A Report on the Jenga Day, 10 June 2005

I did not know until recently that Jenga is a British invention. It was created in the 1970s by a Leslie Scott a British citizen, who used to live in Africa. So she named this game of piling up wooden blocks 'Jenga', meaning 'to build' in Swahili. According to one website, this is the second best selling game in the world (the best one being Monopoly, I think). And another one, a promotion website, hyperbolically writes that 'JENGA is a must have game that no fun-loving household would be without. Behind its seemingly simple exterior there's a surprisingly daring game that builds to a suspenseful, high-spirited climax.' In short, it declares, the game is 'an ideal way to make the most of your quality time with family or friends.'

We entered a studious experiment, asking ourselves whether this really is true, or not. So here comes K on our left, Yoshi on the right, and our Jenga Girl in the middle, who, with her inquiring spirit, proposed this whole investigation.



Under the direction of our Jenga Master, Andy (whose photo will be made available shortly), I am now preparing the report of our enqury, full of illustrations and demonstrations. But I'm waiting for more materials to come, to make our report better one. I hope to make it publicly available in near future.

Koji