I realized that I was leaving out an important and ever present aspect of my abroad experience. The games we constantly played wherever we were.
Odds
This is a wonderful game introduced by the man, the legend
himself, Davey Gabriel Bales. Essentially, it’s a game where you dare someone
to do something, usually a little embarrassing but harmless. The recipient of
the dare can choose the odds that he would do it. For example, if Davey says,
“Ben, odds you go up and introduce yourself to the next stranger you see”, I
could say “one in eight”, meaning that I would do give my self a one in eight
chance to do that. The challenger, in this case Davey, would then count to
three. After he says three, we both say a number between the aforementioned
range, in this case between one and eight. If we say the same number, then the
person being dared has to do whatever the dare was. So, if we both said seven,
then I would have to introduce myself to the next stranger that I see. If we
say different numbers, then nothing happens. However, there’s a wrinkle. If the
person being dared says one in two, then the darer has to perform the task if
they don’t say the same number. For example, Davey could say, “Ben, odds you
dance across this whole crosswalk?” I, being the dancing fiend that I am, don’t
think that would be too bad. So if I say “one in two” and Davey doesn’t get me,
then he has to dance across the crosswalk. This way, you have to be careful of
daring people, because they could "two" you and you could end up performing the
task. Now, if someone refuses to do the task after losing, then the others
participating can come up with a challenge. For example, while in Poland, I got
Christina on an odds to start dancing in the foyer of this brewery, and she
didn’t do it. As a challenge, I decided to make her give a speech to all 30 of
our classmates about how much they mean to her at dinner on our last night in
Poland. The only two rules in this game are as follows: the tasks can’t have
anything to do with money and your dare can’t negatively affect other people
against their will. Other than that, anything is fair game! And you have to
give odds, but if it’s something absurd, you could always say one in eight
thousand, so you probably won’t have to do it. This game always makes things
interesting.
Blow Dart
This a very simple and rather humorous game. Whenever
someone makes eye contact with someone else, either one can put their hand to
their mouth and blow a blow dart at the other person. It hits the other person
in the neck and tranquilizes them. The tranquilized person must then go limp
and fall down. The person must stay there until someone pulls the dart out of
their neck and then they are back to normal.
Blow darting someone.
Tranquilized
Man-on
Another very simple game. You walk up to someone and yell
“man on!”. You then promptly jump on their back and the person hopefully
catches you. That’s it! Always a fun one…
Spy game
A personal favorite, introduced by the one and only Mags. If
two people make eye contact, one person can put their hand to their eye as if
they are spying on them with a telescope. The person being spied on must drop
everything and put on their hand mask (see picture below) within three seconds
of being spied on. If they don’t get their mask on in time, then they have to
hit the deck so that the spy doesn’t shoot them. They must lay belly down on
the ground for five seconds, at which point you have successfully survived the
spy attack, and can then resume whatever you were doing.
Spying on someone.
Putting on your mask.
Slack Jaw
This one is quite simple. You look at someone and go "slack jaw", meaning you just let your jaw hang there. The other person does it back. Whoever smiles first loses. Rules: you cannot touch the other person, but pretty much anything else is fair game as long as you keep your jaw slack the whole time.
Slack Jaw
