A song that I know that I am actually surprised that has been written by someone is ' Rudolph the Rednose Reindeer". I've never thought about who was the origional writer of this song. It was just one that I have learned and have never forgotten how it goes. I looked it up and the song was origionally written by Johnny Marks.
There are alot of songs out there that I dont even know who wrote them!
A song I sing all the time is "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow." I am not sure who wrote it but it must have been composed by someone. The same goes for "We Are An Island", Cape Breton's "Theme" song. It is a song that I have been exposed to since birth but never really thought of it as being written by someone....it was just there. I did manage to find one web site which made a guess at who the possible writer was for "We Are An Island". Kenzie MacNeil. I am not sure how he came up with that name but it's as good a guess as any.
As you mentioned, Happy Birthday is the type of song. When I had a birthday party with my roommates and a bunch of friends, all we knew the song and sang together. In Japan, we use the lyrics as same as English version, but the pronunciation is a little different from original one. On the other hand, my Chinese roommate sang the song and the lyrics were totally different, I mean Chinese lyrics. But the song is the same. It was interesting to me.The other song that I think of is Christmas song, such as We wish a merry Christmas, Silent Night, and so on. I guess it is also common around the world. I think it comes from foreign countries, I mean from the Japanese point of view. People taught me these Christmas songs, such as kindergarten or from my parents. I don’t know who the writers of these songs are, but to sing Christmas song becomes natural for us.
When I went to my friend’s house two weeks ago, we did a board game together. In that game, I have to humming a song, Puff the Magic Dragon. I knew this song, so I hummed. My friends were kind of surprised because I knew the western song. In Japan, we often sing a song from foreign countries. In the music textbook, there are many foreign songs.
Music is amazing. Music can connect people in all over the world.
When I was little my sister and cousin taught me this song called “Found a Peanut”. They learned the song through some camps that they went to. I knew the song for years and the only place I ever heard it being sung was at different camps. For this question I decided to look it up and see if it was actually written by someone. Though there are many different versions of this little song, it turns out it was in fact written by Stewart Lee and Richard Herring.
"Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" is one of the world's best-known and most-loved poems. Millions of English-speaking people can recite the first verse from childhood memory, but few know who wrote it. The charming nursery rhyme, often wrongly thought to be a folk story, was composed almost 200 years ago by London-born sisters Jane and Ann Taylor, and was first published in 1806 as "The Star." Perhaps the neglected authors will receive long-overdue credit in 2006.” I didn’t know who actually came up with this song. It is basically known world wide. I was also surprised to find that it was written almost 200 years ago. That’s a long time for such a well-known nursery rhyme.
There are a number of songs from childhood, either nursery rhymes or campfire songs that we never really thought about someone having written. I did a search on a number of them that I could remember and the results were varied.My favorite example is a folk poem, sung though, and I cannot find the original author.
It is: There was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly.Some other examples of songs I couldn't find the original author to are:
Roll Over (There were 10 in the Bed)
The Old Grey Mare She Ain't What She Used to Be
The Mockingbird Song (Poppa's gonna buy you a diamond ring)But I did finally find one where the author was identified:
From Wikipedia
Row, Row, Row Your Boat" is a nursery rhyme, and a popular children's song/proverb, often sung as a round.
The tune is credited to Eliphalet Oram Lyte in the publication The Franklin Square Song Collection (1881, New York), which also indicates that he adapted the lyric:
Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life is but a dream.There are a number of alternate verses listed but I don't remember singing those. I think we made ours up except I do remember singing the following verse listed:
Row, row, row the boat
Gently down the stream
Throw your teachers overboard
And listen to them scream!
When I was younger I always used to hum the Mexican Hat dance song, I only found out a few years ago that it was an popular song, quite famous in Mexico of all places. I must have heard it from bugs bunny or something, but had no idea it was a real song.
The song I have chose for this topic is the ever so popular children’s song, “If You’re Happy and You Know It.” This song I have heard over and over while I was in pre-school and my early elementary days. Its one of the most well known songs for everyone around the world because everyone can say that they heard it at least once when they were a child. Some of the lyrics of the song are as stated:
“If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands.
If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands.
If you're happy and you know it,
And you really want to show it,
If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands.”As the song states when it says, “clap your hands,” we are suppose to as the song says, clap our hands. The next verse usually includes, “stomp your feet” and the next verse will be something else. You can even be creative and think of your own things if you really wanted.
What I did not know about this song was that an actual songwriter hadwritten this. I thought for sure that some kid or something a long time agoand it was passed on made it up. But the real inventor of this song wasAlfred B. Smith, who was born in 1916. He died in 2001.
http://www.rhymes.org.uk/who_killed_cock_robin.htm
http://www.wtsmith.com/songs/capitalship.html
http://www.kididdles.com/lyrics/n013.htmlThese links show the words to some of my favourite songs my grandmother sang to me. The songs were “Who Killed Cock Robin”, “Capital Ship” and “One Wide River” which I always called “Noah Built Himself and Ark.” They are all fun songs for kids, “One Wide River” especially is easily adapted to your own words. I learned a verse, “The camel he ate a cinnamon bun, there’s one more river to cross”, which is not included in the versions I found on the internet. I think my version is a little better.
“Capital Ship” does have an author, but I think if you asked people, most people would not know who he is. (Charles Edward Carryl). This one is my favourite, and I still remember some of the words to it, I started singing it to my nephew, mostly because he and the dog are the only ones who tolerate my singing.
I had to ask my grandmother to help me remember the rest of the words, she is able to remember them way better than I can, but we both had to Google the entire songs. She told me she learned them from her father who came from England, she said it was his way to keep the five kids quiet in the car by teaching them to sing these songs.
I have always known "Ring Around the Rosie" which could be considered a song since I was a child. It never occured to me to think of who wrote it or orginally sang it. However, Im sure everyone probably knows some version of it because I have heard several different versions of it myself.
One song that I definitely remember hearing a lot of growing up has to be London bridges. It goes, “London bridges falling down, falling down, falling down. London bridges falling down, my fair lady” This also happens to be a song that I have heard so often throughout my 22 year life that I have never once stopped to think that someone had actually written it, except for now of course. I guess the reason I have never really thought about it is because I honestly heard the song on a regular basis for years as a kid. Even now it is pretty crazy to think that someone out there actually sat down and wrote the lyrics to such a song, although of course it makes perfect sense that it’s a written song. For me I guess it’s just been one of those taken for granted type songs where I haven’t thought once about the song really, until now of course!
The song that I used to sing and listened to for a very long time since I was a child, was "You are my sunshine". When I was a child, I never realized or asked who actually wrote the song? Was it a girl or was it a guy? I had no clue. I thought maybe it would have been just a mother singing to her child one day possibly rocking her baby to sleep or something. When I found out it was a man by the name Jimmie Davis in 1940, I was really surprised. The first time he played it, it became an instant hint. Now it is a very popular song used by all kinds of parents all across the world. It can help children sleep better or just to play and watch a baby smile.
In my memory there is a song. This is a nursery rhyme. When I was a little boy my parents taught me how to sing this song. In kindergarten my teacher taught too. All children was singing and playing in the playground. In china we named this song “two tiger”. The lyric is that: “two tiger, two tiger, running fast, one is not have eye, the other one is not have tail, so queer, so queer.” This song was so popular in china 10 years ago. Every child knew it and singed it. But before 2 years I knew this song came form French. I am so surprise. Little does one think I have been singing a French song for 10 years? It is interesting.
I song I used to sing when I was younger at least was "there was an old ladywho swallowed a fly" and I never really realized that it must have beenwritten by someone (or even thought about it). To me it was just some funnysong to sing when there was nothing to do.
