The Birdman Game

I was in my biology lab when I saw my friend Bruce “birdman” another student in the lab.  The birdman can be done by forming a circle with your index finger and thumb and having your other three fingers extended or sort of fan out.  It is similar to making an “okay” sign or gesture with your hand.  To do the birdman you make an okay sign with both hands, then flip our hands backward and bring them to your face so that your eyes look through the circles made by your index finger and thumb and your other fingers are covering your cheeks.  If you are participating in the birdman game, when you make eye contact with someone who is doing the birdman you have to stop where you are and what you’re doing lay down on the ground.  Bruce “birdmanned” another student in the lab by calling his name and thus causing the other student to turn around and make eye contact with him while he was doing the birdman.  This student then had to lie down on the floor.  All the students were laughing including the boy who got “birdmanned” but our lab TA did not seem to know what was going on.

Bruce is from Arizona and said that he learned the game from his friends from home.  He says he plays the game because he thinks it is hilarious.  He said he worst he ever got birdmanned by his friend while Bruce was driving in his car.  So he had to stop the car and then get out and lie down  in the middle of the street.  In that sense I think the game can also be viewed somewhat as a prank played among friends because of the great joy and amusement that the participants seem to receive when “birdmanning” someone else and causing them to have to lie down if they are standing or stand up if they are sitting down.

Speaking form personal experience the birdman game is actually pretty fun to play with friends.  I remember playing the game with friends from high school although we never called it the birdman game.  In fact I don’t think we had a name for the game, we just played it.  I think what also adds to the games appeal is the fact that not everyone knows about the game so others, “outsiders” may find your behavior confusing or absurd and they won’t understand it.  So I think part of the appeal is similar to the reasoning behind why young children love telling nonsensical jokes to adults; because the adults don’t understand or find it funny, only the children understand and find the joke to be wildly hilarious.  It’s the whole idea of knowledge and power.  I also think it is just fun for most people to feel like they are in on a secret that not everyone knows about or they like sharing something with a smaller more intimate group of friends.

I also witnessed this exact game being played by another USC student and it is documented in this folklore collection.  It perfectly exemplifies the idea of multiplicity of folklore.  It also shows variation because my friend Ravi said that you only have to lie down on the ground if you get birdmanned while standing up, but if it happens when you’re sitting down you have to stand up.  In Bruce’s version you have to lie down on the ground any time you get birdmanned regardless of whether or not you were standing up or sitting down.

The Birdman Game

I was leaving my chemistry lab when I witnessed the birdman game.  Ravi, another student in my lab was leaving the laboratory when his friend called his name.  Ravi looked at his friend who was doing the “birdman”.  The birdman can be done by forming a circle with your index finger and thumb and having your other three fingers extended or sort of fan out.  It is similar to making an “okay” sign or gesture with your hand.  To do the birdman you make an okay sign with both hands, then flip our hands backward and bring them to your face so that your eyes look through the circles made by your index finger and thumb and your other fingers are covering your cheeks.  If you are participating in the birdman game, when you make eye contact with someone who is doing the birdman you have to stop where you are and what you’re doing and stand up if you were sitting down when you made the eye contact or lay down on the ground if you were standing up when you made eye contact.  Ravi was standing up when his friend did the birdman to him, so he stopped and laid down on the floor or the chem lab. When he stood up he made circle with both hands and looked through them as if they were binoculars.  He told me that he did that because he didn’t want to get birdman’ed again and that was the only way to block the birdman.

Ravi is from Cupertino, CA but said he learned the game from a friend here at USC, who is also a freshmen.  Ravi also said he plays the game simply because it is something to do when he is bored and he had fun playing the game.  But he says it is more fun to birdman someone else than to have them birdman you.  In that sense I think the game can also be viewed somewhat as a prank played among friends because of the great joy and amusement that the participants seem to receive when “birdmanning” someone else and causing them to have to lie down if they are standing or stand up if they are sitting down.

Speaking form personal experience the birdman game is actually pretty fun to play with friends.  I remember playing the game with friends from high school although we never called it the birdman game.  In fact I don’t think we had a name for the game, we just played it.  I think what also adds to the games appeal is the fact that not everyone knows about the game so others, “outsiders” may find your behavior confusing or absurd and they won’t understand it.  So I think part of the appeal is similar to the reasoning behind why young children love telling nonsensical jokes to adults; because the adults don’t understand or find it funny, only the children understand and find the joke to be wildly hilarious.  It’s the whole idea of knowledge and power.  I also think it is just fun for most people to feel like they are in on a secret that not everyone knows about or they like sharing something with a smaller more intimate group of friends.

I also witnessed this exact game being played by another USC student and it is documented in this folklore collection.  It perfectly exemplifies the idea of multiplicity of folklore.

Turkish Rounds

– Game

“The only smoking game that I’ve ever heard of is Turkish Rounds… Although, I think I’ve also heard it referred to as Chicago.  It requires at least two people to play, and from that point on, the more people you add, the harder the game is.  The point is, after you rip the smoke, you are to hold it until the piece or joint is returned to you.  Only then are you supposed to exhale.” (A.G.)

