Spirit of Aloha | Features | March/April 2004

Aloha Shorts

News and notes from around our world

Instant Hawaiian
Until the 1960s, Hawaiian was considered a dead language, having been successfully replaced with Western ways and language by 19th-century New England missionaries. The Hawaiian Renaissance changed all that, with immersion schools, continuing education programs and old-fashioned pride in Things Hawaiian.

The comeback of the Hawaiian language is responsible for the surprisingly brisk sales of a new audio CD language course titled Instant Immersion Hawaiian, marketed by Seattle-based Topics Entertainment, the world's No.1 software language publisher. One of some 90 languages currently offered by the company, the Hawaiian course, consisting of eight CDs (or computer software), is currently the most requested catalog item, in part because it is Topics' latest release. Topics vice president Duayne Zeigler became aware of the resurgence of interest in Hawaiian on one of his many trips to Hawai'i.

Topics Entertainment promises that its programs are "the quickest way to learn a language, guaranteed." With Hawaiian words such as "humuhumunukunukuapua'a" for linguistically impaired students to deal with, they will be well-challenged to prove that claim. By the way, if you notice that one of the narrators has an interesting accent to his spoken Hawaiian, it's because Kaliko Beamer-Trapp is a linguist from England.

The course is available at ABC Stores, Borders, Walmart, Costco and Amazon.com

A Brief Interlude
As frequent travelers simplify their lives, washing dirty underwear in hotel sinks is a time-consuming thing they'd prefer to do without. Help is now on the way. A Santa Monica, Calif., company called Break Room Concepts has created OneDerWear, which is 100 percent cotton biodegradable underwear you can wear once and throw away. "It will actually last five washes, and dry overnight," company CEO Betty Hung tells SPIRIT OF ALOHA. "I've learned I can't live without it when I travel." The OneDerWear collection, each in inexpensive five packs, features a man's brief and boxer brief, and a woman's bikini brief, classic brief and thong. Wear and toss. What's next? Disposable aloha shorts? We'll see. OneDerWear is not yet available in Hawai'i, but you can order it online at www.onederwear.com

Brew News
There is something to be said for people who invent alcoholic beverages that benefit good causes, so a headline on a news release that stated "New Hawaiian Beer to Save Sea Turtles" was certain to get our attention. A Portland, Ore., brewer named Brett Porter released Honu Beer in Hawai'i in January, with a portion of profits benefiting the World Turtle Trust. In case you missed it, the Hawaiian word for sea turtle is honu. "The moment you see a sea turtle face-to-face is the moment you commit yourself to their preservation, says Porter. "I returned from my last Hawaiian vacation knowing I had to do something. And since I'm a brewer, I figured I could make the greatest impact through beer." Honu Beer is sold in a clear bottle, through which beer drinkers can see a swimming sea turtle.

Other good drinking news this issue comes from our far-flung correspondent Phil Hayworth, who reports that a former president of the company that owns Jack Daniels will commercially produce the famed, potent Hawaiian beverage called 'okolehau (pronounced oko-lay-how) and sell it only in Hawai'i. According to Steven Thompson, president of Sandwich Islands Distilling, the first 5,000 cases of this drink, which was once outlawed as a bane to society, will roll off a temporary bottling line at an old sugar mill in Pa'ia in April 2005. By April 2006, the distillery plans to open a permanent plant and showroom near Kïhei and distribute to the Mainland. According to Hayworth, who is a connoisseur of the famed beverage, 'okolehau is a clear, smooth rum or brandylike whisky, which gets its base flavor from the local ki plant. Its potency depends on how much sugar cane and/or rice is added. The new drink will come in 80- and 140-proof versions, aged in used bourbon barrels. "The formula will be the original, but our 'okolehao will also be filtered through a secret filtering medium available only in Hawai'i," says Thompson. 'Okolehao, by the way, means "iron bottom," after the vats in which it was originally made, which were intended for boiling whale blubber. Here's to ya.

Books: The Land That Time Never Forgot
On page 133 of Kohala 'Aina, the lovingly illustrated history of North Kohala, the isolated, northernmost point of the Big Island, is a haunting photograph, taken about 1915, of an unnamed child dressed in her Sunday best and seated on the sacred Mo'okini sacrificial stone. She is a foreign child, described as the daughter of a Mrs. Achilles, and the feeling she conveys, as she smiles enigmatically at the camera, is that she has lost some vital connection with her surroundings and doesn't really belong there.

Kohala 'Aina, written by Sophia V. Schweitzer, with Michael S. Gomes (Mutual Publishing, Honolulu, 2003), is provocative like that: it's a picture book, a storybook and a vivid work of myth, legend and indelible reality. Traders, whalers, missionaries, Chinese Tong societies, the loved, the lonely, the betrayed-all are here in unvarnished glory, and they swell the great land around them. In its ensemble approach to history, the book consecrates one of Hawai'i's most remote and important areas-the place where King Kamehameha I, the first chief to unite the Islands under one ruler, was born; and where life subsequently blossomed, then abruptly faltered, during sugar plantation days.

The historical photos and archived letters and journals are alone worth the price of this hefty (more than 4 pounds) volume. It's dramatic, thorough and poignant-reasons that Kohala residents and visitors have already made it a deserving bestseller.

Two thoroughly engaging new works of history and nostalgia are recommended companions for Honolulu-bound visitors (or locals) who prefer to go beyond the obvious. Waikïkï: Nine Walks Through Time, by Veneeta Acson (Island Heritage, 2003), is a carefully researched guide to sometimes Ancient Hawai'i and more accessible contemporary life and lore in what is arguably the best known part of Hawai'i, as experienced through nine planned, but meandering walks through Waikïkï's streets. Take a walk with this book (good maps) and imagine life a hundred years ago. It's a book to light a traveler's fire.


