Mah Jong

Mahjong (麻將 pinyin: ma2 jiang1 or 麻雀 Cantonese: ma4 jeuk3) is a Chinese gambling game for 4 players. The game pieces (tiles) and scoring rules used in the game are slightly different depending on regional variations. The game play in general are very similar in all versions.

There are 4 suits in the tile set, commonly known as circles, bamboos, characters, and honors. Little known to most players, the suits of the tiles are money based. The circles represent the coins; the bamboos are actually strings of 100 coins; the character myriad represents 10 thousand coins or 100 strings. The honor suit includes the four winds and the red, white and green dragons.

One can try the game (American version) on line at http://games.yahoo.com.