Chihayafuru

Oh yeah, today was Taichi Tuesdays. Chihayafuru is an anime about high school students playing Karuta. Karuta is basically a speed card matching game where the matching cards are from 100 poems that all have 2 verses. When the first verse is read, you slap the card with the second verse. The game is generally played by elementary students to help them learn the cultural 100 poems.
This anime extends this game into the professional realm much like other game animes like Hikaru no Go or Shion no Ou. Unlike the other two which I'm sure there are actual pro circuits for their respective games, I'm not entirely sure there is a pro circuit for Karuta. However, the universe of this anime seem so well established that I do not doubt that professional Karuta may exist in Japan. Then again, it could just be a well written universe like Saki where mahjong with beautiful high school girls takes the world by storm.

Anyway, Taichi Tuesdays was dubbed by Guardian Enzo at Random Curiosity because of the endearing endeavors of the male protagonist Taichi in trying to win the affections of the oblivious main character Chihaya. Taichi seriously has a lot to overcome to get the girl despite the fact that he is unfairly handsome, absurdly rich and top of the school smart.

He is hindered by the fact that Chihaya is a completely dense tomboy who is extremely beautiful if only she stays quiet. It also does not help that she is completely focused on Karuta with no thought left for boy-girl relations at all. In her quest to become Queen in Karuta, she pretty much throws away all delicacy in her slouchiness after a match or in wolfing down chocolates to recharge during tournaments.

 Furthermore, as dense as she is, Chihaya seems to harbor romantic feelings/Karuta skills envy to their common childhood friend, Arata. Arata was the grandson of the Meijin (Grandmaster in Chess terms) when they were kids, and he introduced them to the world of competitive Karuta. He moved away around elementary school with the promise of meeting in the Karuta world in future tournaments. Spurred by that promise, Chihaya becomes completely obsessed with Karuta. Therefore, Arata is pretty much her raison de'tre.

So, despite the name of the series, each Tuesday (when Chihayafuru airs in Japan) is really Taichi Tuesdays where we see the turmoil and frustration for Taichi when faced with overwhelmingly denseness with Chihaya and brotastic angst with his complicated relation with fellow friend/Karuta rival/love rival Arata.

I actually intended to write a much shorter summary and post again next Taichi Tuesday, but I already took the screenies so ended up writing a whole explanatory summary. Well, I did not actually discuss anything about this 21st episode, so I took the number off the title.