Bingo!

Oh, I nearly forgot! Whilst I was in Leeds a few weeks ago, I had a night out at a Bingo Hall with Sarah and her friends. Yes. A Bingo Hall. What, with bingo being a sacrilegious pastime for most Northern folk, it would have been wrong not to go native. So that is what I bally well did.

But before I get lynched by an angry mob of Northerners for calling bingo 'Northern', here is an interesting fact:

Yorkshire (including Leeds) has 34 Bingo Halls. Oxfordshire has 2. It seems that Southerners are too busy prancing around on dobbins to partake in a gambling game of unknown origin.

It was with trepidation that we pulled up outside the Gala Bingo Hall on the outskirts of Leeds. I didn't know what to expect, and all I wanted to do was blend in with the locals.

I entered the foyer of the building and approached the cashiers desk where an overweight man in a polyester Gala suit (Lord knows how he survived without an earthing strap) was sitting.

"I would like to purchase a game of your finest bingo please," I said to him, waving my credit card with a flourish.

"Are you a member?" he asked. That floored me. Apparently, in order to play bingo, I had to be a member of some secret society, even though all I was going to do was cross some numbers off a bingo ticket.

"No, why? Do I have to be?" I asked.

"Yep. I can't let you in unless you're a member?" he replied with no expression.

"Why can't I play unless I am a member?" I demanded. "It doesn't make sense. What do you think I am going to do? Sabotage some granny's bingo ticket or run amok with a dabber?"

Sarah heard the ruckus and came running over.

"I'll sort it out," she said to the chap behind the desk, pushing me to one side.

Five minutes later, I was the proud owner of a 'Gala Bingo Card'; a card that admitted me to the secretive 'Masonic Lodge' type underbelly of Yorkshire society.

And my, was it a revelation? Once we were past the unassuming foyer, we entered a dimly-lit, but huge auditorium, the focal point of which was a giant screen above a stage. I surveyed the scene: There were hundreds (if not thousands) of grey-haired women occupying a plethora of tiny bingo tables as far as the eye could see.

They were all silently, yet intently staring at the screens in front of them (oh, yeh, bingo has gone high-tech). A man seated to the left of the stage was hypnotically reading out one number after another, whilst the bingo warriers kept on top of their game by quickly touching the screen after each calling. These women were digital athletes in comfy slacks. After years of intensive bingo playing, their index fingers could probably lift a truck off a prostrate child.

Anyway, enough of the bingo warriers, what about the game itself? My first shock was the cost. To play the bare minimum of games you had to spend £24.00 ($37.44 USD), and I chose that option because I am tight. However, the vast majority of other people also bought the optional games, spending a minimum of £48.00 ($74.87 USD). WTF?!

 Pic.No.1. Gary and Gaynor playing bingo. Don't talk (ever) whilst a game is in progress. This is serious shit

 Pic.No.2. Sarah and Louise. They wouldn't sit next to me because they said I 'stood out' and 'talked too loud'

Pic.No.3. Look! It's me playing bingo like a native

Not only were people spending £48.00 on their bingo games, but the whole environment was contrived to extricate even more money from the hapless victims by making sure that they didn't need to leave the building for any reason. It was like a little world inside a world had been created. It had food halls, bars, and soft drink counters .... all with uniformly dim lighting. Signs on the walls instructed visitors: "Only food bought on the premises may be consumed here."

Even the smoking area had bingo machines installed to ensure that people could keep on spending even though they were away from their touch screens. It was marketing genius.

So did any of us win? Nope. Between us we had spent a King's ransom, and hadn't had a nugget in return. But hey, I was now a member of the Gala Bingo fraternity, so what did it matter? I was 'in' there.

Pic.No.4. Yeh dude. That's my Gala Bingo Card. Sorry, you aren't in the gang

P.S. After the event, I was reflecting upon my bingo experience with Sarah. "You don't need any talent at all to play bingo do you?" I asked.

"You're missing the point," she said, "it's all about the excitement of winning."

Maybe I would have appreciated it more if any of us had won something, but I came away thinking it was a bloody weird pastime. You give someone £24.00. You spend 4 hours touching numbers on a screen, and then you go home poor. Weird as.