Board games
Board games, do people still play them? It's a game you play on a board _not_ online that's the whole idea of it. We no longer play board games, we might once it's December 5th.
At a certain point, it's over. It's something from my childhood and as my children were very young we did. Today all they do is wake up early, travel to school, arrive back home, do homework and back to bed. Even weekends are filled with home(school) work. I wonder what they do at school but also why they do not have holidays. The average employer has a few weeks per year my children have zero (holidays and vacations are for school, studying or working at a company for school.
One daughter and son taught themselves how to play chess plus both games (the daughter is a prof) and my son (and I) do Sudoku plus to relax I do crossword puzzles.
If on vacation we took a travel Scrabble board game along, next to Sudoku. Both good for shutting out whatever (or whoever) surrounds us.
The oldest "Dutch" board game is 'Ganzenbord' and it is one of the games I like most it's just not what one plays alone. If it comes to it I wouldn't play any board game solo. It's not the idea of board games. It was a (Italian?) gambling game in the 16th century turned into a children's game. Two dices needed.
The Ganzenbord (geese board) on the picture is old and not the one from my childhood which had nice sculptured geese. It's an easy game, as many eyes you throw as many steps you can take. If you end up in the well or prison you wait till someone comes to your rescue (takes your place).
Mens erger je niet (Human don't be annoyed - Ludo in England) is just as simple and can be annoying if you play it with someone who cheats and always needs to win. It can be a drama if you play with men since they have a hard time if it comes to losing a game. I always lose to keep the peace which was a lesson from my childhood (do not play with men in my family they give you a hard time and their bragging is annoying. Better read a book!).
Checkers is the game my maternal grandfather taught me. I must have been about 5 years old. I still like it more than chess although chess looks better. The boards, the figures. I wonder why checkers look frequently so cheap. My grandfather had a wooden board.
Stratego I loved this game as a teenager. Indeed it's a warfieldgame and it takes a bit of time to remember who's the highest in rank. It's a bit like checkers or chess although in this case, you have an army, once included with spies. The idea is to find (or stay out of the way of the bombs) and "clean up" the army of the enemy. You need a bit of memory since you can not see the ranks of the one you are playing with.
If you "step" on a bomb you are dead and better try to "clean up" that bomb of the enemy as soon as possible.
A Nightmare Before Christmas - mainly a collector's item
Monopoly it's good for misery. I never really liked it. The first time I played it was at my grandma's home with my uncle. He introduced it to me I guess he needed an idiot to play with just like he always used me to be on the lookout if he stole food, candies and so on out of the cabinet my grandmother always locked with a key. That key she kept in her handbag and the bag she mostly carried with her even while doing house chores. Let's say she knew her youngest son.
While "playing" my granny entered the room and said: Which streets and houses are yours?
Huh?
It was clear my uncle didn't only rob the bank but also me. No way he taught me how to play a game. I still wonder why an adult is fooling a 6-7-year-old and how he can feel great to win from a child but like said it runs in the family. My father lost chess from my daughter when she was 8 years old, for sure he did not let the child win but he got extremely mean to her.
Years (20-30?) later I played Monopoly with my children but never finished it, they played together till the moment arrived we mainly focused on mind games. All sorts of to trigger the brain and solve the puzzle.
Photos: all taken by me
26-4-2024
I am a mobile phone user only