By now we all know that Children’s folklore has a variety of different ways to be looked at. Please let me explain into greater detail. Beginning with children’s song and story. A children’s story such as Robert Munches’ “I love you forever” or Mortimer has certainly been passed down from many years ago or further more a song such as “Skip Skip Skip to my Lou” or “Somewhere over the rainbow” ties in well with both song and repetition.The song that was very popular for me was “Ms. Mary had a steamboat”. Which goes like this:
Ms. Mary had a steamboat the steamboat had a bell,
Ms. Mary went to heaven, the steamboat went to
“H-E-L-L-O operator, please give me number 9 or I will kick you in
behind the yellow curtain there was a piece of glass
for when Mary sat upon it she hurt her little
ask me no more questions, please tell me no more lies.
The boys are in the bathroom beating up their
flies are in the city the bees are in the park.
Ms. Mary and her boyfriend are kissing in the
D-A-R-K D-A-R-K D-A-R-K dark; the dark is like a movie, the movies like a show.
For this is Ms. Mary and her boyfriend and this is all I know.
I know I know my ma’ I know I know my pa’
I know I know my sister with the 80 meter bra.
I know I know my dog, I know I know my cat,
I know I know my brother who is 60 meters fat.Just reading the words black and white on a piece of paper you realize that it wasn’t the greatest song that I learned but it’s certainly funny in the long run. In terms of the meaning to the lyrics I believe that it basically had a meaning of a boyfriend and girlfriend breaking up after a fight and making fun of the physical features of the brother and sister.You don’t hear a whole lot of this song being told by to many people now of days but I can remember it unfortunately word for word and asking my friends they can remember just the same!!
As I sit in the Halifax Int’l Airport patiently awaiting my flight home from an amazing reading week one song really jumps at me. That song is Don’t Worry Be Happy. I actually thought it was just written for that annoying Bill Bass toy that was manufactured a few years ago. My grandfather got one for x-mas and I could have killed it. But to my surprise I once went to download it and I found out it was actually composed and sung by the great and legendary Bob Marley.
The first song that came to mind when I thought about this question is the well known traditional song accompanied with a dance called the “Hokey Pokey”. For example:
“You put your left hand in, You put your left hand out,
You put your left hand in and you shake it all about...
You do the Hokey Pokey and you turn yourself around,
and thats what its all about!”.As you would sing the song you would follow the actions of course and it was a great old time back then. As a child it was a very popular song to be played at birthday parties and even weddings and everyone had their own way of singing it. The song has been played and sung all over the world. In some places the words are slightly changed but it still has the same beat and sound to it. It may have come across as a silly kids song but it has been copyrighted several times in the United States for reasons that I would never had known as a kid or even until I researched it today. A little interesting fact: “In the United States it costs $32 000 for an ad campaign (television and radio for 3 months) to use the "Hokey Pokey". In the United Kingdom the "Hokey Cokey" (although not necessarily the U.S. Hokey Pokey) is regarded as a traditional song and is therefore free of copyright restrictions.”
Speaking of being drunk and singing, I think (although cannot actually guarantee it) that I was singing "The Song That Never Ends" on Saturday night. Wait - I can assure you that I was singing it because I ended up in a heated argument with a friend over the lyrics. She thought it was the song that DOESN'T end. Honestly, who does not know the words to that song. Anyway, I don't know who sings/wrote it, although I do remember that it was on that show with the puppets - Lamb Chops? I just looked it up and it was Lamb Chop's Play along. I also looked up who wrote it and it was a guy called Norman Martin - whoever the hell he is.
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Glooby glooby dweeby, plooby ploopy plee-twee, blah blah blah blow blow: song song song si-ing, sing sing sing song
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Question of the (reading) week
Identify a song that you know / sing that you were surprised to find out was actually written by someone.
Let me explain: people have repertoires of songs just like they have repertoires of stories. I know not everyone is a singer, but you all know songs, and you probably sing in a number of contexts, even if none of them is on a stage in front of people. Many of these songs are products of popular culture and their association with their creators and/or most famous performers is still intact. When you get drunk and start singing "Wild Thing" or "Louie Louie," you probably remember that, as ubiquitous as they are, they are most famously associated with The Troggs and The Kingsmen, respectively. Even if you're not sure of the original artist you are probably aware of them as "created." (Anyone remember Shirley Ellis's most famous song? Again, you all know it, despite your immediate desire to exclaim "Who the hell is Shirley Ellis?") This is in part because they bear the hallmarks of popular music.
But there are other songs that you may know that you have had as part of your repertoire for so long that they seem not to have come from an outside source like popular culture but passed down exclusively through informal interaction. A classic example would be "Happy Birthday." I defy you to find an English-speaking North American who can honestly make a claim that they do not know or have never sung that song. Doesn't mean they like it, just that they know it. But "Happy Birthday" was not only written, it's copyrighted. I you have seen a movie where it was performed, watch the closing credits and note that it is listed in the song permissions.
If the question proves too weird, here's a modified version:
Identify a song in your repertoire for which the association to the originating artist is (largely) irrelevant.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
My students tell stories. Some of them are nuts
A dull thud sounds as the corpse falls to the ground, it's blood soaking into the parched earth.
No one is there to witness it's last gasping breaths as Death comes to claim her prize.
"Anyone, anyone there?" It gasps weakly, coughing up crimson liquid.
And then, letting go of it's panicked grasp on life, it falls softly into the blind peace of death.
Still, no one appears to give any last respects.
The corpse is left to rot, unnoticed by the rushed world surrounding it.
The body becoming part of the earth once more, as the soul escapes into eternity.
Memories of torture slowly fading into the darkness, never to return.
Everlasting bliss as all worry is washed away into nothingness.
Free...
That is what it is now.
Free of pain, heartache, sorrow, anger, happiness, hate, love.
Free.
Hey remember when Paul and I used to drive you crazy playing soccer. We used to go out every day one summer and play from dawn to dusk. I know you used to hate it because we would use you as our tackling dummy. We would always play the ball intentionally right to you so that we could practice our slide tackling. You didn’t like it but you have to admit that it toughened you up and improved your skills. At the beginning of the summer you would start crying after one tackle but by the end it would take us two or three tackles before we got you. I remember Paul and I trying to bribe you when you did start crying. We didn’t want to get in trouble so we would fetch you ice cream and chips just so you would not tell on us. We could not hide that one time though. We both tackled you at the same time and you got a gash on your shin. Paul and I tried to patch you up and to your credit you did not tell on us. I guess your white socks slowly turning red gave it away to the parents. You ended up having to get six stitches and Paul and I got in so much trouble. The next day though the three of us were back outside playing again. I love looking back and remembering those times. It turned out to be the last summer we all hung out together. We moved to Canada in August and Paul stayed in Malawi. That is part of growing up though. Since then we have led our own lives. In the past few years I have been off at university and you will soon be moving to England. Maybe one day we will both get to go back to Malawi and meet up with Paul and reminisce, maybe not. Regardless of what happens I will never forget that summer…some of the best slide tackles of my career!!
Farmer and snack
In a very cold winter there was a farmer. He finished his work and went back home. When he walked through an alley he looked something on the grass. He approximated and looked around. Oh, he found a snake. The snack was cold; it was like a ice-lolly. It was very pathetic. The farmer said: “poor snack, I knew you were very cold. Let me gave you warm.” then put the snake into his clothes and kept walking to home. In the clothes there were warmer. The Snake warm, regained consciousness little by little, the snack was regained its natural instinct and bite its benefactor, the farmer was suffered a fatal injury. He was poisoning. Before dying, a farmer, said: “I never have, I pity villains, we should be evil.”That story told us we should not pity the bad guy or evil people. Sometime you safe them and they will bite you back.
A little background before I get to the stories, they are really short, so I opted to tell more than one. Gramps tells the best stories, and I always say I need to write them down, I took this opportunity to do so.
