Learning Mah Jong

I am trying to do all kinds of brain exercises in order to recover from the stroke.
Today I had a lesson from a very gracious Chinese women on how to play Mah Jong. This is the real deal with tiles -not the computer game. Some people said that I shouldn't try Mah Jong as it was too complicated and has many symbols to learn along with Chinese words.

I was worried I would embarrass myself or get so frustrated I would do something stupid. Since the stroke, I am what my family calls "unfiltered" - I have trouble with impulse control and I just blurt out what comes to my mind; not always good in social situation. But this is the year for me to try new things and go out of my comfort zone. At 1:00 PM I showed up at the clubhouse with three other people to learn the game. Interestingly, it was not hard for me to pick up the basics. I had to learn numbers and word spellings again after the stroke so it felt like the same kind of exercises.

I was so pleased, it was fun and it was good to be with three other people learning the game at the same time - I almost felt normal.