University. Burton had learned the game himself while attending Southwest Minnesota State College (now Southwest State University) in the late 1960s. In this area of southwestern Minnesota, consisting primarily of rural families with German, Swedish, and Norwegian roots, everybody grew up playing this unique variant of Euchre. When John came to graduate school at MSU he was surprised to learn that no one knew the game and enthusiastically began teaching the game to the students in his residence hall. The two Toms have continued to play this game in reunions with John and other former Mayo Hall residents, with friends, and with their children and other family members. Tom Donaldson has heard of other groups and communities where the game has been popular, including among workers of the old Studebaker plant in South Bend, Indiana. -- Beth Donaldson and Marsha MacDowell, fieldworkers Chalupa In the Lansing area, Chalupa is a favored game among both long-term Mexican-American residents and newly arrived Mexican families and friends. The game is very similar to what is known as "Bingo" in the United States but is based on matching pictures, rather than numbers. Players draw a card featuring a picture from the special deck of game cards then must match the picture to one on the matrix of each player's unique playing board. When a player covers all of the pictures in a row on their board, that player calls out "Chalupa" and wins the game. --Sallie Campbell, fieldworker Cribbage Cribbage is a card game for which you need a deck of poker cards, a cribbage board (to keep score), and at least two people. When two people play, each person is dealt six cards. From those six cards, each person discards two cards to the "crib." Points are awarded for pairs, runs held in hand, and combinations of cards that add up to fifteen resulting in the common counting chants "15-2, 15-4, 15-6....." When laying down cards points are also awarded but the total cannot exceed 31; the player who comes closest to 31 without going over gets one point. The 1st person to score 121 points wins. Cribbage is the card game of choice whenever the extended family of patriarch Harlan MacDowell get together, whether at home or on fishing trips or reunions. Harlan recalls learning the game at an early age from his father, George MacDowell, and grandfather, Clarence MacDowell. George, a woodworker by trade, made several cribbage boards including one table-sized one inherited by his son Forrest. Harlan's son Doug recalls many times playing cribbage after dinner with his dad while listening to the Tiger baseball games on the radio; they played on one of George's boards and used toothpicks, matches, and nails for pegs, but never a properly carved cribbage peg. Today, Doug, his brothers Bruce and Paul and his brother-in-law, Chris Luz, each has several boards, all of them unique and some designed for three players. Together with some spouses, fishing friends, and their children-particularly the male cousins--Hugh MacDowell, Ian MacDowell, Conner Luz, and Joey Spring, they carry on this family "unplugged" game tradition. - Marsha MacDowell, fieldworker
Dominoes
The game of dominoes is a traditional favorite of the Sudanese. Using commercially made dominoes-often called "tiles"--purchased in stores or ones handmade of bamboo trees, boys play in the "cattle camps" in Sudan, in refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya, and now in Lansing, Michigan where they have resettled. Girls generally do not play, but are allowed if they know how. Four players gather with partners sitting across from one another. Twenty-eight dominoes are turned face down in the center of the playing surface (table, floor or ground) and each player selects seven. Whoever has the "double-six" begins play and lays that domino down face-up, often slapping the tile loudly on the playing surface. Play commences, moving counter-clockwise to the right, one person. Each player, in turn, places their domino, face-up, in line with the matching domino at one end of the sequence or the other. If the player doesn't have a matching domino, they "pass" to the next player by clicking their dominoes together or tapping a domino on the playing surface. Play ends when the play is blocked, i.e. when none of the participants can place the correct matching numbered domino in play, or when all of a players' dominoes are gone. The person who "goes-out" and his/her partner are the "winning" team of that match. The total points of all the remaining dominoes are awarded to the winning team with the "double zero" domino counting as either zero or 50. All 28 dominoes are then turned back over (face-down), each player selects seven and play continues with the last round's "winner" starting play again, beginning with any "double-faced" domino. Play continues until one team acquires 51 points (if the double-zero equals zero points) or until 101 points (if the double-zero domino is counted as 50). The winning team then plays another "team" of players. -- Sallie Campbell, fieldworker "Fourteen" "Fourteen" is a card game played with two complete decks of regular playing cards. The game is played by individuals, not by teams and is best enjoyed with 4 players, but can be played with 2, 3, 4 or 5. When there are 6 interested players, two different sets of 3 players each participate in their own game. One person is selected as the dealer. The person to the dealer's left chooses which suit is to be the "joker" for that round. The Ace of the "joker" suit is wild. The 2 decks of cards are shuffled and the dealer distributes 14 cards to each player. The remaining cards are placed to the side as a "draw-pile." Players take turns moving counter-clockwise, by taking a card from the "draw-pile," and discarding one card to a pile in the center of the playing area. A player is allowed to pick up the previous player's discard only if it is then used to "lay-down," or if it is used to "go-out." If it is used to "go out," the person who originally laid that card down is "shot" and assessed an automatic 10 extra points. Sudanese youth who have recently immigrated to Lansing learned how to play this game in refugee camps in Sudan. Here in the United States, they enjoy playing the game with other Sudanese as well as sharing the game with new friends. The game is played on a table, the floor, or ground. -- Sallie Campbell, fieldworker Mahjong Mahjong is a game for four players that originated in China. It requires skill, calculation