The Universe is a Game
The Game A few days ago, at Vijnana Dal, we gave students a challenge. This is the story about that activity and how we connected it to a larger pursuit. The dadas (guides) had designed a simple card game by themselves, whose rules were known only to them. Two of the dadas sat everyone down in a circle around them and started playing the game, which was later dubbed ' Gillu ' (because, why not!). It was a modified version of "Bhikar-Savkar" or "Beggar My Neighbour" where some choice and startegization were introduced in an otherwise random game. The students could only observe. The challenge for them was to figure out the rules of the game through observation. [The 2-player game starts with each player having 26 cards in hand. They are not allowed to look at the cards. Player 1 begins by compulsorily playing the top card (violating this gets a penalty of 2 cards). Player 2 now, can look at their top card. They can ...