Tiaoban
Also known as seesaw diving, tiaoban requires prodigious balance and bravery. The two participants (often women) mount a wooden springboard on a pivot like a seesaw, and take their places at either end. The fi rst player jumps down, launching her opponent on the opposite side skyward. The airborne player then spins or back-flips before landing on the seesaw and sending her rival in the air. The players go higher and higher with each rebound, trying to out-do the other and win the crowd’s approval. The contests usually are held during the Dragon Boat Festival.

Firework catching
Imagine: instead of mum telling you to stay away from lit fireworks, she encourages you to get right under and catch them for this team sport. A small iron ring swaddled in red ribbon is attached to a firework and shot over the playing field. Two eight-member sides then rush out to grab it and throw it to their teammates — without it being intercepted — as they make for a basket at the field’s end. Once a team scores a point, another firework is launched and the scrum begins anew. The game is played in two 20-minute halves.

Stilt ball
Ostensibly it is similar to football, except all 10 players (five per team) are wobbling high above the ground on stilts, which they use to dribble, pass and whack the ball down the fi eld and into the opponents’ goal. Anyone whose feet touch the ground is suspended, leaving the arena to wait in the ‘penalty box’ for two minutes. In some regions of China there is a related, smaller-scale sport in which each be-stilted team is comprised of a husband and wife.

Silk-ball throwing
Played between boys and girls at harvest time, this sport goes beyond good exercise — it’s also a way to court that hottie you’ve been eyeing all season. First of all, everyone suits up in their finest threads. Players then take the field, with males lining up on one side of the fi eld and females on the other. The teams then toss silk balls back and forth, with individuals aiming for their beloved. Each ball is handmade by the females using intricate embroidery. If either side drops the ball, that entire side is required to perform a song or dance.

Basketball
It’s not the game Yao plays in the NBA, but a more literal version of the sport. The basket is just that, a woven, picnic hamper-esque receptacle, and each player carries one on his back. A bag of sand constitutes the ball. Otherwise, the rules are the same: five players per team run around and try to score by shooting the ball into the opponents’ basket (or baskets, as the case may be, with the added twist that what players are aiming for is constantly moving). Another difference: less bling and fewer sideline babes in the Chinese game.

Straw Ball
According to legend, a local fisherman brought home a good catch. But his wife complained, ‘The fish have big holes in their skin made by your spearing fork!’ So the husband practiced his aim by forking bundles of straw. The exercise morphed into a game vaguely akin to volleyball. Two three-person teams stand on a court that’s divided into eight zones. One team handserves a straw ball, to be received with a wooden fork by the other team. The side that fails to spear it withdraws to the next zone and loses one point when the ball gets dropped in the end zone.

Tug-of-war
People throughout China have been trying to yank each other over the centre line for close to 2000 years. Back then, tug-of-war was a contest between neighbouring villages. The main rope had multiple branches so up to 100 people could join in the game, fired up by the sound of beating drums. While the primal rhythms are now gone, the sport continues to be popular, not only as an exercise of strength, but also as one of team-building and group cooperation.

Yak racing
This sport is a Tibetan specialty and usually takes place during the Ongkor harvest festival. Owners adorn their shaggy bovines’ heads with red flowers and their backs with ornamented saddles. The yak jockey swings atop the animal and lets his whip fly as he urges the creature toward the finish line. While the mammoth yaks are surprisingly sure-footed, they can also be disobedient and stop in the middle of the track, refusing to budge. Less amusing to spectators is when they charge toward the audience.

Mongolian-style wrestling
Long a revered pastime in Mongolia — Genghis Khan supposedly used it to decide which soldiers to recruit and officers to promote — this theatrical style of wrestling takes place outdoors on a grassy field. The contestants enter wearing leather boots, necklaces of silk ribbons and cowhide waistcoats. They start by performing a dance that imitates a fierce animal such as a tiger or eagle. Then the smackdown ensues. There are no weight classes or time limits, just man against man throwing, tripping and lifting until one gets the other to touch the ground with any body part other than his feet.

Dragon-boat racing
Dragon boats are — get this — boats carved and painted to look like dragons. About 20m long with the front resembling the beast’s fiery open mouth and the rear shaped like its scaly tail, the bold-coloured vessels hit the water during the annual Dragon Boat Festival, an event held across China on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month. Teams of 20 or more paddlers, including a gong beater and a drummer, send each boat slicing through the waves spurred by the rhythmical beating. Zong zi, the festival’s traditional gooey rice-ball snack, provides the oarsfolks’ power.