Homespun Honolulu

Remember when they covered the news with all of those stories about the ethnic cleansing of Albanians in Kosovo? Remember we bombed the heck out of what was once Yugoslavia because of those claims?

Pure fiction! They lied to us! There was no such ethnic cleansing. It was all propaganda and false media reporting. How can we now look away and ignore this? Has our entire country become so parochial that we’re comfortably oblivious to the atrocities that are done with (and sometimes without) our citizen’s oblivious stamp of approval?

I know the newsies are laughing at me. Yeah, I know, you news experts are chuckling and wondering why I’m so surprised. You’re thinking, “They always lie to us, didn’t you know that?” Yeah, okay, I know. But this, for me anyway, is way beyond anything I have experienced in the way of deception by my own government.

If our government officials had said to us that we needed to protect our interest in the oil, we would have understood that. The problem is, they know we would have NOT understood, or tolerated, our country backing drug-trafficking terrorists! That’s what they were doing.

Are you mad yet? Believe me, it took me a while to cool down enough so that this post wouldn’t sound like raving lunacy. So, why am I writing about this? What does this have to do with me? What does this have to do with Honolulu? Read on…

The United States is not without its share of Serbian Americans. Serbian Orthodox churches all over the United States held big demonstrations about our (the United States of America’s) condoning of the Kosovar Albanians claiming Kosovo as their own — declaring independence in a land that is not and never was theirs.

My friends and members of my Church family are deeply hurt by this — hurt from personal, historic, religious and ethnic standpoints. Comparatively speaking, the declaration of disgust expressed in Honolulu was very small, but just as sincere and heartfelt nonetheless.

They gathered a concerned few together and met in front of the Federal Building just outside of downtown Honolulu. What America has done, without the knowledge of its citizenry, is to create a stage for this mess to play out where the outcry is too soft to be heard. Nobody is talking about it. The media is disinterested because there is no mob and there is no violence in the street. The feeble cry of, “but Kosovo is Serbia!” falls on deaf ears.

Yes, people were more than willing to talk it through — more than willing to explain their position and why it hurts them. I was able to get the full impact of those explanations. But, where do I go for a disinterested party?

At this point of discovery I am angry. I needed more information to make a case for seeing the Serbian side of this Kosovo conflict. I needed more to disagree so vehemently with my own government — the government that is supposed to be doing good throughout the World.

Increasingly frustrated and still in denial that my country could be so deceitfully secretive, and leave us with no access to news from the other side, I kept searching. You see, it’s not that we don’t care, it’s that we just don’t know and we don’t fully understand the degree of our involvement.

Other countries think our calm is because we’re wimps. That is not the case. We are seeking knowledge and trying to ascertain the truth. I don’t want to hear governmental rhetoric that is laced with “creative” truths, aka lies, that are designed to sway public opinion. Give me the facts and let me make my own decisions on the movements of the people we voted into office!

Do we have culture clashes going on here? Definitely. Hawaii, of all places, should be used to it! Well, for the bulk of the population, the Slavic nations haven’t made a large enough impact on Hawaii to keep us all paying attention to what’s going on with their cultures and their homelands. We keep track of China, Japan and the Philippines, but, for the most part, the European Union seems to be kind of off our radar.

The media (I refer here to mainland media — our local stations are exempt on this topic) is obviously hell-bent on lying to us. Either that or they’re being strong-armed or paid huge sums to rewrite the facts. So, we need news sources that come directly from the people — people who are in the middle of it all and know the truth. Fox News is already on my list of places not to listen to because they shoot their mouths off before verifying their information — anything for headlines and to be first with breaking news — even if it’s false!

I really don’t want to add CNN to that ugly place of distrust. Sigh. This is a classic reason why we need something like the blogosphere if we expect to get the truth. We’ll get particles of truth, but at least they’ll be just that — the truth! When I say blogosphere I mean real people, not spin-off blogs from the news channels — those are just the same thing we already get from the media with some added editorial comment. They’re not bad, they’re just not reliable when the honesty of their station(s) is being questioned.

The blogosphere I’m talking about is the actual people living in the neighborhoods they’re talking about. The real people that understand the culture and current events and are living and sharing their lives with the world through their blogs.

While our local media and blogs are quiet about the topic of Kosovo, the blogosphere as a whole is not without its opinion and voice on this matter. Nothing Against Serbia tells us about how Zurich has heard the pleas of its Serbian population.

So, Now What?

Where do you think the United States stands with Serbia now? Our applauding this illegal drama has made Russia mad at us too. Have we made enemies out of our friends?

