From left: Members Alex DeGeorge ’20, Anna Leveroni ’20, Cassie King ’21, Angela Yasutomi ’21, Ji Ha ’21, Alexis Dias ’21, and Kevin Wang ’19, before dinner. (Photo by Christopher Huang)
Room 415 in Fulton Hall contains tiers of long, curved tabletops that serve for desks, and a front wall of sliding chalkboards flanked by projector screens, but no stovetop. And so the leaders of the Hawaii Club of Boston College (HCBC) fried their Spam in a residence hall before carrying it in foil-ware to their meeting. They also brought two trays of steamed sticky rice and several bags of the edible seaweed nori.
Thirteen undergraduates at Boston College call Hawaii home. On one Wednesday night, for a gathering billed as “Spam Musubi 101,” the HCBC brought food for 50.
About 125 students belong to the Hawaii Club, which is led by co-presidents Kevin Wang ’19, a New Yorker, and Kara Nystul ’18, of Honolulu. The club hosts 10 events a year, beginning with the evening of Spam musubi, a Hawaiian twist on the Japanese dish onigiri (at its most basic, small mounds of white rice wrapped in nori), and concluding with a spring culture show, an open-air luau that routinely draws several hundred students.
That Wednesday, Wang arrived at Fulton early to prepare the lecture hall: He cleaned the blackboards, then wrote “Spam” in large chalk letters. Because it’s not uncommon in Hawaii to see Spam musubi anthropomorphized on pillows, toys, jewelry, and in cartoons, he sketched two examples—with smiling faces and tongues protruding—holding hands. As other members arrived, including Nystul, they set out plastic-ware and paper plates. Using scissors, they cut sheets of green-black nori into two-to-three-inch-wide strips. Somebody put on reggae music (Hawaii has its own brand, called Jawaiian). From the top of the chalkboard, Wang hung the club’s banner: a central maroon crest with the club’s name in white, superimposed on a grove of pale blue palm trees.
Thirty or so students spread out among the desks, and soon the room effervesced with talk and laughter and the smell of crispy soy-fried Spam. Club treasurer James Spizzirro ’19, another New Yorker—Squishy, he’s called—brought the group to order.
“We show you how to make musubi,” he said, ticking off the agenda on his fingers. “We tell you a little bit about the history of Spam in Hawaii . . . and then we give you some food. And then you leave.” He smiled. “It’s a pretty good deal.”
But first the club’s 12 executive board members, five of whom are from Hawaii, introduced themselves.
“At one point in my life,” said publicity chair and Connecticut native Alex DeGeorge ’20, “I knew more than 200 digits of pi. Today, Squishy knew more than me.”
“I go by Ji,” said Ji-Won Ha ’21, who’s from Honolulu, “and I play the trumpet.”
Spam, a canned, precooked meat product first marketed in 1937 by Hormel, “is not much different from what you find in a hot dog,” Nystul told the group. It became popular in Hawaii during World War II, when it was brought in for soldiers stationed on the islands (cheap, easy to ship, never spoils). The military dispatched more than 150 million pounds to the Pacific theater. After the war, Hawaii’s Japanese-Americans substituted “Uncle Spam” for the salted fish and pickled apricots traditionally featured atop onigiri, creating musubi, the now ubiquitous concoction sold in restaurants, groceries, and convenience stores.
Sophie Kim ’19, the club’s vice president, demonstrated how to make it.
“First step is always to wash your hands,” she said as Purell circulated. (Kim’s fun fact: “I’m from Hawaii, and I was on the TV show Lost.”) She fitted a slice of spam onto a bed of rice, wrapped them together with plastic, and formed a roughly four-by-two-inch rectangle. “Shape it into a nice shape,” she said. “Show it some love.”
She removed the plastic and bound the rice and meat with a strip of seaweed, wetting the end of the strip with water while explaining, “It’s like glue.”
Students gathered and shaped their own musubi, most of which were large enough to be hefted with both hands, like a sandwich. Then they ate.
“It’s weird,” said Californian Avery Gu ’20, who’s never been to Hawaii. “You should really try it.”
Marisa Acevedo ’18, of Pittsburgh, is a longtime convert. “I probably come to this event every year because I love musubi,” she said.
“I’m here for dinner,” Joy Zou ’19, who’s from New York City, admitted. “But it’s also nice to take a break from work. I’m, like, all over the place right now, so this is just . . .” She paused. “Nice down time.”
Texas, Florida, and New Jersey were represented, by students who had been to Hawaii or not, who came to learn and to eat and to spend time with friends.
As for the Hawaiians, Alexis Dias ’21 of Kailua says she wouldn’t have selected Boston College if not for HCBC. “Most universities have a Hawaii club. . . . I wanted to make sure there was one here before I came.” “It’s like a family away from home,” Nystul said.
Somebody suggested a musubi eating contest, and the group negotiated the terms:
“Is three too many?”
“Three is way too many.”
“One winner will get a Hawaii Club pocket tee. They’re super cute.”
“Since you guys are already eating, we’ll do one musubi.”
The group gathered on a tier—contestants seated, spectators standing—and then the race began with cheers: Chew! Swallow! Finish that rice!
Joseph Ponce, a senior from New Jersey, emerged the winner. His victory speech: “I feel gross.” But a few minutes passed, and he returned for another roll.
By 9:00 p.m., most were through eating. There were tests to study for, papers to write. Members packaged the leftovers and urged them upon the others. “Give it to your friends,” Nystul said. On the blackboard, Wang had listed the club’s upcoming meetings, which include a liquid nitrogen ice cream social and lei-making.
“It’s having fun with a group of people who you know will laugh with you,” the New Yorker said of the club. “Being Hawaiian can be an ethnicity, but it’s also a way life.”
The room emptied, and Wang began to erase the chalkboard. Come morning, Fulton 415 would host “Computers in Management.”
Christopher Amenta is a Boston area writer.