There was an old fella who lived over in George’s River, once a week he walked to North Sydney to go to the bank and get some groceries. Once this day he was walk back and he met the old priest from Boisdale who was walking down the road muttering to himself. The old fella stopped the priest and said “Father what is wrong with you today, it’s not like you to be going around talking to yourself”. The priest said, “some young gaffer stole my bike and I now I can’t get around to do my visiting,” the old fella thought for a second and he said to the priest, “Father, what you need to do is at mass on Sunday you need to preach the Ten Commandments, when you get to ‘Thou Shall Not Steal’ really emphasize that Father, and I am sure the fella who stole your bike will feel guilty and return it.”
The following Sunday the priest gave the sermon, but didn’t seem to emphasize “Thou Shall Not Steal”, so the old guy stopped the priest on the way out of church and said, “Father what happened, why didn’t you stress about the stealing?” The priest said to the old guy, “I was giving the sermon and I got to thou shall not covet thy neighbours wife, and I remembered where I left my bike.”
There was a Boisdale who worked on the train, one day he was walking to work and about half way there he took a “spell” sat down for a few minutes and decided he’d better go home and go to bed for the day. When got home, he took his boots off in the kitchen and walked upstairs, in his bed he found a man with his wife! He was so enraged he took the shot gun and killed them both. He went over to the next door neighbours to tell his friend what had happened, now this friend was famous for saying “well, it could be worse.” If someone said “oh it’s pouring buckets today”, he’d say, “well it could be worse, it could be a nor’easter”, or someone would say, “oh my mother fell and sprained her ankle today,” he’d say, “well it could be worse, she could have broken her hip.”
So the fella who shot his wife is telling this neighbour all about the events of the day. When the story is all done, the neighbour looks at the man and says “well ya know it could be worse,” and the man says, “how the hell could it get any worse? I shot my wife and another man, tell me how can it get any worse?????” and the neighbour says, “could have been worse, if it was yesterday, it would have been me.”
There is a frog, tiny tiny frog. She grows up by her kind parents in a small village.
As she grew up, she started to think that she wanted to know more about something. And then, she decided to go to elementary school. She learned how to communicate with her friends.
She enjoyed school life, but she is so curious about the outside world from the small village. So, she decided to go university in another city. This was the first time for her to go outside the village. Everything was different from the village. She was overwhelmed a little bit, but she was getting used to its life. It was also first time for her to live alone. She learned many things, such as cooking, washing, cleaning, and especially she started to appreciate her parents.
The curious frog started to think that she wanted to know more and more. She decided to go abroad to study another language. She had no idea how much different from her world. Of course, she had anxiety, but she has already decided to go. It is challenge for her. What is waiting for her? Is it so tough thing or so happy thing? She believe she will be able to know many things from the study abroad.
She goes to the abroad with a lot of hope and dream.
One day a sister and brother were sitting in the kitchen and there was an ironing board and an iron set up beside them. The older sister thought she would play a trick on her younger brother, so she told him to kiss the little boy that they could see in the reflection on the iron. The little brother, thinking that his sister wouldn't do something mean to him, leaned over and kissed the hot iron. His lips were burnt for a week and his big sister was grounded for even longer!
It was a mid summers day of 1999 where two kids were playing in the trees. Jordan was hanging upside down from the branches as he jokes with his friend Lila about what it would be like to be a monkey. “Ee ee” Lila responds, “I love acting like a monkey”. They both laugh and swung from branch to branch, imitating monkeys. There was a smell in the air that afternoon; it was as though something was burning. “What is that smell? Its getting stronger.” states Lila. They never paid much attention to the smell after that until they heard sirens. The sirens grew louder and louder when a fire truck came roaring down the street. The kids jumped down from the tree and went running after the flaming red fire truck. The firefighters were fighting the blaze with their hoses and there were planes dropping water from above. The kids were amazed by the firefighters they wanted to see more but the police officers told the children to go back to their house and not to worry about anything. The kids ran home to tell their mom. “Mom! Mom! Do you smell that, the woods are on fire! The police sent us to tell you” Lila exclaimed. The mother did not believe her children but then she sees the smoke. The mother franticly ran around the house looking for things to try to salvage in the case they have to evacuate. She is gathering photos, papers, anything she can think of when there is a knock on the door. “Sorry miss but you are going to have to evacuate as soon as possible for you and your children safety” the Police officer states. The mother is unsure of what to pack away she knows she cannot fit everything in the car. She tells her kids to grab anything that means a lot to them and that they have five minutes. The kids run to their rooms where they grab their teddy bears, blankets, and some clothes. The mother packs up the car with her children in the backseat with their dog, cat, and even their neighbours’ hamster. She drives away scared and thinking this would be the last time she sees her home. The family stayed with their grandmother that night. There was not much sleeping happening that night by the kids or their mother. When they awoke they were unsure if they even had a house to go home to that morning. The mother assured the kids that everything was okay; she got in the car by herself and drove back to her house unsure of what she was going to see. As she turns onto her road she see firefighters in the ashes of the forest and she begins to cry thinking that her house is gone. She approaches her house and there it was standing just as she left it all in one piece. There were firefighters sitting on the roof soaking the house all night to ensure that it would not catch on fire. The mother could not be more grateful; she called her children and exclaimed to them the wonderful job the firefighters did to save their house. The family returned to their house the next night and they were never so happy to be sleeping in their own beds.
( In the voice of a young girl )
The very first time I ran away I was just a little girl. I was only five fingers old when I ran into the forest for the very first time. I’d put my play clothes on first though so mommy wouldn’t get mad if I got all dirty. I’m six now but I would never leave home without my best friend Ben. I got Ben when I was just a baby, and when I felt scared he would lick my hand to make me feel like everything was okay. I liked his company when I used to hide in the forest but sometimes he’d let his nose get the best of him and we’d find ourselves lost in the darkness of the night. I used to tell him not to get us lost but he didn’t listen much. I guess I should have listened to my mommy too when she told me not to wander farther then the white fence that separated our house from the ‘magical’ forest.
It was me and Ben’s secret though, no one else knew that the forest was magical and all of the fun things that we found there. When I ran away at night time after supper we would see glowing yellow eyes in the trees, I tried to tell mommy once but she said trees don’t have eyes, but I know they do I saw them with my own. Sometimes on our adventures Ben would bark at the squirrels, but they couldn’t talk back because they always had their mouths full. Mommy always told me never to talk with my mouth full, so I guess there mommies did too. I’ll never forget that special night when I was only five, me and Ben saw lots of stars twinkling in the sky and the some stars made the shape of a big spoon, like the ones mommy would let me lick after making a big chocolate cake.
When I’d feel lucky I’d make a wish on one of the brightest stars it was my favorite. Sometimes I’d wish for new toys or candy but most of the times I’d wish for daddy to come back home. Mommy said he’s not comin back though cuz he’s at peace now in a place called heaven, mommy wishes he’d come home too. I think Ben misses daddy too sometimes, he used to take Ben huntin in these woods and Ben used to chase rabbits. He don’t like to chase them anymore though so he usually just sticks with me. I never told mommy about my favorite star for a long time, but when I did she didn’t get mad no more when she’d see me go past the white fence. I think its cuz she knows I liked to go make wishes with Ben in my special place as long as I was home by seven to hug and kiss her goodnight.
A little bird was flying south for the winter. It was so cold the bird froze and fell to the ground in a large field. While it was lying there, a cow came by and dropped some dung on it. As the frozen bird lay there in the pile of cow dung, it began to realize how warm it was. The dung was actually thawing him out! He lay there all warm and happy, and soon began to sing for joy. A passing cat heard the bird singing and came to investigate. Following the sound, the cat discovered the bird under the pile of cow dung, and promptly dug him out and ate him.
