Pinoy Kaba? Game

As a Filipino parent, do you sometimes feel that your children are not growing up to be as Pinoy as they should be? Or at least as Pinoy as you are? Oftentimes, I get that feeling. My kids don't speak Filipino that well (blame it on Cartoon Network?) and sometimes, I feel that there is less Pinoy culture in media these days.

So when my husband and I went out to do some Christmas shopping last year, the game Pinoy Kaba? caught our attention. It's an educational Philippine board game produced by Joytoy, from a concept by Aurora M. de Leon and from the design of JC Lucas. You can buy the board game in toy stores like Toys R Us and Toy Kingdom.

We've played the game twice or thrice since then and it is a good way to learn about Philippine culture, history, and geography. Questions are either easy or difficult and the first player who gets to spell out the word PHILIPPINES with his or her tiles wins. You get to put a tile in by answering a question correctly.

So far, we've had fun with the game for our family of four - two adults and two kids, aged 6 and 12. My daughter, who is six, is a bit too young to know any of the answers but individuals can play in teams so she usually teams up with me.

The easy questions are really easy (they're give-aways) while the difficult questions are really difficult. If those playing are children, you may include the easy questions. However, if you are all adults, I suggest you just stick to the difficult questions as choosing the easy ones will really not require you much effort.

Here's a sample difficult question, for example: "What is the world's smallest shell that can only be found in the Philippines?" Do you know the answer? I didn't.

One area of improvement for this game would be the number of cards included in the game. In my view, they are just few, so much so that probably after playing several times, you would already run out of cards and know the answers to all the questions.

So, if you are looking for a Board game that the whole family can play, do check this game out. Aside from your family, it will make a good gift for balikbayans or overseas Filipinos so they may teach their children about Filipino things.

So, Pinoy Kaba?