4 Bamboo

On playing Mah Jong

This past Friday I had the good fortune to be invited to play Mah- jong with a group of ex pat women who meet every week in the afternoon to play for spare change and bragging rights. If you've never played (and I've never met anyone who has other than the ex pat who invited me), it's basically gin rummy with tiles. It's also insanely, almost comically addictive. I've certainly had my enthusiasms, and I have a "collector" personality-- one who likes to own whole sets of things and likes rare editions, but I the only thing I can compare this to is my interest in vintage Springbok jigsaw puzzles from a certain artist (and only this artist, and only if they're cut with a random die, not cut with a homogeneous die-- tell us again why you can't find a man, Auntie Naomi?).

Things that have captured the imagination of so many others (Poker, Sudoku, video games, YouTube, smart phones, the books of Nicholas Sparks, Dungeons and Dragons, and so on)- they leave me stone cold. My (not very flattering) attitude is "If the rest of America likes it, chance are it will totally bore me."

Well, as usual, I discover something that fires my spirit about 85 years too late (there was a huge mahjong craze in the 1920's). Let me see if I can codify the intense appeal of this game:

Social: Of course, the main draw is that you can play it like a shark or you can play sort of desultorily and for someone like me, who will never be good at games of skill and chance, it really makes little difference. Therefore, you can enjoy the flow of chit chat around you while you listen with half an ear, trying to build your hand. If you like stats and rules, as my friend Martha does, you can learn the complex rules (if you get the east wind three times and win, your winnings triple, if you're east, everyone pays you, if you're not, your opponent directly across from you pays, the points system --which is incredibly complex-- etc).

The element of chance: of course, it's super exciting to see what the "wall" will give you next, what your opponents will throw away, and what you'll build or not build. It's like a very mild drug taking.

The esthetic elements: the tiles themselves are lovely- classic examples of the delicate, modernistic, and yet timeless hand that all of the best Asian artifacts carry, and all aspects of the game are pleasing: the sound the tiles make, the crisp,cold feeling of touching them, the racks, the way the hands are dealt, the numbers (13 tiles to win), the suites (circles, characters, bamboo) and the honor tiles-- dragons, winds, and flowers. The rituals of play are sedate and circumscribed- there's none of the betting, raising, and checking that you find with poker. Even the jargon is delightful: "honors"-- the hands you build are full of chows, pungs, kongs, and pairs. You "twitter the sparrows" to mix them, and you "curtsey the wall" to make it easy to draw from. There's a flower wall, each seat represents a wind, and so on.

And then there's the hands themselves. I learned, at the advice of the ladies, to play "American" a slower moving version where you (essentially) choose one hand (using a book of illustrated hands) and commit to it, slowly building this hand, and this hand only. Your other choice is the fast and dirty Chinese version, where you can build any hand you like, as long as it has one pair in it.

Some hands from the American version:



They all have names: "Moon at the bottom of the well", "Three Philosophers" (I won with that one). It's hard to explain the almost poetic appeal of this-- for the right personality type, it's akin to visiting a museum full of art that you can touch and spend all day with-- there's an element of tradition, beauty, preservation of mystery, all that's best of "old" games.

For those playing "with the book" it's a mental and aesthetic work out-- you have to use your mind in a way that you may have never used it-- you feel alert yet relaxed. Seldom do I feel so immediately "in the zone" as when playing this game. Rarely do I enjoy visual games like this- I can rapidly become bored playing Tetris or Bejewled, for example, whereas my sister and brother both love computer games. 

Four hours wasn't enough of this for me.

The surroundings were also part of it: it was in the high rise apartment of a lady of leisure. Let's see if I can do justice to this joint: It's the kind of joint where when you walk in you kind of turn into James Dean in Giant, squinting around and trying to look tough, while keeping your hands jammed in your pockets and looking around with a silent whistle shaping your mouth.

A huge (and I mean huge) white on white space station floating in the sky with a view of the golf course and country club ("Insanely expensive to join, darling, insanely") , it was decorated with reams of spoils from years of travel and (no exaggeration) at least 50 bottles of Blue Label quality scotch (and there was a wine fridge, too). Sea foam green and teal rugs so silky they reflected light, dainty folk dolls from around Asia, the kind of lamps you see in department stores, "serious art", tons of family photos and tzochkes---and a bowl of glowing golden marigolds in a shallow bed of water at the door.

Now, it was very much "new money", but baby, who's counting? Our hostess was a very outgoing, earthy and funny older woman (my guess is 50's), with black hair and the "leisure tan" skin you sometimes see around here- tan skin that has kept it's tan for years. Her eyes were golden green, with heavy lids, her best feature, and she had a resemblance to Emma Thompson, the actress, with a cute, slight underbite that gave her an appealing pugnacious quality.

There was a buffet style spread-- jugs of fresh juice, wine, champagne, cookies, crackers, coffee, and all of it put out by the silent, nearly invisible maid, who disappeared behind the swinging door leading to the kitchen now and then to bring out more for us.

The tables (there were 3) were set up with immaculate white tablecloths embroidered with a mahjong theme, and there were copies of "the book" for all of us. This dame knew what she was doing, and we all reaped the fruits of her labors.

This was the kind of place where when you compliment someone of her little frock, and ask "May I ask where you got it?" They say, with a straight face "Diane Von something or other, I think?" and the shoes by the door are Jimmy Choo, Manolo, and Gucci (and Vans-- me.)

Just the place to take off your shoes and step back in time, to a more gracious age of champagne and afternoon mahjong games with gossip and a view that goes on for miles.