Playing Hanafuda With The Hand You're Dealt
As a fourth-generation Japanese American, photographer Will Matsuda tries to unpack some of the liminal spaces of cultural identity in America. He grew up playing hanafuda, a Japanese card game.
At her home in Honolulu, our grandmother hovered above us, inspecting our cards: illustrations of wisteria, chrysanthemum, cherry and plum blossoms and, if we were lucky, a crane perched among pine branches. My cousins and I were playing a 200-year-old Japanese card game called hanafuda, which translates to "flower cards."