and a bit of luck, and in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Japan it is often associated with gambling. The goal of the game is to select and discard tiles to score points by forming groups or runs of similar units. Several explanations of the origin of mahjong exist. One suggests the game was developed by Confucius in 500 BC, another that the game was developed around 1850 from existing Chinese card and domino games. The game was imported from China in the 1920s and made a big sensation in the United States. The rules went through many revisions and in 1937 the National Mah Jongg League was established and an American mahjong rule book was published. While very popular in the United States, mahjong was banned in China during the Cultural Revolution, because of its association with gambling. Today, however, it is a favorite Chinese pastime. Most players in the United States are women, and it is especially popular among Jews, so much so that mahjong in the United States is considered a Jewish game. The American game has diverged considerably from traditional mahjong, and purists claim that American mahjong is not a "true" mahjong. Minor variations of Chinese classical mahjong, however, do exist in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, Vietnam, and the Philippines. Today mahjong is enjoyed all over the world and one can find many organizations and websites devoted to mahjong. -- Yvonne Lockwood, fieldworker Rock Paper Scissors "Rock, Paper, Scissors" is a hand game that is often used as a selection method (similar to tossing a coin) but is also a centuries-old game in and of itself. Although the game is usually thought of as a children's game, young and old play it alike in many different variations around the world and is known by many names, including Ishiken, Shnik Shnak Shnuk, Ching Chong Chow, Farggling, and Roshambo. In 1842 a Scissors Paper Stone organization was founded in London and when it moved to Toronto, Canada in 1918, it changed its name to the Rock Paper Scissors Society and in 1995 began sponsoring a World Championship. The USA Rock, Paper, Scissors League started in 2005 and held its first U.S. national championship in April 2006 in Las Vegas. The game is simple: players count together "1...2...3…Go!" while simultaneously bouncing their fists. On "Go", each player simultaneously changes their fist into one of three basic hand signs: Rock: a clenched fist; Paper: all fingers extended, palm facing downwards, upwards, or sideways; and Scissors: forefinger and middle finger extended and separated into a "V" shape. Rock beats scissors, scissors beat paper, and paper beats rock. Brandon Denby of Webberville, Michigan played "Rock, Paper, Scissors" as a youth and only entered a regional contest this year on a whim. After winning the regional, he went on to win Michigan's first state tournament held earlier in the year and then competed in the national championship. Like other serious R-P-S players, Brandon employs well-known strategies like the "The Avalanche" (throwing three rocks in a row), "Paper Dolls" (scissors, paper, scissors) and "The Bureaucrat" (paper, paper, paper), but he also employs a bit of psychology and a strategy called "The Triple Threat" that he won't divulge. Tina Bailer, Brandon's fiancée, serves as his coach and helps him prepare for the game. Ironically, it was "Rock Paper Scissors" Tina chose to research and present several years ago as part of a Dale Carnegie course she took. -- Marsha MacDowell, fieldworker www.USARPS.com
SET SET® is a game invented in 1974 by former Michigan State University population geneticist, Marsha J. Falco while she was living and working in Cambridge, England on a study to try to determine if German Shepherds inherit epilepsy. To understand the research data she was looking at, Falco came up with a system of using symbols for blocks of data: different properties indicated different gene combinations. As she viewed the sets of symbols she realized that it might make a fun game and, with family and friends, worked out the rules for the game she called SET. Basically, the game consists of identifying a "set" of three cards from 12 cards laid out on a surface. Each card has a variation of four features. A "set" consists of three cards in which each feature is either the same on each card OR is different on each card. The game can be played by one person, a group, or teams and by players of almost any age from six on up. http://www.setgame.com/
String Figures How much fun can a person have with a simple piece of string? Surely if you've tried your hands at string games like Cat's Cradle, you know! Creating string figures is a worldwide, cross-cultural pastime. Some people dabble in this ancient pastime and others master the art of string figures, patterns made by manipulating a loop of string. One such master is Bob Grimes. For forty years, Grimes has been teaching and passing on the art of creating string figures to youth at outdoor education camps throughout southeast Michigan, as well as at many other events. Come and learn how to do the Star, the Tipi, and the Cup and Saucer. -- LuAnne Kozma, fieldworker International String Figure Association
Traditional Card Games Traditional card games are important recreational activities that most players learn from friends or relatives. Children begin with easy games such as war, hearts, and go fish. Some games are popular within certain age or social groups, some are more popular in certain regions than others. Many are relatively easy to learn, all require minimal and easily portable equipment, and, except for solitaire, all have a social dimension. Yo-Yo Tricks Can you Walk the Dog and Shoot the Moon? The yo-yo is a perennial favorite unplugged game with kids and adults alike. Yo-yo companies once hired adult salespeople highly skilled in yo-yo tricks to demonstrate what the yo-yo can do, and to sell the product at events directly to consumers. They also sponsored competitions, a tradition that still continues today. Returning to East Lansing for the Great Lakes Folk Festival is yo-yo master artist Dennis Grzesiak. Known as "Yo Dude," Grzesiak has been performing, competing, and teaching young people the art of yo-yo for 50 years and this summer his granddaughter will begin performing with him. Try some beginners' tricks yourself and before long, you'll be doing your own synchronized routines. -- LuAnne Kozma, fieldworker |
|
© Copyright 2002. All Rights Reserved. |
