Living for pleasure alone...

Who wants a game of Hot Rice! ?I was out playing with my pop9 camera the other day and took this picture of a tennis ball. The moment I saw it I thought “look a “tennessy” ya don’t see kids playing them as much as you did”. The sight of the ball sparked a whole chain of thought mainly about growing up.

Now our town when I was a young lacked many things; jobs! A swimming pool! A MacDonald’s! (this was a good thing) but one thing we had in excessive was tennis balls. This wasn’t because our lanky mate Soggy (a ginner) looked like Boris Becker, no the reason was Dunlop/Slazenger had factory on the other side of Barnsley making the things. Every school had at least one dad who worked there and got “seconds”, I don’t ever remember buying a new one.

Now I don’t know if these games are particularly local but we use to play a number of tennessy based games as well as the usual footy etc.

One game was called pegs (yes, this makes me sound like a Victorian street urchin but it was only 1982 Honest!) In pegs you made a tiny goal out of 3 pegs placed against the wall and then one of you threw a ball at the pegs and I can’t remember what happened next but throwing a soggy tennis ball at your best mate was involved.

No the main game I wanted to record was called Hot Rice!

How to play!
Kit: one tarmac play ground (it doesn’t work grass)
One manky hairy tennis knackered ball.
Players: at least 4 up to 10-12. (but not any “mucky binner’s or dodgy types from Woolley or Pye Ave)

Rules: Bearing in mind that games of hot Rice! have been going on centuries we must assume this isn’t the first game.

Aim of the game: Hot Rice! is a running game similar to tag, tig or dobby but using ball to catch players not your hand.

To start the game an elaborate circle was formed. See diagram.
1.The group stands in circle facing inwards.
2.The Kingey “(a lead player chosen during, either from the previous game or possibly the owner of the ball) bounces the ball in the centre of circle.

3.The ball is bounced 2 times the group chant “hot rice! bounce twice” “once” “twice” as the ball bounces.
4. On the last bounce the ball is set free and careers round the ring of legs, the players try to deflect the ball to make it go through the legs of another player who will be “ON” if it happens. To do this, players flick their legs like pin ball flippers hitting the ball with their heals. If they move their toes it counts as cheating or “ chaytin” as we would have said.

5. As the ball passes through the legs of the player who is “ON” the Kingey can choose to shout “sticky pudding” whilst holding their fists in front of them thumbs aloftC .
6. This is all happening all at once remember so one kid is now “ON”, the Kingey is claiming “sticky pudding” this allows him to stay where he is and not be take part in the first phase of the game. Other players can also claim “sticky pudding” but only if the kingey has already proclaimed it first. Players can’t claim “sticky pudding” if they have moved their feet or attempted to leave the circle .

7. If the kingey doesn’t say “sticky pudding” everybody has to break from the circle and the game begins. Even if “sticky pudding” is called one player has to run this player is the “bucket” or as we would say “ oy johnsey tha bucket from furst brek thy is”. Johnsey or whomever became “bucket” by being the first person caught in the last game. The bucket has to run whatever happens and is in danger of being bucket again if all the other players stay in the circle.

8. While everyone else is “sticky puddinging” the kid who’s On has run off and retrieved the ball.

9. The ON player now searches out players to throw the ball at. If they hit a player the player joins the ON side and hunts down the other players until they all caught. The last player becomes the Kingey and the game restarts.

10.The moment the first running player is hit the immunity of “sticky pudding” is broken and all the players join the running game and are eligible to be thrown at and caught even the Kingey.

11.Now the aim of the running game is to avoid being hit so players would twist and turn, feint right and left, duck and jump. The player who is On doesn’t want to throw until they were ready otherwise they may have to retrieve the wall from the other end of the playground.
12. The hunted can protect themselves by hitting the ball with their fists but not the open hand and could even pick the loose ball up with their knuckles but not palms. If the ball touched you anywhere else you where ON.
13. The running game could last for 5 plus minutes with the hunted taunting the kids who where ON or the ball could be thrown between the hunters making the hunted weave like piggy in the middle.
The old tennis balls where generally hairy and knadgered with beards of cloth hanging from them, that if dipped in a puddle made a delightful splatter on your mates clothes.

Anyway that is as far as I can remember the rules to hot rice! I’ve never met anyone not from Barnsley, who played it, I’m not sure kids play it today. It was a cracking game, very energetic and because of its repetitive nature strangely uncompetitive at least not in the crowing modern shirts over heads way. It did occasion the odd stung cheek from a fast thrown ball or grazed knee from hitting the tarmac but not much else. Good players could evade capture by running through the girls skipping ropes or behind teachers.
I thought I’d post it here as these sort of things go un-noticed and unrecorded. I’m not one for the Hovis ad view of the past but it would nice to know that somewhere 6 lads are chanting their version of the rhyme, laughing at the bucket and dipping a Slazenger in a puddle ready to christen their best mate’s tracky top.