I’m going to tell you an embarrassing story of when I was younger. So, when I was 12 years old I was very excited going into the school year because I was no longer a child, trapped in the elementary school system but rather an adolescent, entering the wonderful world of junior high. For essentially the entire summer I was anticipating my first day of school. The excitement that I had is beyond anything that I can really describe. In fact that first day of school just may have been the most excitement I remember feeling in my entire life. Anyway, so finally the day arrives and I make it to junior high where my brother was a senior in the graduating class so I felt pretty cool and confident with no sense of fear. After all, if anything were to happen I’d have my brother’s protection because he and his friends “ruled the school!” However, my excitement turned to pure embarrassment when while on break between classes I had to go to the washroom so badly. I had to go pee so bad I practically wet my pants. So, I quickly ran to the nearest washroom, kicked open the door and immediately started undoing my belt buckle before I had even entered the stall when suddenly I looked up and saw a boy washing his hands. For a moment I was completely confused, thinking he had made the mistake when I turned around and realized I was surrounded by a number of males. After hearing a bunch of laughter, I quickly ran out of the washroom where I was met with more laughter and puzzled looks. Extremely embarrassed I finally ran into the proper washroom and peed like I had to do, taking an extra amount of time in the washroom afterward to gather my thoughts and dignity, trying to erase the embarrassment moment from my memory. Clearly, since that was a good ten years ago, the strategy did not work and I am still haunted to this day with that terrible memory.
This past summer my two sisters, my friend and I drove to Moncton New Brunswick to camp and to go to the Country Rocks the Hill concert. The day of the concert we were all hanging out around the tent and two of Alan Jackson’s film crew came up to us and asked is they could video tape us. They wanted to show what fans do before they go to see Alan Jackson. At the concert during one of the songs, my younger sister’s picture came up in the background of the video. Some of the other performers at the concert were George Canyon, Sugarland and Brooks & Dunn. The concert was absolutely amazing aside from the fact that we got rained out and ended up sleeping in the truck.
My mom told me a story once when her and my dad had just moved into their home and were doing it over. My grandfather and my father were up in the attic working around the chimney. She said my grandfather had been continually repeating to my father to “Be careful now Barry, you have to step on the beams so you don’t fall through the jip rock” (because the attic didn’t have proper flooring, between each beam and insulation had only been jip rock). My mom said my grandfather must have preached to my dad, saying it almost 5 times. At the time my mom was in her room watching television, and all of a sudden she sees a big leg come pummeling through her ceiling. Scared! She screams; then starts laughing hysterically. She ran up to see if my father was okay. It turns out that it wasn’t my father’s leg through that ceiling, it was my grandfathers. She said she ran downstairs trying to hold in her laugh because my grandfather was after preaching to my dad about not stepping on the jip rock, but she just couldn’t help it. My mom sat there and laughed so hard she started crying. She said my grandfather wasn’t too pleased about it. But after a while he started to laugh at himself. Haha
A Horse Of Course
One summer for my 7th birthday, my parents took myself and my sister Jillian to P.E.I. on vacation. For the first few days we did all the typical tourist stuff, spent the day at Rainbow valley, Cavendish beach etc... One morning while eating breakfast at the cabins were we were staying, my sister hollered : mommy there's a horse in the kitchen" before my mother could answer , I had run ahead of her and saw a horse with its head stuck in our kitchen. We were all in shock and burst out laughing. We went outside to investigate and there was a very old man weakling overalls, tweed jacket, and smocking a pipe. The horse was hooked up to an old wagon. He asked us if we wanted to go for a little drive. My parents hesitated at first, but off we went. It ended up being one of my favourite childhood memories.
He told us storeis along the way, like the time he was pulled over in the horse and buggy and charged with drinking and driving. He fought the charge and drvoe his buggy all the way to the court house in Charlotte Town, he even made money on the way picking up bottles on the roadside. The highlight of the drive though was when he pulled up to the liquor store and parked the horse & buggy in the parking lot, leaving us to sit there while he went into the store. Everyone was smiling and talking a second look when they pulled up to the store and saw us sitting there. The funniest monet came when he said " I have to get home to mom, and make her some supper". He looked about 80. We wondered how old his mother was (ha ha!)
This is a story I was told as a child. I never bothered to investigate it but I liked the romanticism of it.
My great-great grandfather on my Mother's side was a smuggler along the coast from Nova Scotia to Maine. Like a pirate, we always asked, picturing a swashbucking handsome hero. Apparently, he smuggled rum and tobacco and other goods 'un-named'. He was, so we were told, very successful at what he did and managed to amass a lot of money and a lot of land. Of course, the authorities stepped in and ended his illegal activities. He was arrested and although his lands weren't confiscated, his money was. His descendents didn't have enough money to maintain the land or pay the taxes and they weren't good at farming so most of the land was also confiscated by the authorities.
That is how our family lost its fortune. Although made from illegal activities, they were the 'innocent victims' of 'harsh' government regulations.
When I was a child, it was almost 20 years ago. I used to live with my grandpa, everyday morning, we got up early, then go to a restaurant to “drink tea”, that is one daily event between me and my grandpa.
One day, we went to the same restaurant as usual, and I had fun with other children in the restaurant beside a small manmade lake which added a few fish in it on that day. I was so curious about the fish that new in the lake, so I wanted to touch them, I got closer and closer to them, suddenly, a boy pushed me, and then I fell into the lake. I thought the lake was so deep that I can’t stand on the bottom, so I struggled and scream. My grandpa heard my voice, and he ran to me, and said, anki, the lake is not as deep as you think so, but I heard nothing and kept struggling. There was no choice, so my grandpa jumped into the lake, and helped me got out of the lake…
It’s the most impression story I have remembered in my childhood.
People often ask me why I’m so religious. They ask me why I continue to visit a church that continues to rejects me. It is written in the bible after all that my ‘kind” is sinful. I am allegedly damned to hell when I die. But yet I’m a devout catholic. Every time I enter the church I get blatant stares, or people uncomfortably look away. Everyone knows the truth, but no one will say anything. They save the gossip for when I’m not around. A horrible feeling of loneliness and rejection in an otherwise sacred and spiritually fulfilling atmosphere.
I still remember the day the priest found out. I had been volunteering to direct a Christmas pageant that was to be performed the following Sunday. The priest invited me over for dinner that weekend, and said he’d like it if I brought my family as well. I gladly accepted his offer. That weekend, the priest heard a knock on his door. On his door step, he saw me, another man and two children; a boy and a girl. He asked if the man was my brother; I said no. He was my partner, Jamie, and the two children were from a previous marriage of his from which he maintained custody. The priest seemed shocked. A man who was normally very talkative now seemed unusually awkward. Jamie never helped much either. He had a strong passion against the Catholic church. He believed it was the sole cause of homophobia, and refused to ever step foot in a church. It was a wonder I managed to get him to even eat dinner with the priest.
After that day, the priest seemed to talk less with me. He avoided eye contact, and seemed to stutter during the rare occurrences where we did actually speak.
Jamie still asks me, “Why do you still visit an institution that claims we’re to be damned to hell?” I tell him that the bible is written by man, and it’s God I worship every Sunday. And I don’t believe God would damn anybody.
Once upon a time there was this young boy who had a dream to become a professional athlete. He was from the western part of Canada. This kid was multi-talented; he could play soccer, basketball and hockey at a high level of competition. All his family and friends knew this kid is special, but figured he could not make it professionally.
When he reached high school, his main focus was playing basketball and wanted to get a scholarship at one of the top notch universities in the United States, where basketball is big all over the world. He applied everywhere, but nobody would accept him or take him seriously, mainly because of the fact that he was Canadian and our country usually did not have the talent of athletes in the USA. But one day, he finally got accepted to a small university in California after all that trouble.
When he got there, nobody expected much of him, being a small Canadian born basketball player. So he worked hard everyday, putting extra hours in the gym, bouncing tennis balls rather than basketballs to work on his dribbling skills. Eventually his work started to payoff, as he stood out as the best player on his team, setting a few records at the school as well. Some people recognized that he had great game.
