What's blue and purple and Pinoy all over?
MANILA, Philippines - If you could put everything memorable and funny and just worth mentioning about the Philippines into a box, what would that box look like? Small yet heavy. Simple yet complicated. Oh, and maybe — just maybe — Blue and Purple.
A new board game developed for Filipinos by Filipinos has generated so much buzz since its launch (last July), it may just be the closest anyone’s ever gotten to cramming 7,107 islands, 90 million Filipinos, nearly 500 years of history, and an infinite number of Filipino jokes into a two-kilogram pack.
Mismo! was developed by a group of overseas Filipino workers based in Bangkok because, they said, they “miss the Philippines and everything about it.” Since late July, their creation has clearly hit a chord among other Filipinos. A small craze fueled by nothing more than word-of-mouth is seeing Mismo! being played in more and more living rooms, student hangouts, and family reunions. Staff at Hobbes & Landes attest that the groundbreaking Pinoy boardgame has been one of the store’s bestsellers over the past three months. Mismo’s Facebook Page has more than 800 “Fans” from Pinoys all over the world. Its developers have even had to field orders among equally nostalgic Filipinos in the US, Japan, and the Middle East — despite the fact, unfortunately, they still do not have systems in place to deliver abroad.
So what’s creating the buzz? Mismo!, with the help of two roulettes, cleverly generates more than 10,000 open-ended “questions” in Filipino, the answers to which are of course even more infinite. For example you spin the ruletas and you are asked: Ano ang Mainit na Malapot? Maalat na Nakakakilig? Nakakainis na Hahanap-hanapin?
Nope, it’s not a trivia game. You’ll have to play it to see for yourself: Part of the fun is that with Mismo!, as it promises right there on the box, “Nobody’s wrong. All answers are right.”
Confused? Well, Mismo! lives up to its own tagline: “Ang larong malalim na mababaw. Malabo na malinaw.”
Indeed, the only thing that makes it all make perfect sense is that undefinable Filipino-ness you’ll need — and you’ll happily find in abundance — in yourself. Helping to draw it all out of you while limiting the endless possibility of answers — and thus creating a game out of everbody else’s imagination — are 600 word cards. Each answer card is a nod to cultural and popular touchstones of Philippine culture and identity. Everything from adobo to Manny Pacquiao, Boracay, Dolphy, ChocNut, Tabo, Tansan, Lolo, and even that guy in your gang that’s always “Naka-Tuck-in.” If you don’t know what all those words are, don’t fret. If you’re not Filipino, you might not get it. But if you are Filipino, even without knowing everything in Mismo!, chances are you’ll still know more than enough. And even for that which you’re not familiar, it’s likely you’ll still care and — given friends and family to play with — most definitely still learn while having fun. Mismo! delivers a kind of irreverent, raucous education about the Philippines that would bring any Pinoy family together, whether over All Souls’ Day or Christmas dinner.
Plainly, Mismo! celebrates everything that defines the Philippines and being Filipino, including those who play it themselves.
Visit Mismo!’s website at www.mismo.ph to learn more about the game, and to see a list of stores that sell it in Metro Manila, Pampanga, and Baguio. The list includes all branches of Hobbes & Landes and all Metro Manila and Pampanga stores of Papemelroti. MagNet Cafe, La Monja Loca in Intramuros, Handog Gift Shop in UP Shopping Center, and even Little John’s Restaurant in Camp John Hay, Baguio.
