As one child Aiko Wan, 39, loved math. She remembahs in six grade she won one district math competition which only made her wanna excel at math even more. When she got to high school and came time for take her SATs she got one perfect 800 math score. So I asked if she got perfect on top da English too and she said, “I scored 740 in English, but I was happy with that considering I went in without having studied at all.”
Eventually she went on for get her BA in Japanese Studies from University of California, San Diego and one MS in Accountancy from California State University, Sacramento. Her practical faddah pushed her for get one accounting job which she did, but she felt unfulfilled. So she quit and created her own niche where she could combine math with her other two loves, art and gabbers [For da uninitiated, “gabbers” is Aiko-speak for dogs. Lol.]
Aiko’s company is HakuAi Designs. She illustrates and designs her own dog-inspired prints and comes up with her own original dress designs too. At Local events in Hawai‘i her booth always stay supa-popular cuz people no can resist coming ova to her table for meet her pack of gabber models.
[Disclosure: I had couple-few oddah people lined up for dis month’s interview, but dey all suddenly had for reschedule so I had to Phone-a-Friend. Tanks Aiko for helping me out at da last minute.]
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Lee Tonouchi (LT): Eh Aiko, I know you half Japanese, but I dunno what kine Haole [Caucasian] you. What your precise ethnic backgrounds?
Aiko Wan (AW): So I’m Japanese, Swedish, Jewish, and probably some Irish and Latvian.
LT: How you identify? Hapa, Local, Japanese American, Nikkei, or Poi Dog perhaps?
AW: (Laughing) Probably Hapa. As a kid I didn’t have much consciousness of what it meant when people called me Hapa, Japanese or Haole, but maybe subconsciously I identified as Asian because at school in California I would always gravitate toward the few girls who turned out to be Hapa also.
LT: So what school you went? What year you grad?
AW: Oak Ridge High School. I graduated as salutatorian in 2002.
LT: What area you grew up in?
AW: I grew up moving around the Sacramento area, but my grandma, Frances Fujie Okamura, lived in ‘Āina Haina [on O‘ahu] so we would be there a lot, summers and holidays.
LT: What your fondest ‘Āina Haina memories?
AW: My brother Christopher and my cousin Christopher, and I would walk down the hill to the Foodland Shopping Center, and we would just hang out at Doe Fang, which was a crack seed [Chinese style preserved fruits] store that sold all sorts of snacks. Uncle Clay was the proprietor. He wasn’t really our uncle, but in Hawai‘i we call everyone uncle or aunty.
So Doe Fang was unique because they were a crack seed store, but also had an Icee machine. So we could get Icees there AND we could ask for special toppings on them that they didn’t have at other Icee places like li-hing powder, herbal jelly, azuki or condensed milk. So it was kind of like what you would do with shave ice, but with Icee instead! It was soooooo good.
And Uncle Clay was so nice to me. He’s so friendly and I was a shy and awkward person. I remember when I was off high school for the summer I would go in there and if there were guys my age in there he would try to introduce us and help me strike up a conversation. Nothing ever came of that, but it was so sweet of him to try to encourage me to make friends.
LT: How come you chose for make Hawai‘i your home and how long you been here now?
AW: Well, I’ve always been here on and off, but I’ve lived here since 2012. And I mean, this is the only real home I’ve ever known. I always knew that I had to get back here. There was no other option. It was just a matter of saving up the money to live on my own because I knew I wasn’t going to be able to live at grandma’s.
‘Āina Haina is the only place I ever considered myself happy as a kid. I remember deciding on April 27, 1996, when we left grandma’s house for Folsom that I needed to do everything in my power to make sure one day I’d never have to leave again. Even though my favorite childhood memories are of video games, TV, and shopping, all things we also had in California, I guess it wasn’t the same without grandma, my aunty Arlene, and my cousins.
Of course, it’s not the same now since most of those people aren’t here anymore, but it’s easier to feel close to the good old days when my old neighborhood is just a short drive away. I still can’t imagine calling anywhere else home.
LT: So you came straight from California to Hawai‘i?
AW: I lived in Tokyo for three years during and after college and in Okinawa for the two years that followed as a matter of practicality. Going back to my childhood dream of getting back to ‘Āina Haina, one thing my mom always drilled into me was that it took two incomes to survive in Hawai‘i. She was born and raised in Hawai‘i so she knew that the cost of living is high here. So before coming here I figured I should become fluent in Japanese to ensure I’d at least be a shoo-in for a second job as a retail salesperson in Waikīkī.
LT: Try talk about your time living in Japan.
