I didn’t like Barnga, a game we played in ICLT last week, because it made me feel rotten. That was part of the point: not to make us feel rotten, but to get a sense of the massive challenges faced by those who enter a new culture.

In our first group, four of us learned the rules as written out, negotiating details of meaning, and then began playing. Then we were forbidden to talk. There were four tables of four people. Each of us was assigned a letter from A to D. At a certain point, all the As moved to the next table. We started playing. I hadn’t paused to think that there was a hitch — a duh, but I missed it. After a few plays, I got confused: something was different, and I didn’t know what. I wanted to understand, so when someone took the trick I thought someone else got, I stopped them and gesticulated that I was confused and wanted an explanation. One kid at my new table was dismissive and arrogant, shushing me and signaling me to take a deep breath: calm down. Very insulting. I held up my hand: wait; I want to understand something. I was again condescended to with the same irritated roll of the eyes and calm down gesture. Another member of my new group used body language of irritation at me. My blood started to boil at the arrogance. I didn’t care about the game or winning it. I wasn’t feeling competitive. I just wanted to understand what this game was about. All of a sudden, it hit me: they have different rules. My eyes lit up. I gestured again: wait! I see what’s happening. But they just wanted to keep playing the game. I motioned to my previous table and then to this one, trying to explain, but I couldn’t. They seemed to be in the dark about my discovery. Maybe they knew, but I don’t think so because they were just driven to keep playing, and they never acknowledged that there was some reason I was acting confused other than my stupidity. No nod or other sign that it was okay. There was no signal of recognition of my plight. One of them kept showing me that the card in his hand was a diamond. Before I knew that we were playing by different rules, that meant nothing to me. Once I had it figured out, I realized it was a trump card. We hadn’t had a trump in our game, so the concept was unexpected to me. But I figured it out, alone, with only antagonism from my tablemates, who were a unified front against me. There were other ways I could’ve been. I could’ve smiled and sat back and let them play my hand for me as I watched. But I didn’t think of that. I was so desperate to understand and be understood — and to explain the trick to them once I figured it out — that that was my sole driving force. And because I was driven, I was emotionally invested. I was insulted, hurt and truly angry. Over a game that I wasn’t even competitive about.

Then we moved to a third table, along with one player from that table. So at our new location, it was evenly divided between us two newcomers and the two original players at that table. I immediately assumed that we would be playing by their rules. It never occurred to me that it would be any other way. We were in their “country” and would adapt. The person I came to the table with wanted them to play by our rules but I said no. I don’t know why I said no. It didn’t matter. It just seemed the way to do it. We were their guests. I didn’t want to conquer or change. So as we began, I motioned to one of my new tablemates what I knew about the trick. I don’t know if she already knew it or not, but she paid enough attention to me to try to understand, and she did understand. I signaled to her that she just had to teach me her way. I didn’t have any further troubles, but the guy who came with me to this table was having a harder time adapting. He wanted it his way.

The final change was when another person from our previous table joined us. So there was me, from one table, two of them from another, and a fourth who had been at this table all along. When there were two from one table, one of them signaled that majority rules, and we should now play by their rules. I immediately vetoed that, still wordlessly, saying that we’re at this table, we play by their rules. That was really bossy of me. At that point, I didn’t want to go back to trying to figure out Table 2’s rules. I was already confused enough. I had such a strong sense that in this territory we played this game, that their suggestion seemed ridiculous to me. Of course it wasn’t. Those two did feel some collegiality after building a bond the first five minutes of the game. I was a drifter, and I wanted an anchor. The original person also assumed that we’d play by her rules, and was happy when I nixed the idea of going back to their rules. But it wasn’t really my business.

Interestingly, different dynamics happened at different tables with different personalities. A couple people arrived at tables where they were the first new arrival with three originals, and still they got the other three to play by their rules. There were miffed people, but none as vocal as I when we were unmuzzled and allowed to speak. My frustration was so great that I spoke out almost aggressively: he kept shushing me and belittled me… blah blah blah.

Of course the lessons of the game are clear. It was a tiny but emotional taste of the experience of being an outsider. It wasn’t pleasant. By being wordless, we were replicating language differences. By having one person step out of his/her own “world view”/set of rules into a new situation with people playing by different, established rules, it approximated cultural differences. The biggest source of conflict came from not knowing that we were playing by different rules: cultural blindness. For me, the game became easier once I knew what I was up against, and easier still when one person knew that I was struggling to understand her. But that wasn’t true for everyone. Some people got more upset as the game progressed. Maybe from competitiveness. Maybe resentment at the intruder or the “host.” Maybe piled-on frustration at not being able to communicate. And all with tangible connections to the experience of being an outsider in an established social order.