The devil, the drunk, the star and the skeleton: These are a handful of cards that may bring you good or bad luck in the popular bingo-style game called loteria.

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At a town fair in this small village in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero, men, women and children sit on long blue benches holding their loteria cards and hoping to win prizes ranging from a new wash tub, to a cooking pot, to a matching set of drinking glasses.

Loteria is just one of the games that unite Mexicans of all ages in public venues. In Mexico City cantinas, men play raucous games of dominoes, and soccer fields draw players and picnicking families in towns all across Mexico. There's a spirit of fun and community that you can't find playing a video game by yourself.

It loteria, the player gets a card with 16 squares; instead of numbers, it is decorated with a different figure in each square. The dealer flips a card from the top of the deck and calls out the names of the figures over a microphone. To win, the players must match four cards in a box, or diagonal, horizontal or vertical line.

Big Loteria Cards

Loteria has been a tradition in Mexico for generations and has even crossed the northern border. Many Mexican-American families in the U.S. play loteria around the kitchen table. Growing up in suburban Chicago, my family played loteria with piles of pinto beans instead of change.

Big Loteria Cards

It was one of the regular games we played along with Monopoly, Risk and Life.

I waited with anticipation as my father dealt the cards and would jump up with excitement when my favorites, the mermaid and the moon, were called. The realistic depictions of the heart and death frightened me. The cards also were a language tool. Death, world, mermaid and sun were some of the first words I learned in Spanish.

Today, the images on the cards have been turned into folk art. Colorful depictions of the skull and the sun have been framed or made into coasters and key chains in art shops from San Francisco to Chicago.

There is a mysticism to loteria, which is among the most popular traditional games in Mexico. You can even play Mexican loteria on the Internet.

In Coyuca de Benitez, players paid 5 pesos, about 50 cents, to play three cards at once. They marked the figures on their cards with used bottle caps.

Large Loteria Cards

'We've got a winner with the world,' shouted the announcer at the town fair, where more than 50 people played the game together.

Some players like, Jesus Ochoa, 13, have a favorite lucky card. This teen put his money on the sun in another variation of the game that is akin to roulette.

'I like the sun because it always wins,' Jesus said.

In this version of loteria, players put down pesos on their favorite figures decorating an oversize game card. If the dealer picks their choice within the first eight cards, each player wins 5 pesos.

But if the dealer draws the devil or the skeleton, all bets are lost.

'It's the luck of the draw,' said Dora Cabrera, 30, who has been a loteria dealer for the past four years. 'Few people win big.'

Big Wooden Loteria Cards

One of the lucky ones is Anacelia Benitez. She has won as many as eight prizes during a night of loteria.

One recent evening, Benitez, 55, won a blue pail and an aluminum washbasin. She was hoping to win a set of frying pans.

'It's a fun game. I always have a lot of luck,' Benitez said. 'I don't ever miss the town fair.'

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