Finally, when it came down to trying to make it in the NBA, most people did not think he was good enough. This did not faze him because this happened to him before. He finally got drafted, but was not recognized as a very good player. The first few years in the league, he rarely got a lot of playing time and did not have very good numbers. So again he worked even harder than before, playing in the gym before practice and even staying after practice. He worked and worked and worked and eventually, things got better for him and people started to take him seriously. This lead to him being a high profile player and a two-time MVP of the league……I don’t think it’s hard to guess who this guy is.
Moral- Hard work will always pay-off, maybe not right away, but surely down the road.
At first I didn’t know what story I was going to tell you because I am a person that has many stories to tell (some more legal then othersJ) that I didn’t know what one to tell you, but after a long thought process I have come up with the one that I think is the funniest thing in the last four years of my life.
Back in my grade 11 year of high school I was chosen to attend the Encounters With Canada program in Ottawa, while there we did various tours and other events. On our first day their during the afternoon we went for a walking tour of the capital region but we missed a few things that were on the to-do lists of our monitors so we decided that we would come back that evening to do those certain things. So when we came back we walked through one of the main parks near parliament, and before we went through it was mentioned that this was a popular spot for local “special women” to loom. As we went through I saw this pretty shady looking women (you have to keep in mind this was just around dusk!) and I said to the person next to me (who I ASSUMED was my friend that I had been walking with this entire time) hey look at that babe over there I think it’s a hooker getting ready to start her evening “drive-thru”, and to my unbeknownst surprise it was one of my monitors that was doing the tour. I was very relieved when I realized it was one of the younger ones so she laughed her ass off, and from that point on until it was over the two of us had an amazing insider joke between us!
A few weeks ago my friend Dave and I decided it would be a good idea to go to St. FX to visit our friend Joe…well, Dave decided and gave me 15 minutes notice that we were going to X for the night. I think another factor in his decision was that there was supposed to be a rather large keg party going on that weekend.
After quickly packing up a few things I would need, beer and sandwiches mostly, Dave roared into my driveway with his 1988 Porsche and we were on our way.
The drive was mostly uneventful; we ate some sandwiches, talked about our plans for that night, and wondered what Joe would think when we showed up unannounced with plans to sleep on his floor.
When we arrived at X things quickly got into full swing, Joe was happy to see us and as it turns out there was a party on the floor of his residence that night. We met a few more people who lived in the same building (Lane Hall) and most of them were very friendly and surprisingly free with their alcohol, which struck me as odd. In high school if you brought beer to a party, you would have to carry it around with you all night or risk having it stolen (which it most certainly would be), yet these people were giving out free beer like it was going out of style.
Throughout the night, we traveled to several other residence halls, as well as the house party with the keg, which we had heard about earlier in the night. I vaguely remember getting thrown out of one residence because Dave had taken it upon himself to smoke cigarettes in the bathrooms, rather then step outside into the blistering cold night. Also during the night we had somehow come into possession of a 60 ounce bottle of vodka…I’m quite confident we paid a girl about 20 dollars for it at one of the parties…but I can’t be sure. In any case, we returned to Joe’s room at about 5:00 AM and went to sleep for a few hours.
Feeling in no mood for the greasy breakfast the school provided, we decided it would be prudent to get on the road early for our return home. The 2 hour drive turned into about a 5 hour one however when the Porsche broke down outside of St. Peters.
Dave and I spent 20 minutes trying to hitchhike into town to call CAA when finally a nice older woman picked us up. I was very surprised that we found a drive at all, as both of us looked like serial killers after our long night of partying. In any case, Dave finally got in touch with his mother as well as CAA and we were able to get the car towed. His mother drove all the way to St. Peters to pick us up. I’d say the trip was worth it though.
Once their was a young boy named Jamie who was orphaned at a young age. He was sent to live with his grandmother who treated him like a slave. She made him eat scraps of food that fell on the floor and he had to sleep in the attic. He was allowed to go to school but he didn't have any friends. He wore second hand clothes that were very out of date and he was really skinny and frail. Every night before he went to sleep he would pray to God or anyone who would listen that he wanted to get away. One day Jamie decided he had had enough so he packed his bag of tattered clothes and ran away. He was wandering the streets cold and alone with no idea of where to go. All of a sudden a strange man came out of nowhere and offered the boy a home, job and a chance at an education. He decided it was better than dying on the streets or going back to his grandmothers. He arrived at his new home to find other children who were in similar situations as himself. They explained to Jamie that the mysterious man was a widowed millionaire who wanted to help homeless children because he had lost his own children. Jamie realized how lucky he was to have a home and he grew up happy and healthy with a family who loved him.
I'm standing outside the building with a sign in my hand. Does a piece of cardboard with writing on it attached to a piece of wood count as a sign? I don't know, we'll call it a sign for lack of a better word. My hands are freezing and I begin to wonder why I didn't wear gloves. It's freezing. It's winter, afterall, it's supposed to be freezing. My ears are warm. I've worn a toque. A shocking burst of intelligence in a day of stupid decisions.
I glance around me. Side to side, front to back. I'm one of a small group, a minority. They all look like lost sheep. Sheep holding signs and standing around in the cold wondering what the hell they should do with themselves. I'm waiting for someone to let out a worried "Baaa...". The thought makes me smile. A woman standing next to me frowns so I stop smiling and look back at the building. This is the saddest protest I've ever attended. I haven't attended many. Noone's yelling or breaking things or making funny rhymes. I signed on for broken bones and billy bats, smashed windows and egging. Peaceful protests were boring.
I perk up when someone exits the building. He's dressed in a nice suit and tie, shiny shoes. He's wearing an expensive jacket and what look to be leather gloves. And a scarf. I want that scarf. My neck is cold. He looks at our sad group. The lost sheep. I think I hear a "Baaa...".
"What are you all doing here?" he asks. I can hear the laugh in his voice. Noone says anything. Sheep don't speak. I look around and wait for someone to say something. Nothing. That guy with the warm scarf and shiny shoes is talking again. I'm not listening. Cold and bored I rebel--the black sheep--and toss my sign over the crowd. It lands with a pathetic thump on the frozen grass. The whole group turns to look at me. Scared sheep, their eyes are wide.
I tug my hat down over my ears and mutter an obscenity under my breath. Then I turn away from the group and start walking home.
I never liked sheep.
While my brother was away at college, he called me one day and told me a story about his friend’s sister, named Kimmy. Lee and his sister were sitting in the car waiting for their parents to come from the house. The car had been covered with ice and Lee thought it would be funny to roll down the window and say “Hey Kimmy watch this.” Lee smashed his head through the sheet of ice that covered where the window was. Kimmy was amazed when Lee rolled the window up and a new one appeared. I guess Lee got out of the car for a minute, and when he got back in Kimmy said “Lee look!” Kimmy hauled off and smashed her head into the window and the glass shattered. Lee freaked out because she had a huge gash in her head with glass stuck in it, but Kimmy reassured him it was okay and tried to roll a new window back up, except she had actually broken the window so pieces of glass fell everywhere.
This story has been told around the diner table at my grandparents house many times. We visit my grandparents every staturday for lunch. my grandmother isn't always the best cook(we all seem to pop an antacid right before we pull in to their driveway for our weekly lucheon). My grandfather is 81 years old and is still as young as ever, just this winter he renovated their kitchen all on his own. there is nothing that my grandfather can not build. He is a sweet man and tells us lots of stories about the old farm. There is one story though that explains my grandfather's personality so well and we all seem to chuckle when we hear it.
