Μήλα, which is translated to apples, is a very popular game in Greece. You can play it in the schoolyard, in your garden or somewhere else with a little bit of space. It is a lot of fun and in case you have never heard of this game make sure to keep reading and try it out!

What do you need?
For this game, you need one softball. Make sure that it doesn’t hurt when you threw it at someone.

Who plays?
You need a minimum of three players (two throwers and one catcher), but, as always, it is even more fun in a bigger group.

How to play “Μήλα- Apples”
The catcher stands in the middle of the playing field and has an equal amount of throwers on each side. With three players, there are two throwers and one catcher in the middle between them with a distance of a few meters. In the beginning, every player in the middle has zero “apples”. The players on the outside (throwers) try to throw the ball and hit someone in the middle. However, the person in the middle shouldn’t be able to catch it. If one person in the middle catches the ball, the person gets one ”apple” (one life) more. Then the ball gets handed to the players on the other side and the game continues.
If one of the players in the middle doesn’t have any “apples” (lives) left, the person has to leave the field and lose. The goal as a “catcher” is to reach as many apples as possible, so you don’t leave the field with no apples.
Some extra rules make the game even more fun and interesting. If one person has enough lives, he or she can share apples with other players outside the field. The person giving some of their apples to another player loses the specific amount of apples and the player receiving them can join the game again.
There is also an option for the throwers to shout a certain number of apples he wants to offer to the standing persons in the center. The person can try to catch the ball and receives the already mentioned number of lives. If someone gets hit by the ball, he or she loses this number of lives.
By shouting “stroma” which means “blanket”, you have to roll the ball to the other side of the field and the players in the middle have to try to let the ball roll through their legs. If the ball hits one of the legs, the player loses a life.
Another special event occurs when a thrower calls “bomba” (bomb). The players in the middle have to shout “manula” and go down to the ground. In this case, the players in the middle are not allowed to catch the ball.
In the beginning, it might be easier to leave out the special rules and just play with the basic concept. This is easy to understand and you can add more and more rules while playing. Of course, you can switch catcher and thrower after each round so that everyone has the chance to play in every position.
I hope you enjoy this game and have fun playing!