Games of Chance
Humans invent various games of chance to satisfy their needs of gambling, Balinese are no exception. Bali is no gambler paradise compare to Las Vegas, Monte Carlo or Macau. In fact, the Indonesian government has forbidden any form of gambling. But still there are some chances to hold a game of chance or two. Balinese have devised a range of games of chance from kocokan, a simple game played with dices to cockfighting, with its complex rules and traditions. Apart from cockfighting the most popular games of chance in Bali are Kocokan and Bola Adil.
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Kocokan is a kind of roulette in which the players put some money on a vinyl mat which is decorated with six different pictures of cartoon version of Hindu gods, demons or animals, the players put the bets on a picture, the banker has three large six-sided dices, the faces matching the pictures of the mat, he puts the dices on a plate and covers them with an upside-downed bowl, shakes them up, and opens the cover to determine the resulting faces showing up determining the winning bets.
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Bola Adil is played on a colorful 1×1 meter slippery board on which various shapes (triangle, square, circle etc.) are drawn. A bunch of players squatting or standing around a vinyl mat which is decorated with the same shapes which are painted on the board, they put their money on the mat, on a certain shape they preferred. The banker rolls a weighted plastic ball on the board. The ball finally lands on a picture and the winner of course the ones who put their money on that lucky picture. The interesting thing in a Bola Adil game is the shouting of the players when the ball wanders on the board. They shout “aahhh”, “ooohh” or “yaahh” sometimes in unison sometimes in disharmony to every movement of the balls, sometimes accompanied by apparent body or hip movement hoping to direct the ball on board to land on their lucky shape.
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