Worlds Biggest Bingo Game?

Thousands of Colombians gathered at Simon Bolivar’s Park in Bogota on Saturday to participate in the second edition of the “world’s largest bingo game”, hoping to leap into the record books again as they did last year.

The game was organized by Exito, the country’s biggest supermarket chain.

In December 2006, the Exito store won the Guinness World Record for the largest online bingo game after succeeding to bring together some 70,080 participants.

Officials were yet to confirm whether this year’s attempt made a new world record.

“We won the Guinness World Record for the world’s largest game of bingo, beating the city of Los Angeles (United States), and tonight we are going to give that Guinness World Record to the city of Bogota (again),” said Jorge Jaller, an Exito store representative.

The event took place at 5:00 pm local time (17:00 ET) and saw dozens of Colombians return home happy with their Christmas gifts after more than 500 million pesos (about 250 thousand US dollars) were divided among the winners.

“I came here to have fun but I never thought of winning 50 million pesos, (about 25 thousand US dollars)” said Nelson Sandoval, one of the Bingo winners.

Appliances, vehicles and apartments were given away as gifts as well as bonuses to spend in Exito stores.

The bingo game finished with a display of fireworks.