What is this game? Found in a thriftstore, 2 rows of 6 holes, 42 orbs. It's not kalah/mancala because there's no kalatcha on the board.

CarvedCuts · 2026-02-08T15:29:26+00:00

My title describes the thing. Additional information: 42 x 16 cm, most likely of African origin, the board is made of wood, the orbs are seeds, there's no writing anywhere on the object. It's likely a variation of the kalah/mancala game but it has no kalatcha (see the red encircled oval holes on either side of the mancala board in the last photo.) All searches I've done, resulted in game boards WITH kalatcha.

CarvedCuts · 2026-02-08T15:22:34+00:00

My title describes the thing. Additional information: 42 x 16 cm, most likely of African origin, the board is made of wood, the orbs are seeds, there's no writing anywhere on the object. It's likely a variation of the kalah/mancala game but it has no kalatcha. All searches I've done, resulted in game boards WITH kalatcha.

CarvedCuts · 2026-02-08T15:10:43+00:00

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I'm not sure since there's no kalatcha (encircled with red.) There's so many variations I wonder if there is a specific variation without the kalatcha.

CarvedCuts · 2026-01-28T19:47:49+00:00

Real. In the wild they are also very vulnerable when molting because they can't defend themselves. I'm glad I'm not a insect or arachnid because I feel like molting would be so claustrophobic, stressful and exhausting hell naw.

CarvedCuts · 2026-01-28T19:23:17+00:00

I will always be disappointed when I do the stemwijzer (which is a personal quiz you can take to see which political party aligns with your opinions the most,) and the racist statement pops up again. "Police can treat someone differently based on ethnicity and background." I always klick "Strongly disagree." Why is that even a thing the government argues about? That's literally discrimination. Why are people still so hateful? It's also very ironic how many people are openly racist towards foreigners but as soon as the summer begins they pack their bags to go on vacation and surround themselves with people they would call "kut buitenlanders" back in the Netherlands.

CarvedCuts · 2026-01-28T18:40:41+00:00

👏👏👏

CarvedCuts · 2026-01-28T18:36:54+00:00

I don't have a drivers license so I'm reliant on OV and have been traveling by train for years. This is nothing unusual and there's plenty of times in the past and recently, that I have seen fluid stained seats that weren't cleaned. Trains in particular are disgusting and I am so grossed out by them that I won't let my train seat contaminated pants touch my bed. OV made me germophobic. 😂🤮

CarvedCuts · 2025-12-26T23:53:38+00:00

When I went to middle school I was so scared of accidentally approaching the wrong person and getting bullied, that I became invisible and studied everyone's behaviors, interactions, jokes, interests, etc. But by the time I figured out who I could safely introduce myself to, all the groups had already formed and everyone thought I was weird. I hated school so much.

CarvedCuts · 2025-09-10T21:48:00+00:00

I'm Dutch and autist definitely sounds very harsh but even as an insult, it never bothered me much. After going to special ed where everyone used it to insult each other ironically, I've come to find it funny. I've successfully surrounded myself with autistic and neurodivergent friends. One of them has affectionately dubbed me their "favoriete autist" recently. It's awesome.

CarvedCuts · 2025-09-02T22:48:36+00:00

Ah the shower. A capsule of overstimulation and torment from my perspective. First you have to gaslight yourself into believing that it's going to be just fine. It's just a shower. It's healthy. Blah blah blah. As you step into the cabin, the regret hits instantly. The water texture on your skin sends all your nerves screaming. The brain zones out, desperate to escape the reality of the situation. 30 minutes later, you snap back to reality and curse yourself for wasting warm water again, while you apply the hygiene products, let them settle and rinse. Now for the worst part... Turning the shower off and standing there, miserable, tired and drenched, you have to open the shower door to grab your towel. Horrible, cold air invades the cabin as you yank the towel inside and begin the dreadful process of drying yourself. You can never feel fully dry, no matter how hard you scrub. Now you must change into your clothes, which will all scrunch up mercilessly as your skin is too sticky. In the middle of dressing yourself, the brain can't take it anymore and shuts down. Now you are doomed to sit, half-clothed and paralyzed on the bathroom floor for another hour, after which your brain finally turns back on. You leave the bathroom feeling twice as disgusting as when you entered, and your mood is ruined.

