| His Ideas 26 ~ Roles |
March 24, 2021
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| Recently, he happened to watch a TV program of a professional mahjong game. Four players surrounded a mahjong table, cameras were following their hands, a set of 13 tails, called 'pai', taking one then throwing one away. The players were wearing different costumes like sports uniforms from different teams. He was shocked because two of them were young women. Originally in this country, the image of mahjong was bad. Shabby dressed guys, smoking cigarettes and playing all night, with the room being smoky, and their way of speaking foul. But, recently, he learned of a new type of mahjong that was played among children, parents send their kids to a mahjong club expecting their kids will be smarter as mahjong uses one's brain very much. Actually, there are community mahjong activities in which elderly people enjoy mahjong in order to avoid senility, as mahjong games use not only their brains, but also their hands. He liked mahjong, although he wasn't good at it. Mahjong is not such a complicated game. There are 136 pai that are used. There are 34 kinds, each kind has 4 same pai. 1~9 numbers of bamboo, button, and Chinese character called 'man', and another Chinese 'east', 'west', 'south', '  north', 'middle', 'start', and no design called 'white'. At the beginning of the game, players have 13 pai, and then change one by one. Players aim for 4 sets of three pai and 1 pair. 3 same pai, or 3 continuous pai, from the same design can become accepting patterns. Depending on patterns, depending on its difficulty, the points rise. It is not necessarily that the most skillful player wins, because playing with 4 players and the amount of pai, coincidence works and it becomes a fun game, and which people can also gamble. From the conversation between the announcer and the commentator, he knew that this was one of 180 games, 8 teams (each team has 4 players and 1/3 are women) had been playing 90 games from the last October and soon it would finish and the semifinal and the final is now being held. He realized that they weren't wearing masks. He figured out that they only speak in a small voice when they announce 'leech', 'ron' and other declarations, so maybe the risk was low. "But..." He thought. Mahjong is the game which is played by only four players. If one person is lacking for the game, the other three players will have to give up playing. As the league started last October, have they been avoiding the coronavirus suitably? It seemed to be a tough thing. He wasn't a person who discriminates, but he felt for the young female players, it seemed sad to give up meeting their friends. Because if they contracted the virus, it might transmit to their teammates, and if one team lacks players for a certain period, 3 out of the 8 teams couldn't play their games. They held the games in the capital city, where most of the virus cases were. Thinking about their strict refrainment of their lives, his mind hurt. His Idea #26 : Roles But to come to think of it, there must be a lot of people who were strictly refraining from risks. If one is a member of the Orchestra? How about performers of theater? Shogi players can't play alone. How about if you are a pitcher on a small baseball team? Not only these genres, but also doctors at small clinic, nutritionists of school cafeterias, etc. Anybody can have important roles in society. Being vigilant is the only thing that can make the amount of virus cases be reduced. |
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No.426
*shabby: しょぼい
*foul: 汚い
*senility: ボケ
*not necessarily: とはかぎらない
*declaration: 宣言
*discriminate: 差別する
*refrainment: 制限
*nutritionist: 栄養士
*vigilant: 警戒した