Getting up early on a Saturday isn't always bad. We met some students from school around 9:30 and drove to an orphanage around 10-ish. We were armed with games and ready to kill some time.
On the van ride there I showed the students the card games I brought and tried to explain the rules. One was a Go Fish kind of game with pictures. It involved dialog, like Go Fish. We spent a few minutes trying to figure out what all the pictures were so we could say the names correctly.
When we got there the students took two of the games, simplified them to memory matching games, and played with the younger kids.
Another group of younger kids found the Jenga blocks someone brought and fought over them a bit. We tried to teach them the concept of sharing, then gave up and divided the blocks into half. That worked.
I joined a third group, playing a category and color matching game called Crazy Eights. One older boy effectively changed it to a game not much unlike Uno, then proceeded to kick our butts at it. He seemed happy.
The oldest boy supervised the others and occasionally helped the younger ones diplomatically when they were arguing.
He still refused to play games, but I at least got him to agree to a couple of rounds of "Rock, Paper, Scissors." I actually won a round this time. I cheered. He smiled.
After a few rounds of card games, and long after the younger ones turned Jenga into a set of building blocks, the kids were ready to go play outside. We smiled, said our goodbyes, and parted ways.
There is something sacred in making people smile. Hopefully we can do this again.
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