Good times get better with games

Aneighbor recently invited us to celebrate Chinese New Year at her house. Her invitation indicated the gathering would feature food, drinks, and games.

She had me at food; she’s fabulous in the kitchen. No doubt plenty of wine would be served. But that third item mentioned in her text gave me pause.

Games … what did she mean? What skills would be needed? Would cash be involved? Or teamwork?

Plenty of friends and families play games at gatherings. Some of them are highly competitive and require experience, if not expertise. The last time I played any sort of social game—it was probably Trivial Pursuit or Pictionary—was long ago.

And having such activities gradually drop off our party circuit wasn’t a big loss, especially since parties among journalists usually involve hanging out in somebody’s kitchen, eating a lot of hummus and crackers, drinking box wine, and complaining. A game would get in the way of the complaining part.

So I hesitated at the idea of having to take on my neighbors, especially since remembering the rules of many games is difficult after imbibing a couple glasses of pinot noir.

Curiosity won out, so after eating and drinking everything on offer, 10 of us were summoned to seats around a coffee table where we were introduced to Bau Cua Tôm Cá (gourdcrab-shrimp-fish) that, according to the Internet, is a Vietnamese gambling game using three dice.

The six sides of the dice have colorful imprints of a fish, a prawn, a crab, a rooster, a calabash gourd (our hostess called it a wine bag, which didn’t seem to fit in with the others, but it’s her game and she can call it whatever she wants), and a stag.

Players place wagers on a board printed with those pictures, betting on which images will appear with rolls of the dice. If one die corresponds with a bet, the wagerer receives the same amount as that bet—in our case, quarters, kindly provided by our hostess.

If two dice correspond with a bet, the wagerer receives two times their money. Three corresponding dice result in a payoff of three times their money.

There is absolutely no skill involved here; we might as well have been pulling the lever of an old-time one-armed bandit in a diner in Reno in the 1950s. Players might win, or might lose; the only decisions to be made are which picture to bet on and how much to put on it.

But that didn’t prevent us from having an uproariously good time placing bets, indulging a need for post-prandial sugar with handfuls of sweetened strands of coconut, and doing our best to eliminate the hosts’ wine reserves.

Before we knew it, it was nearly midnight; the only reason we left was because we hadn’t fed the dogs before coming over.

Non-competitive adult games like this one are a great way to blend together a guest list where some don’t know each other well (if at all). Players can start and stop at any time (it’s not like Monopoly, which can go on and on). No particular ability is required (unlike charades, which can be daunting for those who lack theatrical talents and don’t like being the center of attention), and if someone has to leave, the others won’t be affected.

Games are also a helpful way to integrate guests if the host is trying to avoid confrontations or differences of opinion (or, as is in vogue now, beliefs) on politics, economics, local government policies, world domination, and anyone who isn’t at the table (as we snarkily used to say at the Arkansas Gazette: Don’t leave the room).

There are lots of games like Bau Cua Tôm Cá that can be accessed via apps on smartphones. But the physical presence of a neon-colored board of cartoony animals (and a gourd/wine bag), along with the equally flashy dice, gave the goings-on a grounding in time and space that made the evening memorable.

The only moment that seemed headed for debate was when one of the guests wanted to know why there were only six images on each die; for some reason, this usually intelligent human had it in his head that a die has eight sides. We let him down gently. Sort of.

Since we were playing with the hostess’ spare change—we could have been using poker chips or wrapped hard candies or anything else on hand—nobody took home a bundle of cash.

But watch out.

“Next time we play with your money,” our hostess said.