Rules of bowa, African game, played in Malawi, involves a board with dish shapes for holding counters in .?

Question

the general idea being that you collect as many of your opponents counters/beans/stones as possible.

Answer 1

Oware.

Oware is an abstract strategy game and the mancala game most widely considered suitable for serious adult competition. Oware is the national game of Ghana, and the particular name "Oware" is that given by the Akan speaking people there.

It is played throughout West Africa and the Caribbean. Among its many names are Ayo (Yoruba), Awalé (Côte d'Ivoire), Wari (Mali), Ouri (Cabo Verde), Warri (Caribbean), Gebeta (Ethiopia/Eritrea), Adji (Ewe), and Awélé (Ga). A common name in English is Awari.

The mancala family of games has existed for at least 1000 years. Oware is perhaps the most widespread game in that family.

Reflecting traditional African values, players of Oware encourage participation by onlookers, making it perhaps the most social two-player abstract. Games may provide a focus for entertainment and meeting others. The game, or variations of it, also had an important role in teaching arithmetic to African children.

A typical Oware board has two straight rows of six pits or cavities, called "houses" and optionally one house at either end to store captured stones. Each player controls the six houses on their side of the board, and the score house on their right.

.... ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( )
( ) ............................ ( )
.... ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( )

The only pieces are 48 undifferentiated seeds. In the Caribbean, these are typically nickernuts, which are smooth and shiny seeds of sprawling coastal shrubs. Beads and pebbles are also sometimes used. In the West, marbles are sometimes used in cheap sets, but these do not have the feel or ease of play of traditional seeds.

The object of the game is to capture more seeds than one's opponent. Since the game has only 48 seeds, capturing 25 is sufficient to accomplish this. Since there are an even number of seeds, it is possible for the game to end in a draw, where each player has captured 24.

At the beginning of the game four seeds are placed in each house except the end houses. Typically, the winner of the previous game starts the next game.

Players take turns moving the seeds. On a turn, a player chooses one of the six houses under their control. The player removes all seeds from this house, and distributes them, dropping one in each house counter-clockwise from this house, in a process called sowing.

Seeds are not distributed into the end scoring houses, nor into the house drawn from. That is, the starting house is left empty; if it contained 12 seeds, it is skipped, and the twelfth seed is placed in the next house.

After a turn, if the last seed was placed into an opponent's house that brought its total to two or three, all the seeds in that house are captured and placed in the player's scoring house (or set aside if the board has no scoring houses). If the previous-to-last seed also brought an opponent's house to two or three, these are captured as well, and so on.

Oware is featured at the Mind Sports Olympiad taking place at the University of Westminster campus at Baker Street in London:

Oware | Thursday, August 31st | 09:30 to 17:30

Details at www.msoworld.com

Answer 2

This is a version of Mancala, known to my sister's family as Bao in Malawi. Two versions of the rules are here (the second is from Zanzibar):
http://www.gamecabinet.com/rules/Bao2.html (Malawi)
http://www.gamecabinet.com/rules/Bao.html (Zanzibar)

Neither, however, quite tally with the board and rules which I played with my nephews who were brought up in Malawi.


The board they used had four rows of 8 (an outer and an inner row for each player) and no larger holes. One could start from any hole in your outer row (I think) and work in either direction but could not change direction in the same turn. The board was sown with 2 stones per hole initially.
(Edit: From looking at the rules on those two pages, it seems as if the rules I learned - and have forgotten - were a simplified set from one stage of the game only. There was certainly no sowing of stones from a stock: all 64 stones were placed two to a hole at the start of the game. The game ended when neither player could capture any more stones and the winner was the one with the most stones.)

I suspect that each area may have its own rules. My sister's family lived in Zomba and Lilongwe and their servants spoke Chichewa. There were areas where the language was Chiyao and I think Swahili was also spoken. (I apologise to Malawians for using the old spelling!)

There are several more versions of the game detailed here:
http://www.mastersgames.com/rules/mancala-rules.htm

Answer 3

I don't think there are strict rules, I found this in an online diary by someone who travelled in Malawi:

"Bowa - It's one of those games that seems to have no clear set of rules, strategy, etc, and depending on who you ask, and their level of intoxication, you get a different story."

Answer 4

Definitely Go. That's the only one where black and white counters are placed on the intersections of a grid. Othello and checkers you put the pieces in the centre of the squares, backgammon and mancala aren't played on grids at all.

Answer 5

The Oware Society UK organises the game of oware in this country. It arranges tournaments, workshops and exhibitions and sells boards, books and software. It also produces a newsletter.

Answer 6

Mancala?

Answer 7

Mancala. You might find more t if you use this name.

Answer 8

mancala