The damage has been done, so what will Washington do now to keep the peace? Anything? Hmmm… I wonder what Barack Obama would do to fix the situation? I don’t know. Perhaps he will open the lines of communication and help mend the rift and discuss options with all involved. What would Hillary Clinton do? NOTHING! Her husband was president when it started! What will McCain do? Nothing — he and his party want to continue it all in their “business as usual” manner.

What can we do? Not much. As citizens we can acknowledge the injustice done to our brethren so far across the globe, we can send venom-filled letters to our representatives in Congress, or we can pray for them as seen here.

Why does our Russian Orthodox Priest see this as important? Aside from the fact that Serbia gave refuge to the Russian Orthodox so many, many years ago, when so many were threatened by the communists, Father Anatole justifies his prayerful support in this way:

First of all, ANY immoral act, whether committed by an individual or by a government, must be condemned in no uncertain words. Let me just cite a few undisputed facts connected with the Kosovo debacle:

1. Kosovo is not only a territory which formed the heartland of Medieval Serbia, but by long standing tradition it is the seat of the Serbian Orthodox Patriarchate. In addition, there are (or were) many historically important churches and monasteries in Kosovo.

2. When NATO, led by the United States, was threatening to bomb Serbia and Kosovo, the Kosovar Terrorists (a.k.a. ‘freedom fighters’ in the United States) were demanding full independence from Yugoslavia. At that time Clinton’s girdle saleswoman, Madeline Albright, told the Kosovar Albanians that ‘unless you only ask for autonomy, NATO cannot bomb the Serbs.’ Well, since the Albanians wanted Serbs to be bombed they changed their demand to ‘autonomy’.

3. NATO was originally formed to defend Western Europe from aggression from the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact countries. Yugoslavia, at the time of the bombing was not allied with the Soviet Union, and the Warsaw Pact had disappeared. Thus, the bombing of Yugoslavia by NATO was not an act mandated to it – it was interference in the internal affairs of a country that had not attacked anyone.

4. During Miloshevich’s crackdown against the Albanian separatists in Kosovo it was the Serbian Orthodox Church that did its best to shelter and defend innocent Albanian civilians. And what thanks did it get after the Serbs were driven out of Kosovo? Churches, monasteries were burned and desecrated, and the NATO peacekeepers did little to stop the Kosovars from doing their ‘ethnic cleansing’.

5. There is so little law and order in Kosovo now that after NATO eventually pulls out, the remainder of the Serbs in Kosovo can only expect genocidal attacks against them. (And the Kosovars can be sure that they will be in no way punished by NATO and the United States for that.)

6. Finally, the Israelis, if not the United States government, have spotted the precedent, a very unfavorable precedent for them, in the Kosovo situation. If NATO can bomb a sovereign state because that state refuses to grant independence to one of its territories where a particular ethnic group is in the majority and even engages in terrorist acts against it, what is preventing the Palestinians from declaring independence in Gaza and the West Bank? After all, logically, NATO should be protecting them against Israel by bombing the Israelis. One may also add to this, the Kurdish separatists in Eastern Turkey, the Basque separatists in Spain, etc., etc.

Does he know what he’s talking about? You bet. A now retired linguistics professor from the University of Hawaii, Father Anatole has had his own ethnic reasons to follow the news of the Slavic regions all these years. He is Russian and he was born in Yugoslavia where his mother, like many other Russian people fleeing the Russian communist regime, was given sanctuary.

Peaceful by nature, with a strong and passionate Christian Faith, prayers over the icon of the Serbian saint, Saint Lazar, offer some peace to the distressed Serbs who continue to watch their ethnic homeland and the holy places of its national Church being desecrated. This is all the more hurtful when the land they now call home applauds these visual and mental horrors.

Why is America Being So Disagreeable?

Caution: The following is my paranoid opinion section based only on my own thoughts and observations.

Could all of this be the reason for the rise in the cost of gas? The new pipeline to transport the ever-coveted oil from one country to the next is an ongoing project. That pipeline runs right through Kosovo! Hello?!?

Okay, maybe that’s being just a little too paranoid but, $9 billion of oil revenue has suddenly vanished? (I was listening to Dianne Feinstein on CNN with Wolf Blitzer and had to go get the transcript just to confirm what I thought I heard.) Was that to fund the sending of more soldiers to “help” the citizens of Iraq or are we going there to distract the American public from the travesty in Kosovo? What ever they’re doing, it’s working.

Let’s think about it:

Tibetan Monks being persecuted by China, we say nothing. There’s no oil involved.

Darfur abuses are running rampant and we verbally condemn them, but nothing more. There’s no oil involved.

