Hanafuda receives isle-style makeover

Hanafuda, an ancient Japanese card game that became a Hawaii favorite and faded from popularity, has been given a new look with island flair.

Back in the day, dad had one car and one job, and getting kids to football or soccer practice was not a daily necessity. TV and the internet weren’t in the equation at all. Island families gathered in the carport or porch, called by the cadence of small cards slapped on a tabletop. The cards came in a small wooden box; too tiny and stiff to deal, they were scattered and swirled around the table. Players picked their cards for a game night that could last for hours.

Brought to Hawaii by Japanese plantation workers, the aim of hanafuda was a lesson in fast thinking for kids and betting for the parents and kupuna. But island life changed, and hanafuda went the way of many family traditions.

Helen Nakano, teacher, mother and grandmother, traveled the world as the wife of a military officer. Settled in Manoa, she remembered her favorite game from small-kid days and wanted to teach her then 5-year-old granddaughter.

No one played anymore. The wooden boxes that held the cards were eaten by termites. So Nakano created the game and the instructions from memory and research.

She wrote a booklet, formed a company, Hanafuda Hawaii, and produced the cards. The revival had a short run and then faded.

Nakano did not give up. One of her passions is the Manoa Heritage Center, and looking at the history and legends of Manoa led her to think of new images: breadfruit, coconut palms, ohia lehua. After 10 years of thinking and working with her graphic designer son, Jason Nakano, the ancient Japanese game is all new, all Hawaiian and ready to grow memories for a new generation.

Changes and adjustments were made.

“I live in Hawaii but I am not Hawaiian, so I consulted respected leaders in the Hawaiian community,” Nakano says. Maile Meyer of Na Mea Hawai‘i; kapa practitioner Manu Meyer; Kaiulani de Silva; ‘Anela Iwane from Hawaiian charter schools; Kaholo Daguman, a farmer from Laupahoehoe, and others assisted in the finished product: Hanafuda/Na Pua Hawai‘i.

Maile Meyer applauded the new product, saying, “The changes keep a cultural gem alive.”

According to Jason Nakano, “We went through 14 versions of the cards before we settled on our final results.” The cards include suites of endemic plants, including ohia lehua, ilima, iliahi, limu and hapuu, as well as suites of canoe plants: hala, kalo, ki, ulu and kukui. Cards also illustrate birds, ocean life and objects, including the iwa, pueo, aama, ulua, pulelehua, ilio, puaa, kapa, pahu and kii pohaku. The art is so attractive that individual prints will be available at the Louis Pohl Gallery.

Teachers for the game include Nakano’s bank teller, childhood friends and neighbors. Charlie Chong, a Hawaiian-Chinese man, grew up in Ewa. He remembers family and neighbors playing the game for hours. Now retired, Chong is one of Nakano’s first instructors.

“I know that we identified the cards not by the Japanese names, but by the pictures on the cards. Our neighbors had different versions depending on if they were Hawaiian, Korean, Japanese, Chinese or haole,” Chong says. “Like trumps, hanafuda is a matching game that requires quick recognition. … It keeps the brain working.”

Hanafuda/Na Pua Hawai‘i premiered July 9 with classes and demonstration games at Louis Pohl Gallery and Na Mea Hawai‘i. The cards are available at gift shops across the state.