Lee TaiTai’s House Rules — One game. Two eyes. Three suits. Four legs.
麻雀 · a field guide to the family table
Mahjong, explained the way it was always meant to be: by someone who loves you but will absolutely take your money.
The curriculum
Seven short chapters. Read them in order, or don’t — TaiTai probably isn’t your real auntie.
01
The Big Picture
What mahjong actually is and what you're trying to build.
02
Meet the Tiles
All 144 of them: three suits, four winds, three dragons, and eight bonus flowers.
03
Setting the Table
Seats, winds, the sacred wall-washing racket, and how 144 tiles become four hands.
04
How a Turn Works
Draw, discard, and the ways you can take tiles from the pot. Also: kongs, flowers, and why speed is a love language.
05
Winning, and Declaring It
Calling, sik wu, Zi-Mo: the states of grace. Plus the waits you'll live in, the false win that lives in infamy, and the famous hands that break the rules.
06
Scoring, a.k.a. The Money Math
Points, the doubling ladder, who pays what and when they pay double, and the hands worth bragging about.
07
The Lee House Rules
The constitution. Ratified by decades of Friday nights.
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Actually learnable
Every rule in plain English, every tile drawn out, every term with its Cantonese. You’ll be losing gracefully by Friday.
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One ruleset, no asterisks
This is exactly how the Lee table plays.
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Pull up a chair
Grew up hearing the tiles clack through the wall but nobody taught you? Finally, this site is your seat at the table.