Mah jongg in Minnesota

Minnesota plays a great deal more mah jongg than most Minnesotans realize. There are games in church basements and JCC lounges, in brewery back rooms and library meeting rooms, in living rooms that have hosted the same four women every Thursday for thirty years. Here is how to find one — and what to do if there is nothing near you.

Lessons in southeastern Minnesota

I live in Rochester, and lessons here are taught by Karen Weathersbee, who trained under me and teaches my curricula. We cover complete beginners through tournament players, in homes and community rooms, and we travel across Olmsted, Dodge, Fillmore, Wabasha and Goodhue counties — Byron, Stewartville, Kasson, Chatfield, Eyota, Pine Island, Oronoco, Zumbrota, Plainview and Mantorville, with Owatonna, Austin, Albert Lea, Faribault, Northfield, Red Wing and Winona all within reach.

Full details, courses and booking: mahjong lessons in Rochester, Minnesota.

Elsewhere in the state

The Twin Cities have the densest cluster of games in Minnesota — JCC programs, senior centers, and a good many private groups that never advertise because they have never needed to. Duluth, St. Cloud, Mankato and Rochester all have activity, and the smaller towns are where the surprises are: a standing Thursday game in a town of nine hundred is not unusual at all.

If you would like me to point you at whatever is nearest, write to DottiesMahj@gmail.com with your town. I keep track of the registered leagues, and every one of them keeps a teaching table warm for beginners. There is no charge for asking and never will be.

If there is no game near you

Then you may be three friends away from being a founder, dear — and I mean that literally, because four is the whole requirement. The League Builder Kit walks you from four players to a published season: standings, playoffs, the banquet, the lot. Registering your league with me is free, forever, and it means the next woman in your town who goes looking will find you.

Learning at a distance

If you are in Bemidji or Worthington or anywhere else a long way from Rochester, we teach by video, and it works far better than people expect. You will want a set or a printed practice set — we will send you one.

Which mah jongg is played in Minnesota?

Almost universally the American game: jokers, and the annual card of legal hands published by the National Mah Jongg League, which changes every spring. That is what I teach and what my guides are written for. If you learned the Chinese or Japanese game, you will find the tiles familiar and the rules genuinely different — and you will pick it up quickly.

Also worth reading: the strategy library, and the Dottie's Mahj Community.