Yet phony genocide is retaliated with war with a country over it’s own property. That would be like Mexico taking over California or Cuba taking of Florida and calling it their own, with the help of the army from yet another country. What were we thinking? It’s all about the oil.

Okay, that’s the end of my paranoid opinion section.

I was almost ready to wrap this up and then I ran into this article about Russia, China, and India looking to revisit this very issue with Kosovo. The article opens with:

“The US administration rejected with derision Thursday’s joint call by Russia, China and India to resume talks on the future status of Kosovo.”

With “derision?” Who the hell do we think we are?!? I swear we have no diplomacy or shred of decency left! We have GOT to change what’s going on in the White House.

Still hungry for more? There are articles galore but here is just a bit more reading if you care to absorb more information about this fiasco. I just can’t stand this oil-based hypocrisy.

I remember that! I don’t know why I remember it, I just do. It’s an old childhood memory and, as I got older, I frequently thought about it and wondered where we were when people were trying to “Save Queen’s Surf.” While I was looking up something about the Natatorium, which is located next to the Waikiki Aquarium, I found the answer to this age old question of mine — the Queen’s Surf was a restaurant and nightclub that was nearby a beach where we used to go swimming when I was only about 4 or 5 years old.

They must have made good cheeseburgers or something… or maybe I thought we were trying to save the beach. I don’t remember. All I know is that it was an important issue to this little girl — so much so that it has stuck with me all these years! As it turned out, that little girl, and a lot of other Honolulu residents, lost that battle. The restaurant was closed in 1969 and subsequently torn down in 1971.

It was a perfect area to have a little family picnic and celebrate my sister-in-law’s birthday. We just happened to be very close to the Natatorium on Monday, after the Great Aloha Run. It was also perfect timing too because, after 8.2 miles, I was hungry!

Okay, maybe this was not the healthiest of diets, but we had veggies too!

In fact, there was tossed salad and some mushroom, zucchini and tomato kabobs — I don’t like tomatoes, but I love zucchini!

While waiting for the food to cook, I just had to take a quiet saunter down the beach walk. I can imagine how beautiful this place must be at night.

Since we were so close to the Natatorium, I thought it would be a cool thing to write about. So, I decided to continue in that general direction.

While meandering towards the Natatorium, I passed a lady sitting and talking on her cell phone. I couldn’t help but notice the tattoo on her arm. I continued on for just a bit but then I stopped and went back to where she was sitting. I’m sorry, I just had to get a picture of those star fish! I’ve told you guys before, it’s all about the art!

I motioned to the lady that I wanted to get a picture of her arm. Without even flinching she turned a little so that these lovely star fish faced in my direction. I took pictures of her tattoo as she just sat comfortably and continued her phone conversation. This was obviously not the first time she has had this happen!

Anyway, on to the Natatorium. I know very little about it except that it is “The War Memorial” that was built to honor WWI veterans from Hawaii and the 100+ local lives that were lost in that war. Unfortunately, the Natatorium has been closed since 1980 or so because it is deteriorating and has been deemed unsafe.

It is a point of contention as many want to see it restored while many others want it torn down and the beach restored. I have no opinion myself except that if it is polluting the coastline, it needs to go. If not, we should preserve it in some form to memorialize its original purpose. Maybe they should just lose the crumbling bleachers, maintain the facade and clean up the swimming pool portion for schools and other organizations to use.

My mother used to participate in a lot of swimming meets there — around 1950 or so. My grandfather pushed her to be a champion swimmer — probably with the hopes that she would follow in his Olympic footsteps.

We had a lot of strong swimmers back in the days of Duke Kahanamoku. In the 1920 Summer Olympics, Duke Kahanamoku won the Gold Medal in the 100-meter freestyle; my grandfather, William White Harris, Jr., took the Bronze. Pua Kealoha took the silver in that same race and Warren Kealoha won the Gold in the 100-meter backstroke. Yep, we had a lot of strong swimmers.

Duke Kahanamoku United States (USA)

1:00.4

Pua Kealoha United States (USA)

1:02.2

William Harris United States (USA)

1:03.2

Someone was kind enough to provide Wikipedia with the above information and for that I thank them. Like I said, I’m sure my grandfather saw to it that Mom participated in several meets! The water wasn’t dirty then.

Even “The Duke,” according to an article I read, didn’t want to swim at the Natatorium in the later years. It’s unfortunate, but understandable. The Great War Society has some nice pictures and further explanations about the Natatorium.

Technorati Tags: Historic Hawai’i

They Told Us We Matter!

