A lesson in mahjong etiquette
We were recently on a river cruise. Unlike previously, this one would travel for hours, or even overnight, between ports. So there was time on the ship to relax, have a coffee, and get to know your fellow passengers.
I play mahjong and had optimistically brought the current set of cards along in case 1) there was a physical set onboard and 2) I could find fellow players. The second day out, I saw a woman, a bit younger than I was, with a mahjong set at the staff desk. While checking it out from the library wasn’t necessary (I hadn’t even found the library with its leftover books and various games yet), she was asking about where to play. And then I piped up and asked—naively—if she needed another player.
And I was quickly and curtly told ‘No.’
Shot down before I even got to make a false play. I thought it a bit rude. Okay, a lot rude.
So, what would I have done in similar circumstances had I already had a foursome to play?
I’d like to think I’d have done the following: told her to come along and share her mahjong story.
My local group has played together for over 25 years. We know we do not follow what is now the standard for mahjong. The women who taught the game to their first “students” here were from New Jersey. We play a sort of mid-century mahjong. We’re happy doing it. Some of us have played in tournaments and followed the present conventions and brought back the new “rules.” We’ve tried them but 25 year old habits are hard to break and since we don’t have to please anyone but ourselves, we fall back into our old, comfortable, social ways. Which is to say, WE KNOW BETTER, we don’t do it.
OTOH, there are those of us who have been invited to fill in on mahjong games on cruises and have learned different ways we have adopted, such as how to play with three players rather than the standard four. We can adapt if it suits us to do so.
So, I would have been happy to sit alongside that table of four friends who were playing mahjong and seen how they played. I know how to keep my mouth shut, how to listen and learn, how to be social.
Alas, the woman I spoke to, didn’t even know how to be polite. And then, to add insult to injury, I found out she was with the group from Texas. Now, that’s shameful.
