Chinese children can entertain themselves simply with their bare hands by playing the

shitou-jianzi-bu (stone-scissors-cloth) game. Sound familiar? It is popularly known as paper-

rock-scissors in America. In fact, it may be popular among children of many cultures in the
world. While numerous Chinese childrens games require no props or toys, others use mate-
rials of bamboo, wood, bricks, rubber bands, pencils, stones, ropes, metal, clay, paper,
handkerchiefs, bones, cloth, marbles, sand, and cans. Even apricot pits can be used for a
very demanding hand game.
Before they are old enough to take on the more difficult weiqi and xiangqi, Chinese
children play quite a few board games. The most popular are the chess games feixingqi (ae-
rial battles), luzhanqi (infantry battles), and doushouqi (animal fight). The board game
tiaoqi (marble-jumping chess) is a favorite among Chinese children because they can play
with their parents. Indeed, children and adults share a great number of games. One in partic-
ular is worth mentioning because it is very Chinese. While bullfights, dog fights, and cock
fights are very popular in many cultures, Chinese, old and young, enjoy the sport of cricket
fighting. Cricket fighting is hundreds of years old. Emperors even indulged in the sport.
Players catch or purchase a male cricket and keep it in a jar alone for a few days. Then they
find someone who has another male cricket kept under the same circumstances. One of the
crickets is placed in the others jar. Almost immediately the two crickets lock in a fierce
fight. Eventually one wins and starts chirping to celebrate its victory. The defeated cricket
tries to jump out of the jar to flee. A tale about cricket fighting is retold in the Magical
Tales section in Part 3.
Today, however, the popularity of arcades, playstations, computers, and Internet gam-
ing threatens a great number of traditional childrens games. Most of them, such as cricket
fighting, daga (hitting a diamond-shaped twig tossed in the air), tuitiehuan (pushing a metal
ring with a hooked poke), danziqiu (playing marbles), tiaopijin (dancing over rubber band
chains), tiaofangzi (different versions of hopscotch), and maopian (printed paper cards and
chips) are extinct. There has been a call to revive traditional games as parents and teachers
come to realize that they are good for childrens physical and mental health and better at
teaching them social skills. The Quanyechang Elementary School in Tianjin, for example,
is making conscientious efforts to revive traditional childrens games by incorporating
them into physical education classes. Following are a few traditional Chinese games that re-
quire almost nothing but childrens participation.

Laoying zhuo xiaoji (Eagle and Chicks)

Laoying zhuo xiaoji is one of the most popular outdoor recess games for schoolchil-
dren, because it requires about a dozen players. One child plays the preying eagle; another,
the protective hen; and the rest, the chicks. The eagle tries to catch one of the chicks, who
dodge behind the mother hen. The mother hen extends her arms and moves about in re-
sponse to the eagles attack, trying to protect her chicks.
To start, the eagle stands alone, facing the mother hen, who has her chicks lined up be-
hind her. The first chick holds on to the mother hens clothing or shoulder, the second chick
holds on to the first, and so on. The game starts with a countdown. If the eagle catches a

52 Part 2: Food, Games, and Crafts