Here at Active Cities, we know there are many ways to #BeActive. We think you should do whatever moves you! And to prove it we’ve cataloged 7 of the wackiest and weirdest ways to play for your entertainment and inspiration. Do whatever moves you!
1. Ear Pull
What Is It?
Two people sit across from each other. The ref loops a single piece of sinew around the competitors’ ears and then each tries to yank it off the other. This ends up being, not so much a question of strength, but of pain endurance, as you can see from the video below.
What Are The Origins?
Ever get caught in a blizzard without a cap? The Alaskans who invented ear-pulling competitions spent long cold days away from home hunting and scouting. The sport was a measure of endurance, supposedly indicative of who could withstand cold the best. If you’ve ever felt your ears burning with cold you probably have some idea of what the ear pull is like.
Who Plays Today?
Eddie Arey is the 2015 ear pull champion of the world. He won in the last World Eskimo-Indian Olympics, held annually in Fairbanks Alaska. Some other featured events are fish cutting, Eskimo stick pull, and the greased pole walk.
2. Double Ball
What Is It?
This team sport was played by many Native American tribes throughout the East and Midwest. The Potawatomi, from Northern Michigan, played 5 to a side but other tribes used up to eight. Generally speaking — the rules sometimes changed from tribe to tribe — two teams defended a goal made of three sticks, two six to ten feet high were split at the top and a third passed between them. Think soccer goal with no net.
A referee throws the double ball — two hide sacks, each filled with something to give them weight (a ball for example) and then stitched together — into the middle of the field. Players then fight to pick up the ball with long sticks (no hands!) and fling it at the opposing team’s goal. You get three points for hanging the double ball on the goal, two points for flinging it through the goal and one point for putting it over the top like a field goal.
How Did It Start?
Well, historically speaking, double ball was played exclusively by women. Given that fact and the double ball’s striking resemblance to male genitalia, some people believe the game had some metaphorical significance. I’ll leave that to your imagination but mostly it looks like great fun.
Who Plays Today?
Several Native American and arts organizations teach double ball at schools and camps across the country. It’s easy to set up in your backyard too. If you’re low on deer hide though you can always stick a tennis ball in two pairs of socks and tie them together. Sticks shouldn’t be that hard to find. Check out some resources on double ball’s history and current practice below!
3. Fisherman’s Joust
What Is It?
Leave your steeds at home and round up some friends who know how to paddle. One person stands at one end of a boat with a long stick and tries to poke other boat jousters into the water. You can play one boat versus another or get the whole fishing village together and have a free-for-all. The last jouster standing wins.
How Did It Start?
With an evil genius pharaoh who knew how to get his twisted kicks. Fisherman’s jousting dates back to ancient Egypt. As far as we can tell, the rules were about as existent back then as human rights. Teams mostly beat each other bloody in the Nile for their king’s entertainment. A spectacle that reportedly interested not only the pharaoh but hungry Crocodiles as well. Move over American football, here comes ancient Egyptian death paddle with crocodiles.
Who Plays Today?
The French are responsible for Fisherman’s jousting today, such as it is in our world of laws and human decency. No crocodiles, unfortunately, and it’s a lot less bloody, which is fortunate. What there is, is plenty of pomp, and circumstance, pretty ribbons, and funny costumes. Very French.
4. Calcico Storico
What Is It?
Benito Mussolini may have had some questionable notions about political organization and morality, but he had at least one really great idea. In 1930 the famous fightin’ fascist revived a brutal 400-year-old game, Calcio Storico and the Florentines have been running with it ever since. Each year, four teams representing the old neighborhoods of Florence fill the Piazza Santa Croce and beat each other senselessly in front of a roaring crowd. There are nets and lines and positions, 27 players to a side, no substitutions, and some vague goal to get a ball through a net. But, all you really need to know about Calcio Storico are its 3 rules about violence: 1) no blindside punches 2) no hitting someone on the ground 3) no foreign objects. That’s it. For 50 minutes. Oh and if you win you get a cow.
How Did It Start?
As with the answer to most questions about things from Europe, bored rich people essentially. The game was quite popular with the aristocracy throughout Italy in the 15th century. But Calcio became inextricably linked to Florence in 1530, when the city held a match in direct defiance of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. Besieged by imperial troops the city’s men bravely pulled each other in the name of freedom.
Who Plays Today?
In the 17th century, Calcio took a back seat to other Italian pastimes like plague, economic depression, and war. A seat in which it stayed through the 18th-century enlightenment, Napoleonic conquest, and subsequent Austro-Prussian wars until good ole Benito dusted off the old Venetian breeches and declared Calcio an officially recognized sport by the Kingdom of Italy. And now I get to write two words rarely seen together: Thanks, Mussolini.
5. Stick Fighting
What Is It?
Grab a stick. The first person to hit the other guy in the face wins! It’s more complicated than that, but a headshot it the objective. There’s a strict code of conduct to Zulu Stick Fighting. Each match has 4 phases: dance, challenge, fight, and surrender. Participants, generally young men wielding two sticks, one for attacking and one for blocking, swing at each other in a combination of feints and body shots, trying to get at their opponent’s head. The defense stick isn’t good at its job so committing to a body shot in the hopes of knocking your opponent off guard, can be risky. Think fencing with spears. Jabs and stabbing moves are considered unsportsmanlike but are used as faint attacks intended to make an opponent flinch rather than land an actual blow.
How Did It Start?
The Zulu peoples of South Africa’s Nguni tribes have a fierce historical reputation for military prowess. In the late 18th and early 19th century, Shaka kaSenzangakhona (pictured below) carved out an empire that lasted for nearly a century, uniting the southern Africans against British invasion. It’s said one of Shaka’s many military innovations was formalizing stick fighting and using it to determine rank and status in his forces.
Who Plays Today?
Today, stick fights are more ceremonial and cultural, than practical. There are stick fighting lessons and matches, but a lot less is on the line in actual competition. Where once these matches were a real test of a person’s manhood and capability, now both sexes practice stick fighting as a kind of martial art and cultural event. Fights are organized for family get-togethers, weddings, and women’s coming-out ceremonies.
6. Bull Surfing
What Is It?
You surf some bulls. Well, technically since the animals pull a cart some people call them Oxen. Then again, I had a hard time determining whether the animals used for this sport are castrated so who knows? Ox or Bull, you surf it.
How Did It Start?
Every August the community of a rural Indian town called Kerala, celebrates the end of harvest season by spectacularly destroying a rice patty. They get drunk, get some bulls drunk, and watch participants ride a little plank in the wake of two bulls careening around a flooded rice patty, ankle-deep water. An afternoon of bull surfing leaves the patty churned, fresh, and free of weeds, ready for another season’s planting. It’s all great fun. Is it cruel? Possibly, but apparently, the bulls are well trained for this specific event and at least it’s not a fight to the death. (Looking at you Madrid) Bull surfing. Because sharks don’t have horns.
