A Touch of the Old Homeland

In the early morning, the dusty baseball diamond in Boyle Heights’ Evergreen Park is carefully marked off with masking tape and transformed into a field for gateball, a traditional Japanese form of croquet.

About 15 members of Eastside and downtown gateball clubs gather on the edge of the field watching the play. Traffic rushes by on 4th Street and a group of young boys scramble for a basketball on a nearby court.

But here on the dirt field, the whacks of mallets against wooden balls dominate the quiet, measured game, as players share quick exchanges in Japanese about the length of a hit.

Shielded from the sun by all types of head wear, the Japanese American gateball players are all retired, between 68 and 86 years old.

“I’m in old age--this is fit for me. There’s no running or anything like that,” said 86-year-old Jims T. Fujii, a member of the Little Tokyo Towers Club who has been playing for about 12 years.

About 200 gateball players, mostly older Japanese Americans, belong to the Southern California Gateball Assn., an organization that represents teams from Santa Monica to San Diego.

“Gateball is very popular in Japan, especially among the elderly,” said Kay Matsuda, an officer of the association. “It’s not a heavy, strenuous kind of sport. There’s a certain amount of physical exertion, but even less than golf.”

Younger people are interested in the game, said 77-year-old Dorothy Nakamura, but they have their own teams because they play at a different pace.

“I don’t get tired because I love the game,” said Nakamura, a resident of Rosemead. “It’s good for the older people because then they have something to do.”

Players met one another through the Japanese community, Fujii said. Some saw advertisements for gateball clubs in Rafu Shimpo, a Japanese American daily newspaper published in Los Angeles.

Gateball, named for the wire gates through which the balls are hit, developed in Japan about 50 years ago. Players divided into red and white teams try to knock out opponents’ balls as all participants attempt to pass their balls through the three gates and hit the scoring post in the middle of the field.

The calm air of Evergreen Park is disrupted by loud beeps every 30 minutes as a game ends, the sounds emanating from large watch alarms worn by most players.

Gateball equipment is purchased through the gateball association, which also holds meetings and sponsors tournaments twice a year for teams across the Southland.

The topic of tournaments animates the Evergreen Park gateball players, who travel to the Westside, Long Beach and San Diego to compete with other groups. In May, the Evergreen Park Club is going to Japan, for a tournament.

Almost all the Evergreen players make the regular regimen of practice and play four days a week. After three hours of gateball, they go across the street to a Japanese Buddhist Temple for a lunch of rice, fish, corned beef and more.

Nakamura got to Evergreen Park a little after 8 this Monday morning.

“My husband used to play, but he’s gone now,” said Nakamura. “He used to love it.”

Sometimes neighbors watch the players at Evergreen Park, wondering what ritual takes over the field four days a week. “They say, ‘What is that? What kind of game is that?’ ” Nakamura chuckled.