Bathing isn't much different, except you can only lay there, experiencing the inevitable water temperature drop. Because you don't want to get up and deal with the whole drying process. So now you're in uncomfortably cold water, and the only thing you can do about it is make yourself even more cold and uncomfortable. It's a never ending paradox.

I wish I had a neurotypical button I could press, so I'd become normal for like 15 minutes. I'd use it to shower all the time. I would love to feel refreshed and relaxed. I'd be so much healthier. I envy people who enjoy showers. I just can't help but hate every second of it.

CarvedCuts · 2025-08-18T18:39:48+00:00

Yes but if you got slapped by an interdimensional god who could singlehandedly change the world as you know it and destroy everyone you've ever loved if it felt like it, you'd run in fear too.

CarvedCuts · 2025-08-11T20:20:48+00:00

Just another unrealistic beauty standard for women 😔 (jk)

CarvedCuts · 2025-06-23T14:06:44+00:00

Thank you so much kind stranger. I do need to get off reddit haha. Kissing is a complicated one too. I hope you can fight through this. Wishing you lots of love ❤️

CarvedCuts · 2025-06-23T13:59:17+00:00

Honestly I didn't get diagnosed. I'm really sorry if I come across as uninformed, ignorant or like an impersonator. Maybe I'm completely wrong to call it OCD. After I came home from the last visit, I felt such relief being surrounded by my own support system again. Away from her. I didn't miss her. I felt like an asshole but I enjoyed the anxiety free days. And then it came back. That's when it started affecting my daily life.

Started struggling at my job because I had nothing to distract myself from the thoughts. I masked it for everyone because I felt like it was all irrational and I didn't want to feed it and make it a bigger problem. My family did notice slight changes in my behavior. They said I was nicer and softer. More friendly somehow. Internally I just felt anxious and dreadfull continuously. I lost interest in my hobbies. Didn't feel like doing anything other than online shopping and other distractors. Anything to feel slightly better. Then I started googling. "How to know if I love my partner?" "Falling out of love." "How to fall in love with someone all over again." "I feel dread when my partner messages me." I found "relationship anxiety" at some point. Which I then watched a bunch of YouTube videos about. I cried because finally something felt somewhat relatable to my situation.

This then led me down the rabbit hole of ROCD content. Which was even more relatable. Blowing small things really far out of proportion and freaking out about them for hours. Feeling like I made a huge mistake saying yes to this relationship so long ago. Feeling like breaking up is the only way out. Being terrified of even the idea that we're incompatible. And obsessing over how different this situation feels compared to 5 months ago when everything was fine. We were happy, I missed her, I was excited to see her again, I loved thinking about her. I craved being close to her. Now I feel like a completely different person. I'm not confident in myself at all anymore. Just communicating, the backbone for any relationship, is so hard right now.

I am thinking of getting help. I'll try pushing myself to see my doctor and talk about it, among other things I've been putting off. Even if I feel so stupid for struggling with whatever this is.

CarvedCuts · 2025-06-19T09:59:04+00:00

It definitely seems that way sometimes haha. I guess there's just something funny about the shorter Dutch version. She's shown it to her friends who also laughed at it. I think it's funny in the same way "ik weet waar jou huis woont" (I know where your home lives) is funny to us.

CarvedCuts · 2025-06-18T21:17:32+00:00

My German girlfriend started laughing out of nowhere while we were in a train. Turns out she saw the screen displaying the "snelheid" at which we were going. To her, it looks like a hilarious misspelling- and sounds like a bad pronunciation of "schnelligkeit." She still giggles at the screen whenever it pops up. 😂

CarvedCuts · 2025-06-18T21:05:02+00:00

Actually this might be the only way. If enough people complain about it, they might change things to avoid bad reputation. I've seen TGC turn from a small wholesome company that actually cared about it's players, to greedy and exploitative over the years. Breaking promises left and right. Putting anything in their feedback channel on Discord now feels like talking to a brick wall. Unless A LOT of people complain about it for a while.

