Читать книгу Ting Tang Tommy - Simon Godwin - Страница 12

The Penny Post was started on 10 January 1840 and Sir Rowland Hill was the first Postmaster General. Throughout the nineteenth century steamships and trains revolutionized the train service, so it’s no surprise that a game arose reflecting the impact of these dramatic changes. Playing the game today, there is something pleasurably antique about it. It’s also surprisingly lively, gets the blood flowing and allows you to use your blindfold once again.

Everyone sits on chairs in a large circle. Someone is appointed Postmaster while everyone else chooses cities in the world. These cities are destinations for the post and the Postmaster must remember them all. It will be his job to call out the origins and destinations of the mail. At the start, one player is blindfolded and placed in the middle of the circle. The game begins when the Postmaster calls out the first journey using the cities around the circle. He might say, ‘The post is going from Berlin to New York’. And so now the person who is Berlin must change places with the person who is New York. They must do this without the blindfolded player either touching them or getting to an empty chair before they do. The player who is touched, or whose chair is taken, must take over the blindfold. To get everyone moving, the Postmaster can occasionally call ‘General Post’, which means that all the players have to change seats, giving the blindfolded player an excellent chance to grab someone or a seat. Play until everyone who wants to has had a go in the middle.