Blocks of four
Starting at the break, the dealer takes the next block of four tiles (two stacks), then each player in turn takes a block of four, going round three times. Everyone now has twelve tiles. Then each player takes one more tile, and the dealer takes an extra one — often by "jumping" to take the top tile from a stack further along.
East ends up with fourteen tiles and everyone else with thirteen. East starts the play by discarding, so no initial draw is needed.
Arranging your hand
Each player stands their tiles up in a row facing themselves. Most people sort by suit and number, with honours to one side, although experienced players sometimes avoid neat sorting so that opponents cannot guess anything from where tiles are placed.
In Chinese styles, any flowers or seasons are now set aside face up and replaced from the dead wall, starting with East. Replacement tiles that are also flowers are set aside and replaced again.
The Charleston in American play
American Mah Jongg adds a stage before play starts: the Charleston, a series of tile exchanges in which players pass three tiles to the right, across and left, optionally followed by a second round and a courtesy pass. It lets players reshape their hands toward a card hand.
Chinese and Japanese styles have no Charleston. Play begins immediately after the deal and flower replacements.
Common dealing mistakes
The most common errors are miscounting blocks and taking tiles from the wrong end. If a player ends up with the wrong number of tiles, most rule sets declare their hand dead — they keep playing tiles but cannot win — or require a redeal if the mistake is caught before play. Count to thirteen before your first discard.