Informant Analysis

“People usually play this game when their supplies are starting to dwindle.  They do it because it is tends to be more efficient, and the reasons are twofold.  One, you learn to take much smaller hits when playing, thus making the joint last longer.  Two, the longer you hold the smoke in your lungs, the more it will affect you, and the higher you will effectively become.  However, it certainly requires a high degree of lung stamina which is what makes it such a challenge.  Most people have to cough the smoke out well before the piece is returned to them.  It’s also a way to earn stripes as a credible smoker.” (A.G.)

Personal Analysis:

It seems the functions of this game are both practical and competitive.  As the informant so aptly described, playing Turkish Rounds allows smokers to be more conservative with their consumption.  This must be particular useful when one is nearing the end of their stash of cannabis.  Simultaneously, this game creates a competitive environment in which the lung capacity of the participants is duly tested.

In addition to the functions listed above, this game also serves to highlight the fact that most smokers tend to smoke only in groups.  Unlike with cigarettes, it seems that cannabis users much prefer smoking with others than smoking alone.  It seems to be a bonding experience in which users tend to sit or stand in a circle.  Thus, despite the competitive element of this game, there exists also a significant team-based component.  Players depend upon the others to quickly inhale their share of smoke and then swiftly pass it along to the next person.  The longer they take in doing this, the harder it is for everyone else to play.  Thus, if the primary focus of the group is efficiency as opposed to competition, the circle becomes a unified team with the shared goal of working together.

Blowing Os and the French Inhale

– Games

“A lot of smokers like to try and blow smoke rings.  They usually refer to this as blowing Os.  There is a significant amount of variation when it comes to the techniques used while playing this game.  I’ve seen some people tap the side of their cheek continuously to help the air flow into O like shapes.  Other people try and just cough the rings out using their lungs.  Ummm lets see… the object of the game is usually to blow the biggest ring.  Hmm, another technique used when smoking is the French Inhale.  Basically, the object of this game is to slowly let the smoke escape from your lips.  You should try and push the smoke upwards.  Then, the key is to inhale the smoke from your nose, creating what looks to be an inverse waterfall of smoke falling from your mouth to your nose.  It looks pretty cool, but people do it with cigarettes too.” (J.T.)

Informant Analysis:

“These games tend to be played amongst experienced smokers.  You usually smoke with the same group of people when you’re smoking weed.  So groups of friends that usually toke together sometimes play to see which one of them is best at it.  In one way, it makes the overall smoking experience more pleasurable.  In another, it allows you to show off and display your smoking talents thus granting you credibility as a smoker.  The bigger O that you can blow, the more credible you look.  Same thing goes with the French Inhale.” (J.T.)

Personal Analysis:

The informant does a great job at summarizing both the context and the meaning of these games.  It seems this game is really more of a trick that smokers use to make the experience more playful.  It gives the smoker something to do other than simply exhaling.  However, I would imagine that not only would these games be played amongst groups of friends, as the informant describes, but also when smoking with new friends or with utter strangers.  If you’re seen blowing large smoke rings then you’re making it clear to the rest of the group that you are a highly experienced smoker.

The act of blowing smoke rings is also commonly done amongst cigar and cigarette smokers.  Cigars provide a thicker smoke, thus making it easier to blow rings, while cigarettes tend to have a thinner smoke, thus making it harder to do than with cannabis.  Blowing rings can be seen all throughout popular culture, especially in films and television shows.  In the film, the Lord of the Rings: the Fellowship of the Ring, for example, Bilbo Baggins blows a perfect circular smoke ring when smoking with his old, wizard friend, Gandalf.  However, Gandalf is quick to win the competition, in that he blows a huge ship fashioned purely out of smoke strait through Bilbo’s smoke ring.  It seems the director, Peter Jackson, is poking fun at the smoke ring competition.  A ship is clearly impossible to blow with smoke, and it is thereby monumentally more impressive.

Annotation: Blowing smoke rings is also documented as early as in J.R.R. Tolkein’s The Hobbit.  It is mentioned by Gandalf in the first chapter of the book.

J.R.R. Tolkien. The Hobbit. Ballantine Books, New York. Copyright 1937, 1938, 1966. p. 7-8.

Drinking Game- Korea

“A drinking game, I played while I was studying abroad in Korea was Titanic. Basically, you need a glass cup for beer, a shot glass and it has to be glass, beer, and soju. So what you do is you pour a glass full of beer and then put an empty shot glass on top of it ( you pour a little soju in the shot glass to stabilize it) . So everyone sit around in a circle and each person pours some amount of soju into the shot glass. They can pour as much or as little as they want; as long as they pour some amount. Whoever causes the shot glass to tip over, has to drink the glass full of beer and soju. That’s the end of the game but you play multiple rounds of it.”

Garam said that he learned this game in Korea when he went to study abroad this last fall, in 2007. He said that drinking was a big part of the Korea culture and that is how most people bonded. People in Korea bonded over drinks at bars and at people’s homes. He said he was over at some friend’s place in Korea one night and they wanted to play Titanic. He said that is when he learned about this drinking game.

I personally have never played this game but I have heard about this game before Garam told me about it. I actually was over at my friends place a couple of weeks ago and they wanted to play this game. My friends there were Korean. So they probably heard about this game from other friends that are Korean. Well, we wanted to play this game but the shot glasses they had were all plastic. And like Garam said, it really has to be glass. The plastic does not have enough weight to it so it does not sit bottom down. It just falls on to its side. So we never got to play the game. It seems like a fun game. It is somewhat like “Hot Potatoes”. You want to keep passing it along and not get caught being the last one.