Bad ideas: Challenging a US college grad to beer-pong

A bar I was in recently here in Da Nang had an event of sorts that I was unaware of until it was already going on around me. It was a newer place and me and my friends thought we would go by to check it out.

Unfortunately, I don't think this place is going to make it because they are basically just a carbon-copy of all the other places in the area and they don't really have an identity. Basically there isn't much of a unique reason to go there and while the staff try as best as they can they also don't have the friendliness "edge" that other places have.

During their events which included a DJ... and I hate DJ's at small venues because they always seem to think that REALLY LOUD = good, they also went around and asked all the foreigners in attendance if they would like to be challenged by their staff to a game called "beer pong that is like ping pong but with beer"

I listened intently to their description of the game as if I had never heard of it although I am pretty sure that my generation of Americans or the one that came before was probably very instrumental in the reasoning behind why this bar sport even exists at all. I played this game A LOT when I was in college and this wasn't even that long ago.

I entered the game against a staff member who probably consumes considerably less beer than I do anyway, and I don't know if he was feeling lucky but that all disappeared pretty quick.

The way the game works is that two opponents (or more) stand at opposite ends of the ping pong table and aim for a pyramid of plastic cups that have a bit of beer in them. If the ball lands in the cup, the person on that side of the table has to chug the beer and the cup is removed. This continues until one side no longer has any cups remaining and then that side has to also drink the cups that remain on your end.

The first guy that I played, well, I sandbagged a bit at the start because it was pretty evident that he was not good at this and I didn't want to punish him since he likely didn't "sign up for this shit" anyway.

I only defeated him with 2 cups remaining and pretended as though it was just beginner's luck. The second opponent was not so fortunate because that is when I actually started trying.

In the second game I cleared my opponent's cups one after the other - i missed a few times and not on purpose - I still had 6 of my own 10 cups remaining and he had a very big task ahead of him.

Unlike my opponents I was arrogantly drinking beer from my own bottle, not just the cups on the table, as we played the game as well. I wasn't trying to psyche them out or anything, but that's just how I am.

The idea behind the game was that if you lose, you have to pay for the beers involved in the game - which was only 100,000 VND or around $4. If you win, you pay nothing.

After 2 games I hadn't spent any money at all and also "gave up the table" to other people. I could tell that the crowd didn't want to play against me just like people sometimes don't want to play the guy that is really good at pool in order to "own" the table.

It was a fun night but after I was done I told the manageress that if they do this in the future that they should be very afraid of Americans between the ages of 20-50 because there is a very good chance that not only are they familiar with the game but they are probably also very good at it, especially if they went to college.