J-Wednesdays 水曜日だ！: Chihayafuru, Hyakunin Isshu & Karuta

Chihayafuru, as anime lovers (or casual fans who watch it, whatever) know, is an anime and manga series which is all about high school students who play Kyougi Karuta or Competitive Karuta. First of all, what the hell is Karuta? It came from the Portuguese word, "carta" which means card, and then "Japanized" hence Ka-ru-ta. Karuta is a set of cards wherein poems are printed. These poems are from a Japanese poet's (Fujiwara no Teika) collection of a hundred poems from a hundred poets, Ogura Hyakunin Isshu. All of the poems in Hyakunin Isshu are called Waka (literally poems) but are also called Tanka (literally short poems) these days since there are many kinds of Waka. The Waka's in Hyakunin Isshu have a 5-7-5-7-7 syllable pattern. If you're familiar with Haiku, then Waka is a quite longer and older version of it. Here's an example of a Waka:

なにわずに　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　Naniwa-zu ni

さくやこのはな                                                                Sakuya kono hana

ふゆごもり                                                                        Fuyu gomori

いまをはるべと                                                                Ima wo haru beto

さくやこのはな　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　Sakuya kono hana

"In Naniwa Bay, now the flowers are blossoming. After lying dormant all winter, now the spring has come and those flowers are blossoming." (I got the translation from here.)

This poem is used in competitive karuta, although it is not part of the Hyakunin Isshu. It is the official opening poem or Joka in competitive karuta. An opening poem is recited to signal the start of the game. If you watch Chihayafuru, you'll be able to get used to or even memorize this poem because of its repetitive occurrence in every episode. Moving on, competitive karuta is played by two people going against each other and attempting to take the displayed cards according to what is recited. For instance,

(Screen cap from Chihayafuru 2, Episode 5. This is a competitive karuta played in a group against another group. First group to have 3 individual wins, wins.)

The reader (the man in white, top left corner), recites the opening poem. The reader's copy of cards are the Yomifuda, which is the complete copy of the poem. When a card is recited, the players will attempt to take the card corresponding to the recited card. Here's the catch: the player's copy of the cards are the Torifuda, which only has the last two lines (7-7) from the poem. What the players must do is to memorize the cards and try to anticipate which poem is being recited for them to actually take the card. This game requires players (serious ones that is) to memorize all 100 poems and to actually remember where they positioned their cards in the game "field."

In Chihayafuru, there are players who actually love karuta because of the beautiful images that they get from the poems themselves.

It is understandable and makes more sense that people who love poems are also in love with the story they tell. However, there are also those players in Chihayafuru who are born as karuta prodigies, which means that they actually have the talent in playing great competitive karuta. The lead in Chihayafuru, Chihaya, is however a competitive karuta player who have grown to love karuta and gained skills through practice. In this anime, there are many kinds of people being represented and I can say that they do not only exist in the karuta world, but also in our regular, or even real world. There are those who have talent, those who practice to gain skills, those who try things just to find out where their talent lies, and those who are passionate enough to translate that passion into skill.

In this post, I have talked about many things that surrounds the main topic: Chihayafuru. This anime is not only there for entertainment, or for anime lovers to watch. It is an anime series worth watching especially if one wants to learn about Japanese culture. It tackles the world of competitive karuta, which not only is a game, but a product of the Japanese people's appreciation of great poetry by legendary poets of their time. Most certainly, it also has the capacity to encourage the audience in doing their best in whatever they do, like the main character, Chihaya.

To end this post, here's a poem by Ariwara no Narihira, also from the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu and is the basis poem of the anime series, Chihayafuru.

ちはやぶる　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　Chihayaburu

かみよもきかず                                                                Kamiyo mo kikazu

たつたがわ                                                                        Tatsuta-gawa

からくれないに                                                                Kara kurenai ni

みずくくるとは                                                                Mizu kukuru to wa

"Even when the gods 
Held sway in the ancient days, 
I have never heard 
That water gleamed with autumn red 
As it does in Tatta's stream"

(I got this translation from here.)

おわり。