AW: Yeah, so I don’t read subtext well, and Japan is a very subtext heavy culture. So people a lot of the time will say things they don’t mean. And I kind of tend to take things really literally. So there were a lot of miscommunications that happened, especially in work scenarios. I was accepted as what I am, which is a gaijin, but I knew I was never really going to be part of normal life there.
LT: You get any subtext horror stories?
AW: An instance where I didn’t read the room was when I stayed with a host family in Tokyo and thought everything was going great, but later the grandma wrote a letter to my family explaining everything I had no clue I did wrong such as putting my underwear in with the family laundry when I was told to put my clothes in, or using the internet excessively when I was told I could use it whenever I needed, or playing the piano too much when I was told I could play. So it was like they said the exact opposite of what they meant!
LT:Who you grateful to in helping you on your designer journey?
AW:My cousin Candace Okamura, who was well known in the early 2000s as a shirt designer. Her company name was Super Good or Super Good for You. She had a table at Kawaii Kon every year.
She just inspired me. Growing up, she was the one I looked up to as a big sister. And so when she got into graphic design, I kind of said to myself that one day I want to do something like that too.
LT: Try explain what your company HakuAi Designs stay about.
AW: I create Gabber Gear, which is fashion that’s fabulous, but practical. It makes you feel pretty and good about yourself in fun prints and flattering styles, but you can throw it in the washer and dryer after a day of any activity, from office work to hiking to clubbing. It’s all about looking and feeling good while being practical and comfortable.
My prints are about combining things I love and find beautiful and making them relatable to other people: gabbers, nature, Hawai‘i, video games, Japan, nostalgia. Capturing moments in time like my gabbers at the bus stop.
LT: I wen take a notice that on top your fabric designs you get drawings of only JAPANESE kine dogs, like Akita and shiba. Are you one dog racist, Aiko?
AW: (Laughing) I can’t fake things. I can only draw what I love, which is Japanese gabbers and the scenarios that they tend to be in around here. So I draw my gabbers with local plants or I draw them doing activities we enjoy doing.
I used to draw whatever I thought would sell, but that fell flat because I didn’t feel the personal connection to the artwork. In regards to being a “gabber racist,” it’s not that I draw only Akitas and shibas because those breeds are the most beautiful, but it’s more because I know my gabbers so well that I can really capture their essence and express what they’re thinking and feeling.
Customers at events have commented on how they can see the emotions on the gabbers’ faces, unlike with other brands that just draw shibas and Akitas generically because they’re cute and trendy.
LT: Are you dogs smart talkers? I always been curious, your creative word “gabbers,” is das derive from da English word gab? Like da gift of gab?
AW: It’s from the Japanese GABU, which is an onomatopoeia for the sound of dogs biting.
LT: Oh! Introduce your pack of gabbers.
AW: My gabbers are Blossom Gabriella Goodmuzzle, Breeze Gabriel Goodmuzzle, and Buttercup Gabria Goodmuzzle.
Bloss was an Akita. She was a Gryffindor: encouraging big sister to the two shibs and super chill unless she was laser focused on a goal, which usually involved a chicken-flavored snack.
Breeze is a shiba. He is a Hufflepuff: friendly, hardworking, and soft as his long coat, he will sit with you when you're sad and is always down to help.
Buttercup, the black shiba, she’s my newest gabber. She is a Slytherin and can be conniving and mischievous, but her loyal personality always earns her forgiveness.
LT: Try talk about your most popular print.
Can I add something? I feel like we should talk about how my clothes are sensory friendly.
LT: Hah? Sensory friendly?
AW: Sensory friendly. You know how like some people are really particular about how their clothes fit and the textures of their clothes and their tags. So none of my dresses should feel junk. Nothing should be uncomfortable. Everything has to be soft. Everything has to be acceptable for people like me who are picky about that, because there’s a whole segment of people who care about that. A lot of us don’t like jeans because they’re too thick, too constricting. The buttons and the zippers are cumbersome and dig into your skin. My clothes have none of that.
LT: Awesome. K, you know how teachers always say how math stay important. You can try tell how you need math for do what you do.
AW: Well, it helps in setting up a repeat pattern in a lot of cases if you’re doing say a more geometric design. Or if you’re doing anything with a systematic-looking flow to it, then you have to map it out using math. You subdivide your print area and figure out how to make it repeat seamlessly.
And then obviously too, when you’re sewing the garments or cutting out the fabrics to sew the garments, you have to get the sizing right. So you have to cut out the proper pieces and you have to adjust accordingly for different sizes.
I also do SAT prep and after school tutoring so yes children, math is important!
© 2024 Lee A. Tonouchi
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