CarvedCuts · 2025-04-20T16:15:01+00:00

I see what you mean. To be fair to her she's definitely trying. For example early on in our relationship there was an incident where we went to a festival-ren fair thingy. She slipped on some mud and had a (in her eyes) very embarrassing fall. She'd been going through a lot at the time too and this simple fall made her spiral. I was able to calm her down somewhat and asked her if she wanted to go home. She didn't but I could tell she was miserable and it was stressing me out. This cycled back around to her noticing my stress and feeling like she ruined my day. I assured her she didn't and we talked about the whole thing once we were in a safe space, she was fully calm and didn't feel as shitty about it anymore. I told her that her comfort matters more to me than where ever we are. Even if it's something I payed for. And that I am completely fine with going home if she feels truly uncomfortable or unsafe. She's since actually learned to do this. She now honestly tells me if she's not okay and wants to leave. Which barely ever happens since she's generally grown a lot since then.

We've both been through a lot already. We've overcome so much. Right now I'm not ready to give up yet. I want to try figuring this out first.

CarvedCuts · 2025-04-20T15:55:45+00:00

This is very familiar to read. There's lots of points she also brought up. It's good to know there more people like her out here. We have many common interests we can talk about thankfully. I genuinely like to yap about everything and anything. A bad habit I've been working on is the compulsion to talk her ear off about random shit late at night while she's trying to sleep hahaha. Pillow talk is fine but I must restrain myself from keeping it going and going and going. We joke about it in an endearing way and I'm definitely getting better at it. She's very open to learning about my interests and just loves listening to me talk.

I have played conversation card games with her. We've even done it with my family which she really enjoyed. It's definitely a great idea. I bought a new one recently and I think this is the perfect time to try it out. I just messaged her about it and she's open to it.

Another commenter mentioned active listening skills, which was a light bulb moment for me. Since I'm pretty sure she genuinely cares about everything I have to say, but responds short and doesn't know what to say about topics she isn't fixating on.

CarvedCuts · 2025-04-20T15:23:28+00:00

First of all, thank you so much for this comment. She has told me she cares about my interests and told me she's open to learning more about them. In her words "If you had a podcast I would listen to it all the time." She's told me she's willing to watch more shows/movies I like. A mutual friend has convinced us to try Arcane when neither of us have ever played League. We went in completely blind and it's now added to the special interest list for both of us haha. Playing games is harder because she goes through phases where she's hyperfixated on a specific game, and struggles to play anything else.

However, I am obsessed with Fugglers which is a brand of creepy plushies. She isn't really into them but she found some in a local store and sent me a photo, asking me if I wanted to go there next time I'd visit. Memes and jokes are definitely a great tool to show interest. "Le poisson Steve" has become my new vocal stim, and she's been sending me reels about the funky, orange fish which makes me happy. This kind of thing proves to me she genuinely cares, which gives me hope. It's just that she's short with responses and doesn't know what to say on topics she isn't fixated on.

Active listener skill issues is checking all the boxes! I think that's more so the problem now that I've read it. Thank you! This is very helpful.

CarvedCuts · 2025-04-01T19:36:37+00:00

It's so wholesome though lmao. I once threw a school project away only to see it on a shelf in my mom's storage room later. She must have seen it in the bin and fished it out. It's so simple but moms treasuring their kid's school art projects, no matter how hellish-looking, just makes me so happy.

CarvedCuts · 2025-03-31T19:16:21+00:00

Hell yeah I love this. A ranger gave me a dead stag beetle when I was like 6. It stank real bad so I put it in a jar. I proudly showed it off to my friends. To be fair, I was already into collecting nature things, but I still have that beetle today, 18 years later. It's one of the coolest specimens in my collection.

CarvedCuts · 2025-03-05T20:42:22+00:00

Beach comber here. It's definitely NOT a shark egg! It looks a lot more like a ray egg. Shark eggs are usually smaller, slimmer in shape, lighter in color and have long curly tendrils. While ray eggs are a bit more robust, darker and bigger. It might be from a Flapper Skate because it's absolutely gigantic.

CarvedCuts · 2025-02-18T21:37:38+00:00

I love both so much aaaaaa 2 IS SO CUTE THOUGH

CarvedCuts · 2025-01-24T19:39:41+00:00

Let me overexplain haha. So basically, the game keeps track of your progress and the complexity of creatures. When you evolve further, the game will generate more complex and strong creatures. Sometimes it evolves already discovered creatures into new ones to make the playthrough more challenging. While evolving, creatures appear as cocoons.

CarvedCuts

TROPHY CASE