Spike to behold: Traditional Japanese ball-trick game Kendama is catching on fast in Hong Kong
Accomplished Hong Kong players enjoy international success and aim to pass on their skills to other youngsters in city
Electronics and gadgets may have become hot playthings of recent years, but Smore Chan Chung-yin is swimming against the tide by excelling at the traditional Japanese toy Kendama.
Kendama is played by fitting a spike into a hole in a ball, or landing the ball on one of three cups. As well as a game, 26-year-old Chan – now a successful professional player – saw it as a test of his endurance, patience and perseverance.
In 2012, Chan and teammate Li Ho-cheung won the Kendama USA doubles championship, where entrants uploaded video edits of Kendama tricks of no more than 90 seconds.
The duo’s demonstration of stunning techniques along the promenade linking Kwun Tong and Tsim Sha Tsui beat 60 high-level players from North American, Europe and Japan.
His path to success was full of challenges and now he wants Hong Kong’s younger generation to take up the game and learn while playing. “I am used to failure,” Chan said when asked about the key to success. “The training mode helped me overcome difficulties in my teenage years.”
Chan took up Kendama, which literally means spike and ball, at the age of 16. Two years later he formed a team and established his own brand Pak Fuk Kendama.
The name came from Pak Fuk Children’s Playground in Fanling where Chan had spent years working out with teammates. “I hope one day each district can have a Kendama team to compete in a tournament that belongs to Hong Kong,” said Chan, who co-founded the Hong Kong Kendama Association last year.