Playground Classics – Traditional Thai Childhood Games (Part 2)

What are your memories of your break time at primary school like? I grew up in Bangkok at a time when the internet wasn’t quite in our hands yet and lunchtime was filled with chitchatting, jumping off things in the playground, playing sports and physical games. In Part 1 of this exploration into Thai playground classics, I looked back on the games I played in my younger years – ones that usually involved simple rules and are often accompanied by songs or rhymes. In this blog, I reminisce on the later years of primary school where games started becoming more complex, competitive and physical. Ones that created more holes in my socks than my parents ever wanted!

A lot of the games I played required us to divide ourselves into teams. Sometimes we would come to an agreement as to what this is, for example boys vs girls or Year 4s vs Years 5s. However there is a system called o noi ork to help players fairly divide themselves into teams or to help select a person for a special role. While in a circle each person puts one hand out in the middle and shakes it while saying “o noiiiiii”, once everyone says “ork” they either flip their palms up or down. In the case of making teams, people with palms facing the same way in the minority leave the circle (noi means little and ork means out) and this process is repeated until a team is formed.  If there are two remaining after o noi ork, we switch to the classic scissors paper rock (called pao ying chup in Thai). For special role selection, o noi ork is repeated until there is an odd one out.

Kratai kha deaw (One legged rabbit)

A fun team game that requires 6 to 10 people divided into two teams – the rabbits and the ones running away from the rabbits. Firstly a square or rectangular boundary is set as the game area, sometimes we would use lines on the floor to determine this but we often took our shoes off and lined them up (hence the very holy and dirty socks mentioned earlier!). 

The team of rabbits wait outside the boundary while the other team stays inside, the game starts when a rabbit’s name is called. The rabbits have to hop on a single leg once they enter the boundary and their goal is to catch the other players, they can also hop outside of the boundary and tag in another player to switch at any time. If they fall over or put their leg down, they are eliminated from the game. The other players are also eliminated if they get caught by the rabbit. The team with the last person standing wins! This is the version I used to play with my friends but I have seen other versions as well. In one, the rabbit has a safe circle in the middle of the boundary where they can take a bit of a rest from hopping about.

Mak kep (Picking up stones)

The perfect activity for a group on a rainy day as you don’t need much space to play mak kep – you only need a comfortable spot to sit around in a circle. Traditionally this game was played with small stones however when I went to school we made the ‘mak’ by linking colourful plastic chain pieces together. The classic way to play this game is to use 5 maks, first you determine the order of the players by doing a toss. All 5 pieces are held in one hand, thrown up and tossed onto the back of your hand and caught with the same hand again. The person who caught the most gets to go first.

The game is played by throwing all pieces down and selecting a piece to be your main, picking this up and keeping it in your hand. You start by throwing the main piece into the air and collecting pieces on the floor then re-catching the main one. The game ends for you if you drop anything or if you touch another piece while trying to pick a different one up. This is repeated until all pieces are collected off the floor allowing you to progress onto the next level. The number of pieces you need to collect depends on the level, one piece at a time is required for level 1, two at a time for level 2 and so on. Each group of friends will have their own unique set of rules to make the game more interesting and challenging and many also play with more than 10 maks. Whilst doing research on this, it seems that a version of this game exists in all parts of the world – what is this game called where you are?

Kradod yang (Jump rubber band)

One of my favourite games was the one that created the most holes in my socks! This game requires you to rummage through your house’s rubber band supplies (you usually get them from take away food) to link them up into a long chain. Like other games, the rules vary slightly from place to place and sometimes even between friend groups. Two people hold the rubber band chain at either end and others have to try to cross it according to the rules set. The game starts with the rubber bands held on the floor and progresses to the height of the ankle, knee, bum, waist, chest, neck, ear, head and arm’s reach. 

One of the variations for the first stage is to jump across the rubber band without letting it touch you while the people at either end step on the rubber band and try to release it to catch you. Most rules for stages below the waist also require you to jump over the rubber band multiple times in a row without touching it. Once the rubber band gets quite high you can get creative with how to get across, like doing a cartwheel