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Cake day: June 13th, 2023

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  • Keyflower. The core game play mechanic is very simple in that essentially everything is just bidding meeples that it is very easy to teach, but there is so much to consider, a ton of interaction, meaningful cost/benefit decisions, and so many ways to build up without being too much of a point salad. The game itself is very attractive on the table without being garish, and it can be kind of ruthless. It also scales beautifully, I have played it with 2 players and I have played it with 6 and its great everywhere in between. The iconography is clear and simple, the expansions are both great (although I prefer the Merchants for low player count and the Farmers for high).


  • A few things, how empty and clean it was in comparison (I lived in a city at the time, which could show you how dense Beijing is, like everywhere you go is the most crowded place you have ever been). I also remember waking up from jet lag and my brother was watching that puppet comedy guy on tv and thinking what the fuck is going on here. I was pretty unplugged while I was over there (fall of 2004) so I essentially missed that whole election cycle which was honestly really nice, it sucked that Bush got reelected, but it was good to not be steeped in it while it happened. Since I had a very rudimentary grasp of mandarin at the time I wasn’t really engaging which Chinese pop culture either so I was basically just hanging out and talking to people which was really nice. Chinese social interactions are a lot more structured as well, which I found very refreshing at the time, I didn’t have enough of a grasp of the language to be awkward so that was also really fun.


  • I lived in China for a year after college, and that was basically fine since I was already pretty knowledgeable about the country and I went into it expecting to be off balance and that there would be a lot of new things. What was a surprise was the culture shock when I came back to the US. I don’t think that the jet lag helped, but I remember feeling really really out of sorts for about a week and just generally in a bit of shock about how different life was here having largely not been exposed to it for a year.