Normally, the actual purpose of gambling is to serve as a form or entertainment and fun, and according to how you defined a hobby, what it does is to provide entertainment and fun, since it's something a person's enjoy to do, because if something doesn't thrill you, then I see no reason why you'll enjoy doing that thing. I have a friend from school who's a chef, she loves and enjoys cooking more than every other thing, so whenever she's bored she just enters her kitchen and start cooking, She'll cook variety of dishes and then she'll call us to come over to her place and then she'll serve the meal to us because she can't eat them all and she can't waste em so she'll serve all the food to us. That's her own definition of fun. But you can call someone else to cook and the person will, the person might see it as a big deal because the person is not thrilled by cooking but view it a stressful.
So the fact many people have developed this huge misconception about gambling by looking at it as a way to make money, doesn't mean there ain't people who consider gambling as a thrilling event.