A digging stick cuts into wet sand, working loose a track to a jingle repeated with each turn. Nearby, pebbles rise and fall in a child's palm, one tossed into the air and caught before it lands. A flat stone skids across sections marked in the dirt, the last one named for the sky. Two koa sticks are set into a shallow hole, one flipped and struck to see how far it will travel. Somewhere close by, a handful of small balls rises and falls between two hands, kept moving without a drop.
Kahua Kōi
Andrews defines kahua as "an open space proper for an encampment; a camp ground," and kōi as "the name of a play; a sort of race in sliding."
Pukui describes it as a sliding game in which children used sticks to dig into the earth or sand while repeating a jingle.
Kimokimo
Andrews defines kimokimo as "to seize something while in motion."
Pukui describes it as "a game similar to jacks; a stone is tossed into the air by the player, who quickly picks another off the ground before he catches the other; to play kimo, the player often chanted."
Culin describes kimokimo as played by two or more players with a number of poloku, or small pebbles. Each player had his own aliʻi, or chief stone. The pebbles belonging to all the players were set on the ground. A player began by throwing his stone, picking up the others, tossing them, and catching them all together. The player continued until he missed. This game was almost identical with the game of jackstones played by children in North America.
Pukui's Own Account of Her Childhood
Up to the time she was seven years old, Pukui saw kimo played by her own kinsfolk. It was played with pebbles, one stone in the player's hand called the kimo and the stones to be picked up from the ground, the ai, or "food." Two or more players sit facing each other with as many pebbles as desired in front of them. Each player chooses his kimo, tosses it into the air, picks up a pebble from the ground, and catches the kimo as it falls. If he fails to do so, or to pick up one from the "food" pile, the next player takes his turn. The ai picked up becomes the property of the player. The game goes on until no ai remain. The other players then lay their kimo in front the last player, who chants:
Papaʻi e, Papaikou — It is touched (papaʻi), Papaikou
I helu aku au, ekolu pauku O Kioloku — Let me count the three sections of Kioloku,
Ke awanui e o Keakeke — The wide entrance of Keakeke,
Ke kolohia la i Kaʻalaiki — Creeping swiftly to Kaʻalaiki
Ninole, Wailau, Makanau — Ninole, Wailau, Makanau
Lilo i kai, e, paʻa iuka e, E-o! — Taken seaward, caught landward, I win!
The player must toss his kimo, touch that of his opponent in time to his chanting, and at the word "E-o!" pick up and catch his own kimo. If he misses, he lays down his kimo for his opponent to "touch" and chant over.
The Legend
A legend is told of two rock masses on Paula beach in Kaʻū district on the island of Hawaiʻi. The masses of rock are the transformed bodies of Paula, a beautiful girl, and the lover of Pele, the volcano goddess. Pele found the couple absorbed in a game of kimo and in a rage changed them into rock. Between them still lie the small stones with which they were playing.
Kino A
Andrews defines kino as "a person; an individual, one's self," and a as "a connection with motion."
A player hopped on one foot and kicked a flat stone into sections, in a certain order. The ending section was called lani, meaning sky or heaven. The sections on each side were called pepeiao, or "ear."
Kiola o Lāʻau
Andrews defines kiola as "to lay down a substance for inspection," o as "to thrust," and lāʻau as "a general name for what grew out of the ground; wood, timber."
Kiola o lāʻau, or stick-casting, was played with two sticks made of koa wood. The first stick, about six inches long, was called lāʻau pokole, or "short stick." The second, longer stick was called lāʻau hili, or "striking stick," also lāʻau lōʻihi, "long stick."
The short stick is placed so that its ends rest on a small hole. The player then places the long stick in the hole under the short stick, flips the short stick in the air, and strikes it as far as possible. The distance is measured with the bat, from the hole to where the short stick lands. The player who first reaches a hundred bat-lengths wins.
Kīolaola
Pukui defines kīolaola as "tossing back and forth or up and down, as in juggling."
Culin states that many times a person kept three small balls going in the air at the same time.
Speaking of kīolaola, the game with a ball of green leaves, Captain King wrote:
They are no less expert at another game of the same nature, tossing up in the air and catching in their turn a number of these balls; so that we frequently saw little children thus keep in motion five at a time. With this latter play the young people likewise divert themselves at the Friendly Islands.
Games like these are collected in the Hawaiian Games Coloring Book, ten Hawaiian games and nineteen coloring pages.
Makahiki Games
Sources
Andrews, Lorrin. A Dictionary of the Hawaiian Language. Tokyo, Japan: Charles E. Tuttle Co. 1974.
Culin, Stewart. "Hawaiian Games," American Anthropologist. Volume 1, Number 2, (April, 1899)
Fukui, Kawena. "Games of My Childhood," California Folklore Quarterly. Volume 2, Number 3, July 1943
Pukui, Mary K. and S. Elbert. Hawaiian Dictionary: Hawaiian English-English Hawaiian. 1st. Edition. Honolulu: University Press of Hawaii. 1971.