Back when my grandfather was a younger man, going to the dentist was not something that was regulary done. My grandfather had a really bad tooth ache and could not get rid of it, so finally my granmother convinced him to go to the dentist. Now when my grqndfather was a child there was no such thing as freezing medication but the day he went to the dentist for his aching tooth it was a normal occurance to have freezing done. My grandfather did not know this. My grandfather is not a big man but he did work on a farm for over 20 years and was not the type to get scared easily. When he was sitting in the chair waitng for the tooth to be pulled out the dentist came over holding a long needle to freeze his mouth. My grandfather looked at the dentist and calmly said "just one moment" he took off the bib, got up from his chair and put on his hat and said " you have a nice day" and left the dentist office. He has not be to a dentist since.
This story has brought many laughs to our famillie's saturday luncheons. i love this story because my my grandfather gets just as big a kick out of it as everyone else.
My story comes from my early childhood. I was about 4 or 5 years old I was at my aunt and uncle's house for my cousin's birthday. It was dark when we were leaving the house and straight ahead of the house, about 100 yards away on the hill, is an old barn. Being a young child with a wildly active imagination, I thought that the white boxes stacked in the corner of one of the windows looked very much like the A&W Root Beer Bear. So much so that I convinced myself it was the actual bear and he lived in their barn. Every time I left their house from that point on it was a dead sprint to the car so that he wouldn't be able to catch me. Of course, I was the youngest child in the family and every time before I left their house, my four older cousins would sing the song - the one that goes Ba doom, Ba doom Ba doom Ba doom doom. They still think they are funny and do it the odd time when I leave the house in the dark. I do not think they are funny and have proudly overcome my fear of the A&W Root Beer Bear. I can even eat at A&W now. If this is not a success story, then I don't know what is.
Thursday, February 08, 2007
Tuesday, February 06, 2007
la di da didi da, de dah: la di da didi da, de dee: yeah I'm talkin' bout you and me, and the games people play [anyone?]
What an awesome assembly, from a Chinese version of marbles (called "glass ball" because, hey, who but a folklorist would teach the word "marble" in ESL?), to an honest account of a tag game derived in the context of reading Anne Frank's diary, to imaginative scenario games wherein you play the role of a character from pop culture in new forms.
Just in case you were wondering, here is my favourite game, **objectionable material alert: read no further ye of faint heart or strong opinions** called "the cooze game". Take a dirty word (the title of the game is derived from the word we used the first time we played it) and then place it in the titles of songs, movies, albums, tv shows, etc. [You can do it with clean word too, but what's the point?] Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Cooze"; Martin Scorsese's "Last Temptation of Cooze" (a double-whammy because it's blasphemy too); Neil Sedaka's "Put Your Cooze on My Shoulder" AND "Put Your Head on My Cooze". Play until bored. Trust me: hours upon hours of drunk-nerd entertainment.LONDON BRIDGE
Two taller kids are standing, facing each other. Their arms are up and their hands are clasped, forming a sort of gate or an archway. The others children move in line through this gate.
Everyone is sings:
--London Bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down.
--London Bridge is falling down, my fair lady-oh.
When this part of the song is finished, the two "gate-keepers" drop their hands down and capture a "prisoner".
They shake them back and forth singing the last part of the song.
--Here we go to build it up, build it up, build it up
--Here we go to build it up, my fair lady-oh
After this shake-up, the child is then made to stand behind one of the gatekeepers. They alternate sides until all of the children are standing behind the two gatekeepers.
They then play a kind of tug of war. The gatekeepers mark a line on the ground between the two teams. The gatekeepers hold each other's hands and and everyone else holds the waist of the person in front of them.
They try to get one side or the other across the line.
Like tug of war, the team that is pulled over the line loses the game.
I can't honetly remember who I learned it from but it was usually my older sister and I who passed down these games to younger siblings and cousins.
I don't play this game any longer because it is not a grown up game. I have played a version of the game with my sister when her children were young but all we did was the singing, capturing and shaking of her children back and forth. Very young children like the 'surprise' of being captured and the jiggling back and forth.
When I was probably about 10 years old we played a game in my neighborhood (basically all the kids from 2 blocks) called ‘seek and destroy’. Basically the idea was that there were two teams, one team hides and the other team searches. If a person were caught, they would have to go to ‘base’ where they would stay until all members of their team were caught, then the seekers would have their turn to hide and the hiders would become seekers. However, if one person on the hiding team runs to base and tags a teammate who was caught, that teammate would be able to go free. I don’t really remember the person who I learned this game from, although I would imagine it was one of the older kids in my neighborhood. We stopped playing it after we were all old enough to have our own friends and stopped hanging around with one another. Even though some of us remained friends, most of our group was just brought together because we lived in a certain area, once we got older it mattered less where you lived, so we stopped seeing each other.We grew up in the country. It doesn’t get any more isolated and rural than the Kempt Head Road on Southside Boularderie. When we got older, the bus opened up our territory, by allowing us to go to various houses along the road, and for them to come to us. Our bus would drop us off where ever after school, and later on in the day we could catch the high school bus home. We tended to go fishing a lot, we built tree houses and forts, and one summer made a valiant effort to block the brook hoping the road would wash out and the bus would not be able to take us to school. When there we enough of us to play organized games, we always played obstacle course tag. There are three variations on this game, the first which could only be played at school involved one person being it, and that person chasing the others around the jungle gym equipment. Your feet were not allowed to touch the ground or you were out/it. You had to swing, jump, slide, climb, whatever to keep away from the person that was it. If they caught you, or you hit the ground you would become it. At home we played the same game, only we played it in the barn. There were all kinds of things to climb on, jump from and swing to in the barn, the only added rules were not to spook the cows, and not to get caught running on the rafters. In August, when the hay would be made, we would spend a day stacking the bales (later on they got round, and we rolled them), into obstacle courses. Same idea as before, your feet could not touch the ground and we jumped from bale to bale to keep away from the person that was it. The bales doubled as great hiding spots for when we played tag at night. I remember the nights being really bright with the moon, and we would stay out there for hours playing after dark. Life was good.
When i was a kid the most time i spend the game called "glass ball".This game was played around age from 5 to 12. Usually only simily age people will play together, because of the skills.we usually everybody have own glass ball, the ball cost 1 cent each. so every body no problem get that. The game rule is we first draw a square under one wall. people will play inside the square. How big the square it is, it depends how many people play. First, people will use their own glass ball hit the wall, trying to let the ball go as close the end line as they can, but do not out of the square. Then the ball closest the line and in the square will have right go first. For those balls passed the square, we have special place under the wall ,they will put their and play at last. The first player will use his own ball try to hit another ball, he can make dicision which ball he want to hit first. If he hit one ball, that ball means it was killed and it is out of the game. He had to take it. For the winner , he can hit again. The last one in the square is the winner. And he can hit the wall at last in next game. THis game is the childhood game. Because it played on the ground, it will make hands dirty. And because we have our own groud to play, with the other guys they do not want to play for some reasons. We are slowly out of the game too. Now the glass ball can be found in most of families' fish case for pretty.
I was born in the north of china. In my home town we often play a game when I was very young. We call it hide-and-seek. The place was my uptown. They were my neighborhood or my classmate. We need 5—10 people or more, and we had a “home”. It could be a car, a fireplug, or a bike. Then we choice a people to be seeker, and he or she stay at “home” count the number from 1 to 100. At this time we were looking for a place to hide. I liked to hide myself under the car. I think that was very dangers. After count the seeker started to find us out. If the seeker looked at you, you must run to the “home” if before you got “home” seeker caught you, you will be next seeker. We always forget time. We communicate with each other through the game, and promote our friendship. Now I do not play this game. Because I am bigger than ten years ago, I can not hide under the car anymore. Nobody likes to play this game. All of them have grown up; they do not want to do something childish things. I really I miss those good old days.
