Oct 05, 2006 01:01 PM
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Do you really enjoy life….. Let us take a test…
Answer the following in yes or no….
1) Have you seen the moon on a clear night in the recent days oops I mean nights? in recent Months? (hmmm... with the ever increasing sky scrapers, is there any space for the sky?)
2) Have you ever tried to find any constellation of stars ? ( Whats constellation?)
3) Have you danced in the rain with your kids/ friends/ family? ( Whattttt? with all kinds of viruses around?)
4) Have you seen the sun rise recently or when the sky turns from dark grey to amber? (Oh My God? That should be around 5 in the morning? MIDNIGHT!!!!)
5) Have you ever just sat alone listening or humming the song you love and doing nothing at all? (You want people to call me "PAGAL"?)
6) Have you tried looking into the mirror and admiring yourself :-)? (Now, now, thats something I do diligently :-)
7) Have you cried or laughed your heart out looking at some movie or reading a book? (WHAT? r u kidding!!!)
8) Have you walked on the beach barefoot? (lol... what a question ... ofcourse, yday I went with Sita, day before with Geeta!!!!)
9) Have you tried plain Curd-rice with pickle or plain paratha with simple dal, especially when ekdum hungry? ( Excuse me, my taste buds are alive please!!!)
10) Have you recently played any board games like ludo / snakes and ladder/ carrom with your friends/kids or family? (WHATTTTTTTT)
If you have answered “YES” to atleast 1 question, then you are celebrating life indeed…
And if you answered “NO” to the last question, my suggestion..please try it… you wont be disappointed.
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A vacation for us, would mean a break from the monotonous life, packing your suitcase and going somewhere “different”. It could mean a beach destination, a hill station, a wild life sanctuary and more recently, it would mean a trip abroad.
I have been a few of the lucky ones who in spite of being brought up in cities, used to visit my grandparents during vacation who were staying in a village. The afternoon and evenings of my vacation were not spent in front of IDIOT BOX. It was spent in playing folk games like Pallankuzhi (visit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pallankuzhi for details), Parama Padam (snakes and ladders) and Dayakattai (Much complex version of Ludo). These games were never a one-to-one game. All these became family games with all the ho-hulla and people taking sides, cheering, the cat-fights on loosing :-) It was fun.
The sad thing is the invasion of media has robbed us of these kind of folk games.
I dedicated this article to Ludo… one of the games that we all have set aside as something kiddish and boring.
HISTORY
In ancient India, Ludo existed as a complex game called Pachisi. The name comes from the Indian word "pachis" which means twenty five, the highest score that could be thrown with the cowry shells( a kind of marine shells used as dice). Pachisi is, in fact, the younger sister of Chaupar, a more complex and skilful game that is still played in India.
The Indian Moghul Emperor Akbar, apparently played Chaupar on great courts constructed of marble. He would sit on a Dias four feet high in the centre of the court and throw the cowry shells. On the red and white squares around him, 16 beautiful women, wearing appropriately coloured attire, would move around according to his directions. (I know you want to be in his shoes... wink wink!! :-)
Chaupar was the game played between Pandavas and Kauravas in the epic, Mahabharata. During this game the Padavas lost the game and their kingdom as well as their wife to the devious Kauravas. This was followed by a great war among them which led to destruction of the Kauravas. It is since that time that the play of this intelligent game has dwindled due to a superstition that it leads to pain and suffering... (How about casinos!!! Would that be FINE!!)
Tayakattai or Dayakattai is a similar game still played to some extent in South India. The dice are 2 brass rectangular sticks with engraved dots on all of their sides to denote the numbers. These are rolled in the palm and slid on the floor. There is an interesting article in one of the blogs about this game.
https://indiatemple.blogspot.com/2005/05/game-of-dice-dayakattai.html
In 1896, a westernised version of Pachisi was published in England under the name Ludo (Latin for "I play"), a game which has been popular in that country ever since.
There is another less well-known descendent of Ludo called Uckers. A game very similar to Ludo, and played on a large board by teams of three or four men. In fact, Uckers is a grown-up version of Ludo played with 2 dice instead of just one.
RULES OF THE GAME... A SAMPLE GAME!!!!
1) I throw the dice. It turns out 6!!!! I start. I take out a new coin (out of 4) from my “home”. I throw dice again. Any other number? I move my piece as many steps in the direction given…
2) You throw the dice. Sorry...no 6??? You stay put.
3) I throw the dice again. Chakkaaaaa!!!! Move on, baby, move on.
4) Repeat of 2??? Too bad ;-)
5) Repeat 3 and 4 with occasional 1 many many times… Its my day!!!!! All my coins have started moving around the board.
6) Finally u throw 6. U start off from your home and see the day(?) light (Aha!!!)..
7) My coin is nearby… and your piece is just 4 steps ahead of me??? I throw the dice…. Shakuni Mama ki jai…. I throw a "chawkka" (4)!!!! HAHAHAHA, I land in your cell and your coin goes back into your home!!!
8) All my pieces have traveled a full round and the last one needs 6 to go back inside the home!!!! ( Aamir Khan ki Jai!!! Lagaan ki jai!!! ) YESSSSSSS its a sixer…
(I WIN!!!! Wheres Mrs Draupadi now!!!! hahahahahahaha )
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To tell you the truth, when I play these games with my kids, I feel young again. Its kind of stress release for me. I say this not just for Ludo, but carrom, card games, and any board game. I borrow an excerpt from an article in Hindu sometime back.
"Unlike today's computer games, which celebrate individual players, most traditional games were team games. So, children learnt to accept both success and failure with equanimity. Wonder if our children will get to experience that kind of a feeling. It's as if traditional games have almost disappeared from homes."
