[E-MAG ARTICLE] HOW TO: Ddakji

This article was featured in the UKP Summer E-Magazine 2018.

You can read the full magazine here!

If you have watched Korean variety shows, especially ‘SBS Running Man’, you may be familiar with the game Ddakji (Sometimes also referred to as Ttakji).

Ddakji is a Korean game often played by groups of children outside on playgrounds, in villages and cul-de-sacs. It is incredibly simple and involves the flipping of paper tiles by slamming one down on another.

Today, I will regale you with my ddakji-making journey, instruct you on how you can make your own and how to play a game with them. Please be kind to me though, as you are about see that I am not really gifted in any artistic or crafting way (even with folding paper). I apologise!

STEP 1

Start with two squares of different coloured paper of the same size. I have used card here, but paper is most definitely easier to work with. You could even try it with some pieces of patterned wrapping paper if you wanted to make it look fancy. Of course, origami paper would work perfectly for this too.

STEP 2

Fold each in half horizontally.

STEP 3

Fold the top right corner down to meet the bottom line. You will end up with a triangle shape on the right-hand side. (This is turned 90 degrees).

STEP 4

Fold the bottom left corner up to meet the top line to make two triangles. It should look something like this.

STEP 5

Turn the shape 90 degrees so the points are at top and bottom.

STEP 6

Take the top point and fold it down so the edges on the left side line up.

STEP 7

Do the same with the bottom point. You should end up with a square shape.

STEP 8

Repeat the process with the other piece of paper.

STEP 9

Open the folds and lay one on top of the other in a cross position. There should be a point on each side.

STEP 10

Fold the points in and tuck into the corresponding openings of each paper. You may find you need to flip things over and fold something the opposite way to make this work. It’s slightly fiddly, but be patient and you will get there.

You might want to flatten the Ddakji tile between some heavy books or tread on it to ‘solidify’ the folds a bit more. You can also add some extra layers of paper to your tile to give it more weight.

FINISHED PRODUCT

Here are my attempts. As you can see, the top one folded a lot flatter as it is paper and not card! In any case, I am sure you could make some better versions of these tiles than I can. Quite frankly, mine are a hot mess…

INSTRUCTIONS ON HOW TO PLAY

• ·         Make sure you have lots of tiles made up and distributed equally to all the players.
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• ·         A Thrower must be decided. Korean people will often go for a good, old-fashioned game of Rock-Paper-Scissors to decide this.
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• ·         Another player places one of their tiles flat on the ground.
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• ·         The Thrower will throw down their tile, with the aim on hitting the tile on the ground and flipping it over. If the Thrower succeeds, they get to keep the flipped tile for themselves. It takes practice and good technique to flip another’s tile! If they fail, another player takes a turn.
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• ·       The winner is the one that manages to win all the other players tiles.
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Why not give it a go and see how good you are at Ddakji?