A game I liked to play when I was little was Red light Green light...1,2,3. The rules of the game: one person would stand against a wall or some kind of boundary and turn his/her back to the other players. He/She would yell out "Red light Green light...1,2,3" as fast or as slow as they wanted. While this person had their back turned and chanting these words, the other players would move as fast as they could to the wall or boundary. However, if you did not stop and stand completely still when the "it" person turned around after saying 1, 2,3..you were not allowed to continue playing. A variation of the game is the peron(s) caught would have to go back to the beginning. The person to reach the boundary first was the winner, which meant it was that persons turn to be "it". This game was learned via the older students in the playground. I still play it, however its with my nephew.
One the childhood game I play when I was a child called ice cream melting. I used to play it with my friends in the school playground. One of the players is the melter who melts the ice cream who is the other player. When the “ice creams” is moving all have any obvious movement, then the melter should catch him or her. The person who gets caught would be the melter. I learn it from one of my friend in the day care center. Because I am not a child any more, and the peer group around me have the same thought. You don’t want to play and there are no one in your peer group want to play, then that is why I don’t play it now.
When I was little, I often went out to the nearest park and played with my friends or my brothers. I played tag, playground equipment, jump rope, and so on. When I played with my brother, he taught me how to play it, because he is older than me. When I went to the kindergarten, the teacher taught me how to play, I guess. I also did indoor play, like origami, and cat’s cradle. Origami is Japanese play, and we use a paper and make some shape, such as crane, flower, ship, and so on. My mother taught me how to play it. I don’t play them any more now. I am not sure why, but I think one of the reasons is that we grow up and we started to play other game, such as video game, card game, and internet. I seldom go out and do exercise any more, because of I don’t have great physical vigor. Our environment has changed and the technology progressed. There are many interesting things that we can enjoy in the house.
When I was 4 years old, my teacher Miss Li taught us a game in the kindergarten. That game called the “telephone game.” Our teacher organized all of us to play it. You sit in a circle and whisper something to the person to your left, and then they whisper it to the left and so on. Then when it gets around to you, it’s completely changed. Now, I don’t think the game interest like when I was a kid. It is just a childhood game. Through this game, the teacher helped us to know each other, when we just knew a little word. We can use many ways to know the stranger. Not only play games.
When we were small , my cousin, my sister, and myself would play cops and robbers every time we got a chance. We had learned how to play it from my cousins three older brothers. The concept was simple - the cop, who was usually my sister had to find and shoot both me and my cousin with either a water gun or cap gun. If she got both of us before one broke the other out of pillow prison, she won. We played because it was both exciting and suspenseful as well as a good way to spend a rainy day (or a sunny day for that matter). We usually always played at his house because his mother took care of us when we were small. I guess we stopped playing because there were other, cooler things to do which was usually whatever his older brothers were doing at the time. The three of us were heavily influenced by what his older brothers did.
Although I grew up in the city many of my friends grew up on farms. Most of my “childhood games” were games I remember either playing on a farm or learning about them from someone who grew up on a farm. The one I remember most was one we always played out at people’s farms, I think we called it “grounders”. To play it you need a good size group of kids, well at least 5. One person is on the ground and closes their eyes. The rest of the kids go run and get on the farm equipment or the playground that was in the yard. Then the kid who is it has to try and listen for your where abouts and then go and try to catch you. If you get cornered you can jump down on the ground but if the kid who is it yells “grounders” then who ever is on the ground is it. You can also become it if you are tagged by the person who is it. It was taught to me by my sister and her friends on the playground at our school, but the kids who I hung around with thought it would be a little more interesting if we played it on the farm because of all the old farm equipment and old playgrounds that were usually on farms. Plus the animals would usually make a noise if you were on the ground. After we played it a couple times out on people’s farms everybody just started doing it. After awhile I don’t even remember playing it in the city unless we were really bored at school. I don’t play the game anymore because I guess I just grew out of it. Plus by the time I got a little older we thought of more interesting things to do.
Growing up I had 4 sisters and lots of friendly neighbours. We could always be outside creating new and adventures things to do. One of my favourite games to play was house. House would mainly take place in the tree house in the backyard. Who ever wanted to play had to make up their own character to live in the house like the mother, father, kids, animals, and friends etc. When you picked your character you would do different things as that character and just play as a family. I don’t really remember who taught me the games of house but I imagine it would be one of my older sisters who got me hooked on the fun. I was probably playing house since I could walk playing the baby the mother would take care of. I don’t play house anymore because I grew tired of the same thing over and over again moved onto better games. Also I grew to tall to fit into the tree house.
One of the games I remember best from my childhood was spotlight. This game is essentially hide and go seek only played at night with a spotlight. I became aware of this came from some of the older kids that I used to camp with during the summers we used to spend in Ingonish. There would normally be a group of about 15-20 kids around the campground, the seasonal people comprising most of the group but there was always room for other kids who were just visiting. It was a great way to spend the night, we would divide ourselves into teams one team being the 'hiders' and the other team being the 'seekers' than eventually reverse the roles. Its hard to imagine the hours we spent playing this game. It was a rush! Eventually the older kids grew tired of it and when I reached their age the same thing happened to me, it was no longer the 'cool' thing to do. This is usually the case when one hits the teenage years. However last summer, on a camping trip, after an undisclosed amount of cocktails, a group of friends and I made a feeble attempt to reconstruct a game of spotlight, as we used to play in the good ol' days.....we lost a lot of good men that night. That was ofcourse a joke, no one was seriously injured or lost for over an hour or two, but it still was not the same. It is not as easy to hide anymore, and for the most part, the game just isn't as good unless you're a kid. However, when I think back at how much fun we had playing that game, it brings a smile to my face and some good
One childhood game I played was hide-and-go-seek. This game was played with multiple people and one person was chosen to count to an agreed upon number (20 for example) while the others scrambled to find a good place to hide. Once the ‘seeker’ was finished counting, they would begin to search for the others and each time they found a person, that person would continue on with the seeker to help find the others. The last one to be found was the ‘winner’ and the next seeker. I most likely learned this game from my parents when I was a young child. I don’t play it now because it just sort of faded out of the things people ‘my age’ do.
One game that I remember enjoying very much as a child was “duck, duck, goose”. During my childhood, it was certainly a game that I loved to play. “Duck, duck, goose” was played by everyone sitting in a circle while one person, labelled as the duck would go around the circle patting each person on the head saying aloud duck, until the came to a person they chose to label goose. The person tagged goose would get up from where they were sitting and basically race the person who had tagged him/her around the entire circle to see who could land in the goose’s seat first. The first person to land there would win and was able to sit down in the spot while the loser now became the duck, it being their turn to now go around the circle patting each person calling them duck and the whole process would continue until everyone finally became tired of playing the game. This was a game that as a child I learned one summer at camp and continued to play for many years. I loved the game so much that I have even gone on to teach other little children at camp how to play as well. I’d say the reason I have stopped playing “duck, duck, goose” has everything to do with my age. I guess one might say I have somewhat grown out of it although, during the summers at camp I continue to play it with some of the campers. However, overall, it’s no longer a game that I play very often nor do I really find it as entertaining because I feel as if I am now too old to play the game.
A childhood game that comes to mind is "jump-rope". I learned this game back in elementary school when my gym teacher and the older kids taught us how to play. To play, two people each take an end of a jump rope. Then a third person stands in the middle of the rope. Then at the same time the two with the ends of the rope begin to twirl the rope in a circular motion while the person in the middle jumps over the rope as it nears them hence the name "jump-rope". The object is to keep jumping the rope as many continuous times as possible without stopping the rope or without getting caught up in the rope.
A childhood game I loved to play when I was young was called "Lee-Hockers". It's basically a game of hide and go seek except for the fact that the people seeking have a base area. If someone is caught they are taken to the base and if someone from their team can tag them at the base without getting caught they are free. I guess the reason that I have stopped playing this game is because I have matured.
