Category Archives: Game

Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary, Bloody…Mary?

Nationality: Spanish, Mexican, Polish, and Russian
Age: 18
Occupation: Student at Delaware Valley High School
Residence: Milford, PA
Performance Date: 02.10.2016
Primary Language: English

Original Script: “Okay so I was around thirteen when this happened. I never really believed in this Bloody Mary legend but I was like, ‘what the hell?’ I was at a sleep over and everyone wanted to do it and I was like whatever about it. I have heard so many things on what you are suppose to do but I just let my friends take the lead. Basically, we went into my friend’s, Becca, basement bathroom. It was me, Becca, and Kaylin doing this. Anyways, we lit a candle, apparently the person holding the candle had to say the chant and the other two were suppose to touch the person’s shoulders. Then, whoever was closest to the light switch had to flicker the lights off and every time Bloody Mary was said—which you had to say three times, then blow our the candle. Anyways, I was volunteered to hold the candle, we walked into the bathroom and Kaylin was the one designated to flicker on and off the lights. So we went, ‘Bloody Mary’ lights off, lights on ‘Bloody Mary’ lights off, lights on, and for the last one I started to get a little freaked out for the last one. I had no idea what was going to happen, I have never done this before! So I held my breath and was like, ‘Bloody Mary,’ and blew out the candle. And the lights shut off. I waited a couple of seconds for Kaylin to turn the lights back on, finally Becca was like, ‘Okay Kaylin, turn on the lights,’ and Kaylin was like, ‘I never turned off the light!’ At that point we all started freaking out and fumbling for the light switch, which was not working. Then I heard a, ‘what the hell, oh you have got to be kidding me, girls get up here!’ Which was Becca’s mom, so we opened the bathroom door and it was still pitch black. Like none of the light switches were working, so we fumbled all the way from the bathroom, to the stairs then up the stairs, and, because of the windows, you could see the moonlight outside and Becca’s mom pacing. Apparently, there was a whole blackout on the street! We were worried for nothing! But safe enough to say, I will not be doing that again, still haven’t till this day! That was crazy scary!”

Background Information about the Piece by the informant: Jenna grew up in Chandler, Arizona with her family. About two years ago, she moved across country with her mother and now lives in Milford, Pennsylvania. When she did this Bloody Mary ritual, albeit the legend, she was in junior high school, in eighth grade to be exact. She is now a senior in high school and eighteen years old and plans to go to California in the fall.

Context of the Performance: Bloody Mary Ritual

Thoughts about the piece: The Bloody Mary ritual/ legend quest, is a very fascinating item, foremost, because it falls under the category of both a ritual and legend quest. Bloody Mary is a common legend among, typically, young adolescents, and does fit the category of a legend quest. However, it also fits the category of a ritual, for example, the lights flickering on and off, saying Bloody Mary three times, holding a candle—however, the ritual does vary and it would be interesting to see if it varies by regions. It is noteworthy to also mention, in my folklore class, we had discussed that Bloody Mary was almost a coming to woman hood, type legend quest. Which aligns perfectly with the age Jenna was at, at the time she did the ritual.

Furthermore, it is also important to note the candle in the ritual. The candle almost represents a form of enlightenment, as well as the lights turning on and off. Thus, blowing out the candle could represents the finishing of coming to womanhood, that you know all you need to know, and hence blowing out the candle.

Additionally, though Jenna did not believe in the legend of Bloody Mary, she still got scared toward the end of the ritual—scared of the unknown. This theme—being afraid of the unknown—seems to be precedent in today’s society: people afraid of ghosts, people afraid of things they cannot control. It also seems as if groups add to this inherent anxiety, it seems as if because there was a group all participating in the ritual, they all mimicked the anxiety/ fear of the unknown. (This is also precedent in another interview I conducted with Jenna about a Ghost in her high school, please see the interview for reference).

