Heyang: Hello, everyone! Welcome to RoundTable's Word of the Week. This week, John and myself Heyang are going to talk about playing cards.
John: Yeah, and we're just talking about cards, we will look at a specific card game called poker. Because usually in Chinese, when you guys refer to cards, you use the Chinese term “撲克牌”. But actually, poker is a very very specific type of game that we play. So we'd be looking at some of the suits, and we'll be looking at how to play poker.
Heyang: 在英語和中文有一個小小的矛盾就是我們說的紙牌并不是老外說的poker，紙牌是cards，是總體的一個大的一個類別， poker是其中的一項游戲。

John: Exactly, and so first, take a look at the type of suits. There is the diamond.
Heyang: 方片兒。
John: There is the heart.
Heyang: 一顆紅心。
John: There is the club.
Heyang: 草花或梅花。
John: And there is the spade.
Heyang: 黑桃。
John: There you go, so it's actually very very simple. Let's take a look then at poker, so poker actually has many different types of variations. There are actually many different ways to play poker. Right now, the most popular way to play poker, if you watch it on the TV like the World's Series of Poker, and things like that, is Texas Hold'em. But bottom line for any poker game, you basically have five cards and you want to make the best hand possible out of those five cards in order to win. It does get a bit more complicated than that, but for our purposes here we're just going to try to keep it simple.
Heyang: 在世界上，最受歡迎的撲克牌游戲應該是得克薩斯撲克。
John: Exactly, so we are going to look at what types of hands that you can make in poker, which one's are the worst, which one's are the best. So we are going to start from the bottom and work our way up. The lowest hand, the worst hand you can have and still win, is called 'you have a high card.' You have the highest card out of everyone else.
Heyang: 所謂的“高牌”，由單牌不連續且不連花的牌來組成。
John: There is 'one pair.'
Heyang: 比高牌要強一些的就是你有一個對。
John: There is 'two pairs.' So rather than having one pair, you in fact have two. It can be two pairs of anything.
Heyang: 就是你有兩個對。
John: So you have to remember lots of this based upon the probability of getting these cards. So, the lower the hand, the higher probability, right. So actually you have a lower probability of getting three of a kind, which is higher than two pairs.
Heyang: 嗯，這里其實也是一個概率統計的一個玩法。
John: Right. And there is the 'straight.' So basically one, two ,three, four, five or four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, or anything that is for one number in a series of five, all the way to the highest.
Heyang: 哦，這就是我最喜歡的“順兒”。
John: And there is 'flush.' So all five cards are of the same suits, either all diamond, all heart, all club or all spade.
Heyang: Flush就是同花，就是所有的花色都是一樣的牌。
John: And there is 'fullhouse.' This is actually one of my favorites, mostly because it's so hard to get. And a 'fullhouse' is one pair plus three of a kind.
Heyang: Fullhouse就叫“滿堂紅”。It sounds so hard to get.
John: It's actually very difficult. But even more difficult is the 'four-of-a-kind.' Now we're getting into the area where it's actually very very rare to see this type of hands. Once you get pass the 'fullhouse,' it's very difficult. There is 'four-of-a- kind,' so you have to remember there's only four cards of one number in each deck. So 'four-of-a- kind', somehow you'd been able to get all four cards of the same number.
Heyang: 現在我們進入大神級別的玩法了。
John: And even more difficult, I honestly have never even seen one of these whenever I play poker. It's a 'straight-flush,' so it's two, three, four, five, six all of the same suit.
Heyang: 那就是“同花順”。Is there anything even better than this?
John: Oh, there is actually. And I'd never seen this either. This is like, you know, the white whale of poker hands. It's the 'royal-flush.' It's ten, Jack, Queen, King, Ace.
Heyang: 這就是終極的同花大順，最高為Ace，也就是一點的同花順。
John: Exactly. So they're very very difficult. I think it's important just to point out very quickly, you know, in many Chinese card games used two decks. In poker, you're only ever going to use one deck when you are playing. That's why 'four-of-a-kind' is very difficult because it's going to be four of each number.
Heyang: 在中國，我們玩牌常常使用的是兩副牌。
John: One of the interesting things about Texas Hold'em, again it's a variation on poker. It's that normally when you are playing poker, there's an ante. And in most card games, if you got Los Vegas for example, there is going to be an ante. An ante is basically what you have to pay, to play. Texas Hold'em is a little bit different because you have the ideas of the blinds. There's the small blind and big blind. Only two people have to put this in and this happens before you get your cards. That's why it's called a blind.
Heyang：賭注呢叫ante。
John: Before the game's starts, to determine what the blind is, let's just say it's a dollar. And so the big blind puts a dollar before they see the cards. The small blind puts in half of that. So that's 50 cents and goes from there. Again unfortunately, I don't think we have enough time to really going into how you play Texas Hold'em, but certainly, if you get a chance to play, you'll very quickly realize why it's the most popular.