Knock Down Ginger

Here's a good collection of street games from the UK. There's nothing fancy about the website. The games are submitted by the people who played them.

This is where I found a game called Knock Down Ginger. I personally never thought of it as a game. To me, it much more closely resembles a prank. I quote:

"Knock Down Ginger and it's alternative named variations has been played since there were front doors to play it on. Usually carried out in the hours of darkness, the aim is to ring a doorbell or knock loudly on a door, as though very urgent, and run away as fast as possible.

To make this game even more exciting you can play variations such as after knocking you hide as close to the door as possible, in shrubs or behind a tree, behind the owners gate or just around the corner.

The test comes when you try a second time on the same door, giving the owner a few moments to settle down in front of their TV, the quicker you do this the more exciting it can be."

Variations, yet. Alternate rules, even. As for example, this one, posted by David from Essex: "And the perpetual motion version where you tie two knockers together and knock on the first door, when they close their door the other knocker knocks ad infinitum."

It has all the flow-inducing properties of a good game. For the players, that is. There's a definite sense of challenge/risk. You can apparently make it more or less challenging/risky as you see fit.

This is a good example of a particular flavor of fun that leaves a certain bitter aftertaste - certainly for the victims, but also, despite the hysterical peals of laughter, for the perpetrators as well. Moderately mean fun, perhaps. Slightly irresponsible fun? Lacking-in-compassion fun? Fun that tastes like the joke's-on-somebody-else.


from Bernie DeKoven, funsmith