Rangerette White Elephant

Nationality: Lebanese-American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Plano, Texas
Performance Date: March 13, 2016
Primary Language: English
Language: n/a

“Ok so the Rangerette Christmas tradition of the White Elephant was when every single member came with a silly gift, and we put them all in the middle, and one by one, we grabbed a gift, opened it up, and if you didn’t like the gift that you got, then you could like switch with somebody. It was pretty fun. So there was this picture that has been going around for I’d say about six years, six plus years. And it’s a very hideous picture of this one girl that was on the team and it was framed and she was the captain of the team and so you are pretty unlucky if you get that picture and the next year you bring it back so that way it stays in the circle, the rotation.”

 

Informant: The informant is a nineteen-year-old college freshman from Dallas, Texas. While in high school, she was a member of the Jesuit Rangerettes Dance and Drill Team. She attended the all-girls Catholic high-school, Ursuline Academy of Dallas, the sister school of Jesuit Dallas (an all-boys Catholic school). She began dancing when she was three, performing ballet, jazz, and lyrical styles of dance, which eventually led her to the high-school drill team. She currently attends Oklahoma State University.

 

Analysis:

The Rangerettes Dance and Drill Team is an extracurricular activity unique to Texas and a few other southern states. The team performs at the half-time of football games on Friday nights, as well as at basketball, soccer, and rugby games. They wear leotards with fringe skirts, fringe and sequin overlays, gauntlets, a belt, white cowgirl boots, and sequined cow-boy hats. The season does not end with football season; rather, the team continues to perform at Jesuit events and participates in two dance competitions in the spring. Because this team is a year-long commitment, there are many extenuating traditions that serve to unify and “bond” the members of the team, in order to foster a spirit of sisterhood.

Because of its association with Catholic schools, the team celebrates the Catholic holidays. Therefore, they have embraced the White Elephant, a game that is practiced at many Christmas gatherings in the US, and embedded it with their own tradition. Sitting in a circle with everyone on the team is a significant bonding factor, as no one is left out of the festivities. The picture of the captain may be unique because there are several stories surrounding the girl in the picture about how disliked she was because of her harsh manner of running the team.

The picture itself makes the captain look like a mix-between a clown and the Joker, which I believe represents the distaste the team had for this specific captain. I think this is an exhibition of the dynamics of a team. There may be one girl who is in charge, and she may be very talented in her own right, thereby expecting more from the team. This expectation may be exemplified by her harsh policies, therefore breeding contempt amongst the team. When the team does not like their captain, they are likely to come up with something like this picture as a way of bringing her back down to their level.

In addition, the captain is always a senior, but the other seniors on the team may not like taking orders or instruction from a girl who is their age. If this picture was first brought about by the seniors, then it would once again exhibit the desire to belittle the captain in order that she might remember that she is no better than the rest of the seniors, despite her rank.

The tradition of passing this picture around as giving someone bad luck is what I believe to be symbolic of the fragile threads of kinship that hold a team together. What may unite the team could be their dislike of the captain, and by randomizing who is going to receive the picture, and therefore “bad luck,” there is a reinforcement of the equality amongst team members. It is also something for all of the team members to look forward to as they wonder who is going to receive the picture the next year.

Skiing down a mountain

Nationality: american
Age: 31
Occupation: film producer
Residence: los angeles
Performance Date: 2/18/15
Primary Language: English

JG describes a game she learned from her mother and would do to kids she babysat

What was skiing down a mountain?

JG: “So you know how little kids love to be bounced up and down on people’s knees? Skiing down a mountain was basically just bouncing a little kid on your knee but with a background story. Mom used to do it to me, but she was the one who made it up. She said she wanted to put a background story to it to make it more interesting because it made more sense if there was a story. And then I really liked it so I would do it to kids I baby sat and you when you were a baby”

What do you do?