Finally! They said on the news that our votes in the caucus would actually have an impact on who is chosen to go on the ballot! Every Presidential election is pretty much decided across the Nation while Hawaii voters are still showing up at their polling places. The time difference between here and the mainland is dramatic enough to just leave us at the tail end of the national vote count and make our votes simply the rubber stamp to the Nation’s election results. Not this time…

The lines were long and slow-moving but people were, I think, excited and shocked at the same time. People kept coming… the line kept getting longer. At Kawananakoa Middle School, my polling place, people were lined up all the way around the cafeteria, around the next building, all the way to School Street and the line was quickly backing up to Pali Highway. It just kept getting longer! It was exciting to watch and shocking to see.

As I approached the location where I’m designated to vote, I saw all the people… on the wrong side of the school… what are they doing on that side? Uh, the line was that long! The media had obviously picked up on things and there where news hounds wandering around with cameras hoisted on their shoulders. As it turned out, it was the same way across the island. All across the State we had a voter turnout of 37,000 — compared to about 4,000 or so at the last Presidential Caucus.

What a blast! History in the making, without a doubt! The Democratic Party didn’t expect it and they were as shocked as the rest of us. People were smiling in spite of it all and giddy with amazement!

It’s 7:00 PM and people were still showing up and traffic was worse than it is during morning rush hour! This caucus was not only momentous in its decisiveness, but it was historic in the amount of enthusiasm and the overall body count! For Hawaii, this was amazing. Even Dan Inouye said he felt proud witnessing this and he hadn’t felt anything like it since 1962.

One lady working with the 26th precinct (that overflowed into the auditorium) said, “It hasn’t been like this for over 20 years, and I’ve been here that long.” It was hot in the auditorium with all of the bodies and the flood lights. It was kind of neat for me though… the rest of the media was in the cafeteria so this was my little piece of news coverage.

While trying to somehow capture all of the emotion with this post, I was listening to the news reports from the various news channels as my husband continued to channel surf in the other room… and I was squealing with delight and even more shock as the numbers started coming over the air. I knew Obama would just have to pull it off here, but I was shocked yet again as I listened to the preliminary numbers. The outcome?

Barack Obama - 74%
Hillary Clinton - 26%

The reporters were all quick to remind us that these are preliminary numbers and we will not have a final breakdown of the delegate count until maybe as late as March 1st, but man or man! These numbers are just too huge for it to swing back the other away!

There was a lot of frustration and confusion but on this night we all saw and were a part of a historic moment! We finally got to have our say and be heard. We mattered!

Did I tell you guys that I got a new camera for Christmas? I’m hoping that the pictures will be improved since the mega pixel count is more than double what it was on the old one. The beauty of blogs is that those pictures we try very hard to get just right, stick around for a very long time. The photo albums of yesteryear are wonderful but the photos fade over time.

I have an old photo of my father that I will need to do something with before it is gone forever. I know there are people locally who do photo restoration. I’m afraid of that because this is the only real picture that I have of him, as I remember him. But, photo restoration may be my only option. Old photos are certainly worth restoring or preserving somehow!

This photo is what my father looked like during the latter years of his career as a history professor at UH Manoa. You can barely see it on the right of his face (case in point) but he is smoking a pipe. Like I said, it needs to be preserved, and restored, somehow.

Another thing that I ran across while I was searching around was a company that will actually take a photo and paint an artist’s rendition of it in oil! I have heard of this before but I have never really seen it in action like this. “Paint Your Life” — what a great name! Well, they certainly paint a person’s memories! Neat stuff and the videos on their site show you what they do step by step.

Yes, I know there’s Kat Vondee with her tattoo-artist’s eye, but this is art on canvas, not skin… and with oils! If you want to, you can have them stretch the canvas, mount it, frame it and wrap it for shipping. Maybe this is another thing to add to my shopping page. Even though it’s a little late for Christmas, there are still the other occasions for gift-giving and this would certainly make a great birthday gift!

Those birthdays are coming along fast a furious too! Egads!

There’s an old State building on the corner of Merchant and Bethel Streets in downtown Honolulu. I walk past it all the time. I never really knew there was a functioning little theater in there! The building is just there and usually looks abandoned, like a lot of old State buildings. These buildings are not really abandoned but their age and lack of any visual activity around them gives the impression that they are.

There’s even a… a dispossessed person (that’s my kind word for the day) who spends a lot of time in the back corner between this theater-harboring, State building and the relatively-newer Bank of Hawaii parking structure.

