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Nusantara traditional game : Congkak

Congkak is unmatched of the famous traditional games in Nusantara. This game is very famous within this region. If you would like to learn further in the area of congkak, this site could be the perfect pages for you to learn referring to it.

There come few method to play congkak which the tool also is really basic. Previously and I trusted that several of the population in the early day may play congkak sustaining exclusively some stone as the tools.

What is congkak.
Congkak is a Nusantara traditional games & also a couple other country in the region. It is a game where it involve two individuals to play it. The purpose of the game is to get as many ‘stone’ as potential and the participant which one may own most of the stone or even all the stone at the end may turn into the winner. There are several round that the participant must to take on, there are no time restriction but the participant may have to put to death the opponent by getting virtually all or all the stone.

The tools
There are two possible tools that is employs to play congkak. In the last days, numbers of persons shall play congkak with only some stone as their tools. In this case, the player will need to dig hole on the ‘playing ground’ and they will use the hole as one more tools.

The other way or the one that many people do nowadays is that they might buy a congkak tools which is a piece of wood which have hole in it as the place to put the stone in. In todays world people also didn’t use stone any longer and it has been replaced with small and beautiful marble.

The pic below is the tools which is use to play congkak.

Depending on the photo above, the prominent hole in both end of the tools is call ‘house’. There are two house in the congkak game which is go to each of the player. The house will locate in the left of the player. While the additional hole is the ‘ground’ that the player might and will play. There is constituted of two version of the tools, one have just five playground hole in each side and one more version have seven playground hole in every side. The marble or the stone that is must for this game shall depend on how many playground hole. In case there are seven hole, you may have seven marble in each hole. While if the hole is only five hole, we will need five marble in each hole.

How to play congkak
Congkak games will require the player to be alert of what the opposition do. He need to be incredible in computing and apply effective strategy to win this game.

The player will select to take marble from any hole in his side & he shall put one marble in each hole starting the next hole in the left. He must to put the marble in each hole including his ‘house hole’ with sole except of opponent ‘house hole’. This is how a player could win, i.e. if he able to ‘play’ congkak without whatever distruption or stop the ‘house hole’ will get more marble. In case the last marble that he handle fall into any hole, the player may take all the marble in that hole and continue to play. However, if the marble fall into empty hole, he require to stop & allow the opposition continue to play till the opposition too have this situation & stop. This is when the opponent take turn to play (after the other player stop). The player can choose to start (or select) marble from whatsoever hole ONLY from his side in case he get the opportunity to play. However, if the last marble that he handle fall into his ‘house hole’, the player can own an extra opportunity to begin the game & the opposition will just require to wait.

Rule of congkak game
Here is a few rule of congkak game which the player must remember.

In the beginning , each player commence together but later only one player at a time whenever one of the player have to stop (his last marble fall into empty hole)

After the end of one game which is after all marble is finish in every hole, both player may start over using only the marble that he have accumulate during the game. For example if one player (just call player A) get only 30 pieces of marble - he can have opportunity to fill up only few hole - in case 7 marble each hole - only 4 hole is filled up which the other hole is consider cancelled. While another player (player B) may filled up every one that he have. and after that the game could start again. The game may finally end only if one of the player surrender or one of the player get all the marble.

Some last word.
There are many version of Congkak games and each version shall have their own rule which sometime only based on the player agreement (but it is not too differ from the above). This traditional games of congkak help the player how to calculate & make strategies. Actually there are many tips on how to play congkak and some experience player can even forecast which hole he should ‘start’ in different senario. Even so, all the tip on playing congkak is the story of another day… good luck & thanks for interesting in traditional games.