I was a huge fan of hide and seek when I was younger, and I was one of those kids who could make a fort out of anything really. There was one game that stuck out in my mind and I remember I didn’t play it constantly, it was more or less a one time thing. In my grade 4/5 class, the teacher was reading us ‘Anne Frank’s Diary’ and we didn’t understand the whole concept of what Hitler did . So, at recess time, we all went outside and decided to make a game called ‘Nazi’s and Jew’s’ and we would roll around in the grass and try and hide from the “Nazi’s”. If they caught you then you would become one of them until there were no kids left to shoot. I remember the teacher running outside and she got super mad at us, causing us to lose outside recess time. When I grew up and found out what really happened, I totally understood why she was so mad, but us as kids didn’t understand, we just thought we were cool for making up a new game. That always stuck out in my head for some reason. It’s kind of embarrassing when I think about the games we used to play in elementary school.
I used to play this game called marbles with my younger sister. You would lie like 5-10 marbles against a shoe box or whatever you wanted, then you would role 1 marble down to the other marbels. The idea of the game was to hit the marbles that were worth the most, so who ever had the higher score, won the game. All the marbles were worth all kinds of different numbers. The most you could get was 100 points. My mother and father taught my sister and I this game. My parents was taught by their parents, so they decided to teach us. The reason I or my sister don't play this game anymore is because at that time marbles were very popular, so as we got older it got left behind when more tech or just bigger and more exciting games came out. So one day we just completely dropped and started to play new games. It was a fun game at that time though.
A Childhood game I would like to identify is a game called “Flinch.” This game is very basic, yet it was fun and somewhat amusing to me. Here is how the game works. You simply get a group of kids together and form a circle. One person proceeds to go in the circle with a small, soft ball (a form of a dodge ball). This person is given the name the “Flinch Master.” Everyone around the circle is supposed to stand up straight and have their arms straight along with their hands by their sides. The object of the game is to try to maintain at this position without flinching. The flinch master’s job is too tried to make the people around the circle flinch. This person does this by tossing the ball at a person or faking a toss. If a person around the circle puts their arms up or drops the ball when it’s being tossed, the person is eliminated and has to sit down. This game goes on until one person is left and therefore, is the new flinch master. I learned this game in elementary school from my Physical Education teacher. He played this game just for fun as a relaxing game towards the end of class. Everybody enjoyed the game and had a good time. Part of my job today is to play games with elementary school kids and this is one of the games we play. So sometimes I will join in just to remember the fun I had when playing this game. Unfortunately, I do not play the game with my friends anymore just because we are grown up and do not take the time to play these games like when we were younger. There are more important things that we do instead of playing games.
When you first asked us about a game we played as a child it took me a while to decide what game I wanted to use. But when I finally decided I picked good ole fashion freeze tag. I was taught this game while in elementary school, it was used as a warm up activity in our Phys. Ed. Class. The basic rule is you run around like crazed maniacs from a “carefully” chosen tagger, once you are tagged instead of being out of the game like in a normal game of tag you freeze in the exact position when tagged until someone taps you on the shoulder to “release” you from your frozen state. The reason I don’t play this game anymore is because after a while of aging you realize its stupid and boring.
It’s amazing what used to be famous in the past is still popular today!! The question this week is asking about what was my favorite childhood game played back in the 1980’s. I must say that I had many childhood games that I played when I was a child. I am still young at heart and I will nonetheless consider playing some of these same games today as I did when I many years ago. One game that will never come to an end is “Hide and Seek”, the original game that has been played by many people young and old all around the world. The rules to the game are very simple. You and a friend would get together usually play rock, paper, scissors or flip a coin to see who was going to hide first. After the positions are chosen, the person who is hiding would find a really good place and the person who is going to find would count for about one minute. The whole object to the game is to say “Ready or not, here I come” and see how long it takes to find the person who is hiding from you. There are times that this game can last for hours and there are other times that this game would last all of 20 minutes. The more people who join into play, the better the game can be and the longer it lasts for. Simultaneously, Hide and Seek will be played forever as long as at least three or more people are still interested. I learned how the game was played from a group of friends who learned from there friends and the tradition just continued year after year. Just remember, the best part is the weather doesn’t make any difference as you can play inside or out. ”Ready or Not” let’s play!!!!!!!!!!
As a kid, my friends and I used to play explorer games. Since we live on a street that was surrounded by woods and a lake, we would go in the woods and look for things and imagine. Most of the fun of being a kid is that you have a wild imagination. We would climb trees and we made a cabin in the woods that we said was our house and there were swings and ropes hanging from a few trees that adults put there for us. The only problem with this game is sometimes the game would go from being one about exploring to being about finding the lost child. Since kids have a tendency to wonder away, this would happen a lot. Usually we never were too far into the woods that it was a problem, but it still made our parents mad. There was also the problem with stepping on wasp nests; which I did only once and ended up being stung twenty seven times. Who knew I was allergic and would have to stay in bed for a week until the swelling went down? This, for me was the end of playing explorer. There is probably another game I used to play as a kid and probably was a lot fonder of, but for some off reason this one stands out the most in my memory.
A childhood game I played often when I was a child was "Red Light, Green Light". You could play with as little as two people, but the more you had to play the more fun the game would be. One person was designated as the "Traffic Controller" and they had the duty of saying "red light" or "green light". The rest of the players would stand at a good distance across the yard and when the controller said "green light" they would all run towards the controller. When the controller said "red light" they would all have to stop immediately. If any play moved or fell over they would be out of the game. The first person to reach the controller would be the winner and take over the position as Traffic Controller. I learned the game at school from some friends who weren't from my neighborhood. I don't play the game now because it isn't amusing anymore. As a child a game like that was fun and was a great favorite. Now that I'm older playing that game seems ridiculous.
During my childhood I think one of the most memorable games and maybe the most entertaining for me at the time was the game “ duck duck goose”. When I first encountered the game I was probably near the age of five at one of those stupid summer camps that my mom always enrolled me in. I was also convinced that the game was called duck duck moose, until my older six year old friends told me different. It wasn’t a hard game to grasp really, one person basically walked around a circle saying duck duck duck.and finally GOOSE while tapping someone on the head to then race each other around the circle to see who would make it back first. The loser would then become the goose, I’m pretty sure that’s how it went anyway. The downfall of the game was when the two people would run so fast that they would collide in the middle somewhere trying to pass each other. I think that is why this game stands out in my memory because it was the cause of my first nose bleed.(haha) . When I thought about this question it took me a few minutes to even think of a game I used to play and it hasn’t been that long. I guess some things are almost forgotten because they are no longer apart of your daily life like they used to be. As an adult I’m sure I will play some kid games over the years, but just in a different way being that I will be the one teaching them the game and making sure they have fun like I did.
During my childhood I played a number of games: Tag, red Rover, etc. But the game my friends and I played most often was a game I learned from my friend Garrett, called ‘Mixed Up Guys.” I guess it’s not what most would call a “game.” But I was never much into competitive games when I was younger. I met Garrett when I was about 5, shortly after he asked me if I wanted to play Mixed Up Guys. I ask him “What’s that?” It’s basically a game where we each choose a character (it can be from any movie, show, game, etc) and we enact our own stories using each of the characters we chose. It relies more on imagination than any physical skill. This is what my friends and I spent our free time doing for years. (I guess we never quite made it out that “make believe stage” Piaget believes 3 and 4 year olds go through.) I guess after a while I grew out of enacting stories physically, and now I spent my time writing stories on paper. (When I actually HAVE free time that is. Work and school tends to drain it all.)
A childhood game I used to play most was spotlight. When it would get dark out all of the kids used to grab flashlights from home; one group would hide while the other waited, once their time was up the group would go looking for them. A person would be found by shining the light on them, and they would be out. The game wouldn’t finish until all the kids were found and then it would be the other groups turn to hide. I learned it from my older sister and brother. They would be out at night playing with their friends and I eventually went along with them. I don’t play it now because I’m older. It would still be fun to play though!
