TABU  has rules but it seems than only the competitive amongst us take them seriously.
When beaten fairly and squarely  in scrabble by Bev ( my long suffering wife ),l go into a period of irreversible mourning. Somehow winning still seems more important than playing.If you are fortunate to be driven to play by the rules then this game is heaven sent..why be nice when its so much more fun being a cad...l love that word...so understated!
So you can understand that my greater struggle was not the ltalian,that was challenging enough, but to coax my troubled male ego aside.
It goes like this.
 You are given a printed card with the answer eg CUCCHIAIO (table spoon) and 4 words included below it that you must NOT  use ( that's the taboo bit cause then its a giveaway and no real teasing) eg metal,meals, cutlery, soup. and the rest of the class have to see if they can take the right path to the answer. No deception, or red herrings by clever clogs with the answer in his  (her) hand,  but no point in being generous either. Cucchiaio was dispensed with faster than even Uri Geller could lick a fork.. Keener than mustard are we in Intermediate II!
The class was stumped with (sleepwaker) SONNAMBULO, but l did try to make it accessible...lots of laughs; in this business anything that helps you to remember, Use it. The only trouble is, when would you?
But the best game of all had to do with sounds, and here there was a stroke of genius, because it revealed so much about ourselves, and had our delightful teacher beaming from ear to rear or was it  ear to ear but either way she loved it. The game goes like this.
A series of sounds are played and as they are come, one by one we have to construct a story all in Italian that holds together; if we don't know the word we are helped out but not with the story outline.
The sounds were - Car revving -Tapping sound - Sawing sound - Chain links rattling?  Ours as you will read  is one for psychiatrists to burn themselves out on,and l expect social anthropologists to opt for early retirement citing our piece as the reason.
This is what we came up with, and for my Italian scholars,  the first account is for you .....the rest who make up the greater majority, the English follows.