JG: “So you put a little kid on your lap and bounce them around like normal, but then you say “skiing down a mountain” again and again. Eventually you yell “TREE!” and you swerve your knees to the side like you’re avoiding a tree. There was some other ones too, like rocks and moguls. For moguls you would do really big bounces. It was kind of open to interpretation. All the little kids loved it, it was a lot more exciting than regular bouncing a kid on your knee. Sometimes I’d do you and your cousin Louisa at the same time, you guys loved it. I just remember really liking it when I was little and I would watch Mom do it to Justin too when he was little. So then I did it when I started watching kids”

This piece of folklore displays the importance of regional differences. While bouncing a child on your knee could be adapted to have many different stories, it’s significant that this story involved skiing, mainly because the game originated with JG’s mother in Colorado where skiing is very prevalent. A child would immediately recognize the parts of the game because most children in Colorado learn to ski at a very young age.

The Power Song

Nationality: american
Age: 20
Occupation: student
Residence: los angeles
Performance Date: 4/25/15
Primary Language: English

RS is a member of the group WYSE. WYSE is a student organization on campus that stands for Woman and Youth Supporting Eachother. Each week members of the group go to a local middle school and teach health classes to a small group of 8th grade girls.

RS: “We usually just call it power but basically it’s a song and a game that we play during the breaks. Basically all the girls stand in a circle and we say the chant “P-O-W-E-R we got the power cause we are the women of WYSE”. Then one person goes in the circle and like if I went into the cirle I would say “My name is Reegan” and everyone would else would say “Yeah” and then I say “and I’m next on the list” and they go “yeah” and then I go “and I get my reputation cause I do it like this” and then I do a goofy dance in the middle and everyone repeats “and she does it like this” and repeats the move.

To make it more clear:

Middle Person “My name is —–”

Everyone “Yeah”

Middle Person “And I’m next on the list

Everyone “Yeah”

Middle Person “And I get my reputation cause I do it like this” (dances)

Everyone “She does it like this” (copies dance)

How long does it go on for?

RS: “As long as people keep jumping in the middle. A lot of the girls are pretty shy and take some convincing. It’s a good way to get them not to be so embarrassed. They always want to play but sometimes it takes a while to convince them to go in the middle”

Do you know where it came from?

RS: “I think it was just a basic chant and someone decided to change the words to make it about WYSE. I remember doing a similar one at cheer camp over the summer. Everyone in WYSE knows it though, you just kind of learn it once you go to your school site. They do it and you just kind of have to join in”

Pico, Pico, Beso

Nationality: Bogota, Colombia
Age: 21
Occupation: student
Residence: USA
Performance Date: April 22, 2015
Primary Language: Spanish
Language: English

My Informant was a 21 year old female who moved to the United States from Bogota, Colombia in 2004. She lives five houses down on my street.

Story: Where I used to live in Bogota, there was this game that us kids used to play called “Pico, Pico, Beso” and it was, basically, this kissing game. It was like Tag, except girls would run away from the boys and if they were caught the boys got to give them a kiss on the cheek. If they were got caught again, then the boy got to kiss their other cheek. And if they were caught the third time, it was on the mouth. But only if the same boy caught them three times…not three different boys. Does that make sense? And, you know, usually girls played with the boys the liked and they’d “get caught” so it was a lot of fun. Just kid games.

Collector: How old were you when you played this game?

Informant: Around eleven or twelve.

Collector: What does “Pico, Pico, Beso” translate to? In English?

Informant: Like, what is it called? A peck on the cheek? Yeah? Yea. Like Peck, Peck, Kiss.

Collector: Do you know where this game originated from? Who taught it to you?

Informant: Some older kids at school were playing, I think, and my friend taught me how to play.

This is a great example of children learning about the world by imitating the world. They look to older people for guidance and, in this case, my informant and her friends learned from peers at school. There’s this whole concept that adults tend to shy away from mentioning anything of sexual nature around children, so it makes sense that they learned this game from other children instead of adults.