Gotta Catch 'Em All!™

If I think back to my elementary school days, one of the few things I can recall with any amount of precision is riding the school bus. This is strange, of course, because the school bus was merely the vessel that took us to and from school. But this also makes perfect sense in a way; while we moved from one classroom to another as the years progressed, it was the school bus where our progress as students, nay, as human beings, was really made manifest. Some of you may even be able to recall your maiden voyage as a first grader; with a new backpack still smelling of vinyl strapped to your back and a Ninja Turtles lunchbox trapped in the grip of your tightly-clenched fist, you cautiously descended into the belly of the yellow beast. While those of us with less than total recall might have forgotten this rite of passage, most will at least remember the feeling of sitting in the front of the bus and jealously eying those kids in the very back who seemed impossibly tall and unattainably cool: the 5th graders.

Though it once seemed unthinkable, as sure as the sun rises and sets, you would progressively work your way towards the back of the bus as the years progressed. And one fall day, as dictated by the tradition handed down from bus-riders of years past, you would step onto the bus and claim your rightful place in the back. Perhaps you looked out over your fiefdom from back there, all those kids running about wearing backpacks as big as themselves. Things used to be so much simpler, didn’t they? You, on the other hand, had plenty to worry about: making signs to offend passing motorists, the “silent witness” behavior-monitoring camera, that French exchange student a few seats up that you were crushing on.

So where am I going with all of this? Well, most Japanese children don’t ride buses. They usually attend local schools and the vast majority of them simply walk there. With no school bus to enforce the social hierarchy, you might think that Japanese elementary schoolers have no yardstick against which to measure their progress. However, this is not the case.

One rite of passage that I have been lucky enough to observe is the elementary school karuta tournament. Generally held once a year at many elementary schools, the tournament is one of relatively few events that brings together students from all grade levels. The first graders often train for weeks in advance, approaching their first match with a mix of apprehension and excitement. As they grow older, they also grow more confident in their abilities until they have at last mastered the game by the time of their bittersweet final tournament.

At this point you’re probably wondering, what is karuta anyway? Well, dear reader, move in a little closer and I’ll tell you. Karuta is, essentially, a card-matching game. It is said that in its original form it was played with shells but when the Portuguese introduced playing cards to Japan in the 17th century, karuta was quickly translated into the more affordable medium, which did a great deal to popularize the game. Originally, the game involved matching stanzas from classical tanka poems, as many upper-class leisure pursuits revolved around classical poetry in ye olden days.

The variant of karuta commonly played nowadays is much simpler and requires far less outside knowledge. Known as iroha karuta, it involves matching the first syllable of a proverb with its corresponding hiragana character. Thus, at least theoretically, anyone who can read hiragana can play. Seven year-olds and foreigners rejoice!
Here we see the torifuda, the "grabbing cards". Note that each card has a single hiragana character in the upper-right-hand corner. The illustrations on the cards correspond to the matching proverb. Many schools produce their own karuta decks and Koyuu elementary school (where I attended the tournament) is no exception. All of the proverbs and illustrations in this deck make reference to some Momoishi trademark; be it the statue of liberty or a large pumpkin that someone grew.
These are the yomifuda or "reading cards". These contain the proverbs that correspond to the characters on the torifuda.
While it's not customary to do so, at Koyuu, the torifuda cards were placed inside of a hoola hoop that the players sat around. Note that the players must sit in the formal seiza style, with their hands folded behind their back. This position seems somehow effortless for them but is painfully uncomfortable for gaijin, especially those of the over six-foot variety. It's also worth noting that they are all wearing their recess caps, perhaps to denote that they are playing rather than studying?
The announcer (in this case, one of the teachers) then reads a yomifuda card aloud...
...and after a quick survey of the cards, the fastest player reaches out and claims the correct card with his palm. As you might have guessed, the object of the game is to collect the most cards in this manner.
But what happens when two hands reach out for the same card and seemingly land on it simultaneously? At Koyuu, such quandaries were solved through the age-old method of jan ken pon (i.e. "rock, paper, scissors").
When the last card is reached, the players must hold their hands over their head until the first syllable is read. This way, everyone has a fair shot. The announcer will occasionally read out the wrong syllable, just to psyche the players out.
Personally, I was really impressed with the speed at which the older players identified and laid claim to cards-to me it seemed almost instantaneous. For that matter, even the first graders were surprisingly skilled. For example, I played one match with a circle of first graders. The winner of the match grabbed 16 cards. I ended up with two. The difference isn't in their ability to read hiragana (trust me, I teach them and I know that their literacy level is about the same as mine) but in their familiarity with the proverbs. To be fair, they also had a lot of practice whereas I first learned about the game from Okubo-San on the car ride over.
After a few rounds of playing, the best of the best eventually squared off against each other in semi-finals and then in final matches. As you can see, these matches attracted a fair number of spectators.
After it was all said and done, the winners of the tournament were presented to their peers and announced their name, grade and class number. Then, the principal of the school made a speech. He thanked me for attending (and presumably, for lending my local celebrity status to the event) and remarked that he hoped I had learned something about Japanese culture. He asked the first graders if they had fun playing and if they looked forward to playing again next year (only about half of them raised their hands). He then told the sixth graders that this final karuta match marked the beginning of the end of their elementary school career (as the school year here ends in March). He went on for a bit about how this was the end of one journey but the beginning of another and assured them that they were well prepared for what lie ahead. Things used to be so much simpler, didn’t they?