You know, I never played with my color pencils. I always painted/drew with them - it may not have looked at all like I intended, but it was “pintar”, not “jugar”. My Nephew and the Pseudo-Nephews also paint with their Plastidecors and Alpinos (and, in one case, with anything she can get her hands on; her parents finally plastered stick-on-whiteboard on the lower half of her bedroom’s wall and let her paint on that wall but not on other walls). So maybe at least part of this comes from a language definition problem?
Another Pseudo-Nephew already plays the buttons on his daddy’s trumpet
I have found coloring with crayons to be very soothing.
As far as playing with kids, it goes from playing peekaboo with a baby to playing some complicated strategy game with our teenaged son. My BILs once got into a huge spat over Christmas because one of their kids got a Mr. Potato Head as a gift and they were tussling (all in good fun) over who got to play with it next.
I guarantee you, give an office a bunch of water pistols on a slow Friday and you’ll see some play. I have a bottle of bubbles at my desk and every once in awhile I’ll walk around, blowing bubbles. It never fails to get a laugh.
Another bubble blower here. Go to an area full of adults doing adult things some time, and start blowing bubbles. You can track the bubbles by the exclimation of BUBBLES. You will get people who follow the bubble trail backwards to you, and then stand there watching the bubbles float off into the sky.
Most of my experience is with Viet Nam. I used to visit my friends nieces and nephews fairly often, sometimes bringing them board games or jigsaw puzzles, which I would play with them. The parents encouraged this, but never joined in themselves. These families were extremely close-knit, much more so than many American families. It seems like several posters are conflating lack of play with lack of love, or at least lack of strong family ties, but that’s really not the case.
I’ve been to other countries, but for less time, and with limited exposure to the daily life of families. I haven’t actually seen them playing with their children, but I could have missed it.
I think we should differentiate between different types of play here:
If we are talking about the parents engaging in imaginary-world-kind of play, I would imagine this to be (mostly) an American/European thing. I haven’t really seen parents do that in other parts of the world.
But playing games, drawing, flying kite, blowing bubbles, etc - in short: any type of playing that doesn’t involve suspending the “adult reality” happens everywhere, I’m sure. I have seen it in Europe (I’m Danish), Central Asia, the Middle East, India, and I am sure you can find it all over the world.
As far as playing as an adult (without children): Absolutely! - A few good friends, some alcohol and a big box o’ Lego - amazing fun! Although as I noted we seem mostly to just build stuff, rather than identify with the world we create.
Bubbles are good fun, too: Make 8 litres of bubble mix in a big bucket, go play in a park - it is a magnet for kids and adults alike.
And drawing is not just for kids, either
