I am a Terrible Asian because I have no fucking clue how any of this is used:

what the shit is all this

i tried to play scrabble. it did not end well.

WHY IS THERE A KEY

When we were cleaning out the house of my mom’s stuff, I stumbled upon this mahjong set. She was going to toss it out, but I rescued it because it came in a shiny case and I have the attention span of a – ooh, a dime! It’s so pretty! I’m gonna take a picture and post it to Instagram!

Where was I? Oh, right – mahjong. I think my mom brought it with her when she moved to Canada from Malaysia. It’s old – the tiles are yellowed, and the (extremely confusing) manual is typewritten and smells like old, old paper. It’s a complete set; all the tiles are there and five tile holding thingies with spikes on the end that I am assuming are to be used as a weapon when the match ends. There’s a pile of coloured chips with holes in the center that are held in place by a rod with a pivoting end, a couple of dice, and this weird number dial labeled “Pass-The-Buck”. Oh, and a loose pile of orange chips. And I have NO IDEA what any of it is for.

My only exposure to mahjong is on electronic devices, where’s it’s a solitary game of matching tiles. There are no dice, chips, buck passing or weaponized death-sticks anywhere in sight. I’m really just hanging on to the thing because it’s old and kind of neat, but I have zero idea how it’s used. If I were a better Asian, I would totally rock this shit. Instead, I like to build towers of tiles then walk into them, pretending I’m Godzilla. Although .. that’s pretty Asian too, now that I think about it. Maybe I’m not a complete sham after all!

I wonder if I should donate the set to one of the Chinese senior centers downtown. Thoughts?

i could make crafts with them, too. the world needs more jewellery made out of tiles.