- Para-balloon
Para-balloon is a tool used in
game s and a series of games around this tool. It has a parachute shape and is made of fragments of cloth in differentcolour s. It is colourful and often attracts children.Origin
An unknown Japanese visited
YMCA inUnited States on October1960 . There he saw a game that involved aparachute when he visited a town in Los Angeles. He was attracted by the game and hoped that children could play this game.He came back to Japan and tried to find that kind of parachute everywhere. He found none, new nor second-hand. He later came to know that there were many good
shoemaker s around YMCA千歲幼稚園 inKobe . He asked them to make 20 pieces and design many games for them. He named it as Para-balloon after Parachute and Ad Balloon.Use
Para-balloon is selected as the symbol of
Grasshopper Scout s fromThe Scout Association of Hong Kong . It is used to train groups of children of ages from 6 to 8. The association uses the name 快樂傘 for it in Chinese. Many schools, kindergarten, youth centres follow after success stories from Grasshopper Scouts.The para-balloon games are also adapted to help elderly people in
Hong Kong perform more physical exercise.External links
* [http://www.75scout.org/scout/training-note/10.doc Training material on para-balloon (from the Scout Association of Hong Kong)]
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