Mahjong Dictionary
The American Heritage Dictionary defines Mahjong as:
A game of Chinese origin usually played by four persons with 144 tiles resembling dominoes and bearing various designs, which are drawn and discarded until one player wins with a hand of four combinations of three tiles each and a pair of matching tiles.
Mahjong has been compared to Gin Rummy. You're dealt the tiles and you form your hand into pairs, sets, groups and runs. You build on these by drawing, picking up and discarding tiles. Once the game is completed, you tally up the tiles and highest points player wins.
Mahjong Terms:
4 Standard Winning Hands - The Coward, The Plain, All Pungs, Seven Pairs.
Blue Flowers - Plum, Orchid, Bamboo and Chrysanthemum.
Charleston - passing of tiles to players; used in American Mahjong.
Chow - A set of 3 consecutive tiles of the same kind.
Chuck - Showing a tile in order to allow another player to win the game.
Dragons - Names of the 3 dragons are Red, Green and While Dragons
Eye - A set of 2 identical tiles in a winning hand and independent of other combinations.
Fan - Unit used to measure ranking values of a winning hand
Floor - The middle of the game board where discarded tiles are stored.
Game - A complete playing timeperiod that has a definite ending.
Head - The start of the wall.
Honours - Covering the Dragons and Winds
Joker - a wild tile used in American Mahjong.
Jonga - The player throwing the dice; first player to receive tiles.
Kong - A set of 4 identical tiles
Lefta - Player on the left of a specific player
Mahjong - A Chinese game played by 4 people with 144 tiles.
Meld - A certain set of cards being collected.
Nexta - Player on the right of a specific player
Opposa - Player on the opposite side of a specific player
Tile - The playing pieces
Pair - Two identical tiles
Pung - A set of 3 identical tiles.
Red Flowers - Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter
Selfmake - Winning a hand immediately after drawing a tile.
Serials - Playing pieces identified by numbers 1 - 9
Sok - Name of one of 3 Serial suits
Tail - The end of the wall.
Tan - Name of one of 3 Serial suits
Terminals - Covering 1 and 9 of the Serials
Unios - Covering Honours and Terminals
Wall - Source of tiles and from where tiles are dealt to players.
Wan - Name of one of 3 Serial suits
Winds - Names of the 4 winds are North, South, East and West pieces.
