farkle

I just got home from a fun night out on the town. Okay, its not what it sounds like. We usually have game night on Thursday nights, but tonight the apartment we usually use for this was under construction. So we decided to move the game night to a local coffee bar. Although when we are in the flat we sometimes play loud and crazy games, for tonight we thought to just play a card game or something, since we were in public.

A crouwd began to gather and the tables were full. About 12 of our students had come for this coffee/game night. After the initial greetings and chatting we decided to break out the games. At first this was met with resistence. And even when I mentioned playing cards at the coffee shop during class, my students all looked at me perplexed. Why would I ever do that? Coffee shops are for talking and drinking coffee, nothing more. One students even said to me, "well, we can try it." But he didn't sound very convincing.

One end of the tables started a game of Dutch Blitz (my new addiction) but since only four people can play that the rest of us were left out. I debated what game would be easy to play and would include the remaining 10 people. I mentioned UNO (a game we often play at the flat), but this was quickly dismissed. I tried to explain Yatzee, but I haven't played that in forever and wasn't sure of the rules. My students reassured me, "Its good to just talk." "Its too noisy in here to concentrate on a game."

Finally I thought of a game, Farkle also known as Zilch. With some resistance, we started the game, rolling 6 dice and hoping for a 5 or a 1 to add up points. After the first round everyone was fully into the game and quickly they were cursing me and hoping I would not get points. I love how a game can bring out a completely different side of a person. I won the first round, but my students are quick learners and they quickly picked up some strategy and I was no where near winning the second game.