Intriguing background, the known and the mysterious, on the shops and stores and buildings you pass in Waikïkï and other places in Hawai'i is included in a compilation of stories about 450 well-known companies, in The Companies We Keep, by Bob Sigall, professor of marketing at Hawai'i Pacific University and his HPU students (Small Business Hawai'i, 2004). Ask yourself: Which Waikïkï restaurant was founded by Frank Sinatra's touring chef? Why is Tripler Hospital painted pink? What's the oldest hotel still operating in Hawai'i? The untarnished answers are here, and it won't take long until you're one-upping the locals with your definitive knowledge.

Four Good Reasons to Travel Right Now
ONE. No one knows why hammerhead sharks have such scalloped, sculpted heads (do they aid in locomotion or help distinguish scent?), but now you can see them close up. A 50,000-gallon exhibit of hammerhead sharks has opened at Maui Ocean Center, at Mä'alaea. It's called Hammerhead Harbor. The custom-built exhibit lets visitors see both above and below the water. On display are juvenile hammerheads between 18 and 24 inches in length. They will grow to a maximum length of 12 feet-but not, we hope, at the Ocean Center. For more information: info@mauioceancenter.com or www.mauioceancenter.com

TWO. Fly on Aloha to Phoenix, and then head two hours north to Clarksdale, Ariz. Here you can board the "train for all seasons," the Verde Canyon Railroad, which runs its historical route to Parkinsville and into Arizona's "other grand canyon" almost every day. Train buffs love it: rare, vintage (1953) eagle-decorated FP7 engines, open-air viewing car, old-fashioned trestles, manmade tunnels, room-style seating, love seats, pretty good food. More information: www.verdecanyonrr.com

THREE. Hawai'i's longest-running agricultural showcase and food festival returns to Upcountry Maui on April 24. It's held at the 'Ulupalakua Ranch and Tedeschi Vineyards at 'Ulupalakua (from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. for the general public). It's one of those "must-see" things in Hawai'i. More information: www.ulupalakuathing.com

FOUR. Ark Ceramics is a studio gallery located in Häna on the island of Maui, which is now offering artists' residencies in its guesthouse, known as Maui B and B at Baby Pigs Crossing. According to owner/artist Arabella Ark, a writer, painter, photographer or ceramist may stay for several weeks and use the studio facility to complete special projects. The general public is also welcome, with a two-night minimum stay. Visit www.mauibandb.com or telephone (808) 248-4890.

(PHOTO: MAUI OCEAN CENTER)

Listen Up
Hawaiian 105 KINE's "Aloha Morning Show" radio host Brickwood Galuteria brings a world of experience to this issue's list of recommended music from the Islands.
• Ua-M'ao, Ma'ane'i (Then & Now): Kuhio Yim, Afatia Thompson and Kale Chang have crafted their R&B backgrounds into a soulful Hawaiian creation on their debut album. Produced by Tihati Productions, this is a fine tribute to the long tradition of Hawaiian trios.
• David Choy-Colors of the Heart: Saxophone artist David Choy is joined by a mix of musicians, including pianist Boy Katindig, guitarist Allan Vilaren and singer Josh Kahula, in his premier solo venture. Think of it as the perfect addition to your jazz collection, with a tinge of Island color.
• The Kahauanu Lake Trio-Hapa-Haole Hulas: The first wave of Americans to the Islands in the 1930s and 1940s included songwriters who were inspired to capture Hawai'i beauty in tunes written mainly in English, with an occasional Hawaiian word thrown in for effect-thus creating the beginning of the hapa-haole (part foreign) tradition. The Kahauanu Lake Trio is among the foremost practitioners of this unique form, and this album includes some all-time favorites, including "One Paddle, Two Paddle" and "Hula Breeze."

Flying Feel-Good Food
While making her usual cookies one day in 1930, a Massachusetts dietitian named Ruth Wakefield substituted a semi-sweet chocolate bar cut into bits instead of her usual baker's chocolate. The chopped-up chocolate softened, but did not melt. The rest is sweet history. Seven billion chocolate chip cookies are eaten annually in the United States, including a few thousand a week on Aloha Airlines' flights to the Mainland and the South Pacific, where they are served with milk as a special "aromatherapy" inflight snack.

So popular are these cookies that a year or so ago, the airline received friendly complaints from passengers that they were too small. The cookies have now been slightly increased in size by the bakers, an O'ahu-based company called The Cookie Corner. We recently talked to owner-partners Jim McArthur and Angus McKibbin, who have been making cookies for Aloha for 10 years.

Q. How did you meet?
A. In the seventh grade at 'Iolani School in Honolulu. Years ago, they seated everybody alphabetically, and there's not much space between McArthur and McKibbin.
Q. What's the secret of a good chocolate chip cookie?
A. The ingredients. They must be fresh and they must be consistent. We start with plenty of pure Grade A butter. Then we make sure to use only the finest Ghirardelli chocolate. Everything is natural. No, we're not going to give you the recipe.
Q. Why do we love cookies?
A. It's a feel-good food. Cookies make people happy. When you're eating
a chocolate chip cookie, the quality of the cocoa butter-not the chocolate chip-explodes in your mouth. That's why Aloha's passengers wanted a bigger cookie. So we gave them one 25 percent bigger. The cookies you're getting on the plane are fresh-baked. That's why they smell so good.
Q. Do cookies make you fat?
A. Our cookies are full of love and aloha.
Q. Why do I think of my mother when I eat a chocolate chip cookie?
A. Nobody ever made better cookies than mother. Or grandmother.

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