Charmed and ready for action
Viva Las Vegas and the faithful junketeers who know there's no such thing as feeling too lucky
By June Watanabe
Star-BulletinYOU'VE probably heard about the frogs and the seven musubis, but how about hard-boiled eggs with hand-drawn faces or a can of sardines? When it comes to ways to line up the slots or turn up the hot hands in Las Vegas, Hawaii folks have come up with some intriguing charms. Whether any of them work is another thing, but a red panty here and an eggplant there can't hurt, right?
Take the sardines. M. did.
A neighbor on Lanai first gave M. (he didn't want his friends to see his name in the paper) a can of sardines to carry in a pouch when he played the slots in Vegas. "I didn't hit the jackpot, but I made enough to cover that trip and pay for another one," the retired 86-year-old pineapple company supervisor said. "I credit it to the sardines."
So, last January, he made sure he had the same can when he went back to Glitter Gulch. But, "It didn't work. I guess it was only a one-shot deal. So I came home and ate the sardines," he chuckled.
Then there are the eggs. For reasons that will become obvious, H. wishes to remain anonymous.
The origin of this charm isn't eggs-actly clear, but the idea came from H.'s brother-in-law's friend, who said they had to boil an egg, draw a face on it, then, just before gambling, eat it.
"It was guaranteed to make us win," the 61-year-old retired state worker from Manoa said.
So H. and her husband bought a dozen jumbo eggs, boiled them and felt lucky when only one cracked. When they and two friends arrived in Las Vegas, they found a secluded spot at the airport and divvied up the eggs, drawing on the required faces. They then went to a restaurant and ate the eggs (ordering off the menu, too, of course).
Nothing really spectacular ensued. Still, the next time H. and her husband went back to Vegas, they took two eggs each, deciding to pack them in a suitcase, instead of hand-carrying them. But an airport inspector got suspicious as the suitcase went through the scanner.
He asked H.'s husband if he golfed, before discovering the eggs wrapped in foil. Still suspicious, he spun an egg on the counter. By that time, a crowd had gathered.
"He was so embarrassed," H. said of her husband.
The eggs made it to Vegas, where they were dutifully eaten. But just before H. and her husband went down to the casino, the toilet in their bathroom broke, and "the water kept rising and rising." That was the last of boiled eggs.
"We have so many good luck charms that don't work," H. sighed.
She's also tried the seven musubis, which you're supposed to eat on the plane to Vegas. And, it never hurts to have red underwear, which H. says "has been around for a long time." Like ti leaves and other good-luck tokens, someone has to give you the underwear for the charm to work, she said.
Another friend, H. said, "swears by Hawaiian salt. She puts it in a container of coins before playing the slot machines."
All this was not lost on Cindy Sugai, whose Kaeru Wear line of shirts and vests is aimed at the Vegas crowd, and Evelyn Garbo of Hilo, whose Eggplants in the Sun also has draws on gamblers and their search for the ultimate good luck piece.
"They're constantly exchanging gambling stories and secrets with each other," Sugai said of her family and friends. "And when someone comes across a new trick or gimmick to win the 'big bucks' - no matter how crazy it is - everyone's anxious to try it."
So seven years ago, Sugai, a frustrated stand-up comic and graduate of Pearl City High, began selling shirts embroidered with open-mouthed frogs. "Kaeru means frog and it also means to come back or return," she explained. "So many people feel that whatever you contribute will come back, hopefully intensified."
As the frog shirts caught on, Sugai added other designs, such as the the seven musubis - "our best seller." The one constant, however, are frogs - wearing red underwear, raining down from heaven, lined up in the slots.
So far, selling the clothing mostly at crafts fairs and a couple of stores is "working for me," Sugai said. But if the luck of her designs wear off on her, she hopes to be the female Frank DeLima some day.
Unlike Sugai, Garbo (nee Tajiri) didn't have Las Vegas in mind when she started her business eight years ago. Her focus was washi paper jewelry and she decided on Eggplants as a business name "because my initials are E.G. and I liked purple."
But she soon learned that eggplants are good luck because every flower supposedly bears fruit. At New Year's, the Japanese place a picture of an eggplant, a hawk and Mt. Fuji on their shrines, while some people actually carry whole eggplants to Vegas to place on slot machines.
She started with a a couple of charms and "was astounded at how popular they were, so I looked for more charms."
Garbo was on Oahu recently for a couple of craft fairs, but says she picks up a lot of ideas from customers on the West Coast, where she also sells her wares. It was in San Jose, Calif., that she heard about the sardines.
Last year, a woman in Hilo told her "You have to trim your hedge before you go" to Las Vegas, Garbo said. "I told her that a wife probably made that up to tell her husband. That was rich!" Recently, a woman in L.A. told her, "Red panties didn't work for me. You have to wear no panties!"
Knowing what a superstitious lot gamblers are, Garbo tries to lure them with bunches of charms, such as on pins. One popular pin has a daruma with eyes that pop out and two gods of happiness hidden inside the bottom of the doll; a coin; and a "money hammer" with a little die inside; a bell, "for happiness;" and a frog. Another pin has an eggplant; a frog sitting on a five-yen coin; a slot machine; a die; and a coin.
This season, Garbo came up with what she calls the "Las Vegas Arsenal": miniature versions of an egg; an eggplant; a vial with seven grains of rice (representing the seven musubis); a ti leaf from her backyard; Hawaiian salt; plus an origami frog; a can of sardines; and, "the ultimate," red underwear.
They come in a box decorated as a die cube or in an eggplant bag.
One woman who bought a pin with the daruma and hammer came back and got six more because her sisters and friends all wanted one after she hit the jackpot, Garbo said. "But I've also had people come back to me and say, 'You know, these pins don't work.' They get so upset at me because they didn't win the megabucks!"
Barbara Ogata is not one to shun a charm, but she takes a philosophical attitude about them.
She carries a bunch of different good luck pieces in her coin purse, recently adding fish that she picked up in Beijing to her frog charms. "Frogs are passe," her friends told her. The fish, however, have to be koi, not goldfish, they added. Sardines weren't mentioned.
Actually, Ogata's gathered charms from around the world in her travels. On a recent trip to Branson, Mo., she bought buckeye seeds, which the Cherokees consider good luck, and in Greece, she picked up some charms that look like eyes.
The 70-year-old retiree from Nuuanu admits the charms "didn't do me any good in Vegas." But she's philosophical, believing "good luck can mean anything - good health or anything else good. Most people only think money, about making money in Vegas. But you have to think in broader terms. In that case, it's working for me," Ogata said.
Send them to Vegas Charms P.O. Box 3080 Honolulu HI 96802