Anyway, Kumu Kahua Theater is inside this quiet little building and has been having performances for quite some time. So, why did I choose this play? Well, once I found out about Kumu Kahua Theater, I’ve been wanting to go see some of the stuff that goes on there. I’m not sure how the subject came up but while talking to a fellow blogger who hangs her keyboard on the Leeward side of the island, she mentioned that she not only frequents the productions at Kumu Kahua Theater, but she was also familiar with this particular playwright’s work.

Great! I’ll get tickets to Ola Na Iwi (The Bones Live) so we can go too! It’s about what? Bones? Graveyards? Regular readers know how I love graveyards! So I get to finally meet an online friend and see a play about cemeteries! Perfect!

This is great! I’ve been trying to find a way to meet up with Skeet since… April or May, I think. Maybe longer. Then I get to see a play about Hawaiian graves and stuff! Uh, well, that’s not it exactly. Read on…

I was excited to finally meet Skeet and I was certainly not disappointed. On the contrary, while I expected her to be somewhat nonchalant about our meeting, I later told my mother that I couldn’t tell which one of us was the most excited! Skeet’s a more seasoned blogger than I am, and anyone who reads her stuff at Skeet’s Stuff gets a kick out of it! She blogged about our play adventure quickly afterwards. I have been slowed down for a few reasons, which I will tell you guys about later, I promise.

So, that part went well! Skeet is as bubbly and fun-loving as the “voice” in her blog. She’s vivacious and excited about the functions and opportunities that appeal to her internal scribe. Along with Skeet we got to meet her friend, nicknamed Dusty Flint, who shares many of Skeet’s passions. Dusty Flint (I’m guessing she quit smoking and that’s why her flint is dusty but I’m not sure) seemed as knee-deep in the passion of literary art forms as Skeet did.

Skeet and my mother hit it off quickly and Dusty Flint, to Mom’s delight, is an opera fan! We’re doing really well here. Skeet did a short write-up and put up a picture on her blog. Mine didn’t come out so well, but, I’ll include it anyway just to say I did.

We had so much to talk about, but at some point we had to stop talking to each other because the play was about to start! I have to admit, the play was confusing to me because there were so many parts that I kept trying to piece together — trying to link them the way you do when you read a novel. I kept trying to find the connection between the scenes. The reality was that they had nothing, yes I said nothing, to do with each other. The disassociated parts were inserts with a connection to the past that actually explained a lot of the “Why?” that was going on in the play.

Here’s an insert of my own. This familiar piece of art below is a lithograph of the 1824 painting by artist John Hayter, of Chief Boki, governor of Oahu, and his wife Liliha, who later succeeded him as governor of Oahu. This art work is owned by the Honolulu Academy of Arts.

In Ola Na Iwi, we are led to deduce that the spirit of Liliha lives in the bones that were illegally “rescued” from a museum in Germany by a young Hawaiian girl who, while visiting with a theater group, couldn’t bear the thought of leaving them behind when she returned home to Hawaii. So, while it wasn’t exactly cemetery stuff, we’ve got us a ghost! Liliha is part of the play! She’s smart too — she assumes a different name, Nanea, to manipulate the other characters into helping her achieve her goal — to come home where she belongs, and ultimately rest in peace.

Why were the bones so far away? How did they get there? Here’s where one of those disassociated scenes come in handy and explains, in a nutshell, that it was the anthropologists who took them many years before.  Grave robbers were paid to get these bones and turn them over to the scientists who then took them elsewhere for scientific study.

It was also one of those out-of-context, disassociated scenes that made me want to slap one of the characters as he spoke of the primitive shape of the… pacific islander’s skull. I say pacific islander for lack of a better word and for lack of a better memory — but you get the message.

At some point I found my internal voice saying things like, “Yes, change the scene please. I don’t want to listen to those idiots anymore!” Obviously the play was working on me (albeit not as the playwright had intended)… working on me and getting my emotions involved. Now that think about it, what we were actually seeing was a tongue-in-cheek peak at historic anthropology.

The play’s director, Sammie Choy, said it best in her portion of the play’s write-up when she talks about both the aspect of “cultural memory” and playwright, Victoria Nalani Kneubuhl’s thoughtful ability to take these seemingly separate scenes and treat them with equal amounts of understanding for both the native Hawaiians, and for the 19th century anthropologists. Choy writes that the anthropologists, as abominable as it is to us now, felt that “scientific advancement was a rationale for grave desecration.” After I had a chance to put it all in perspective, I understand what Kneubuhl was trying to accomplish.

Kumu Kahua Theater has a newsletter that explains all of these things. Had I read the issue with the synopsis and the essays by others about this play, I would have known what it was I was watching. But, then again, wouldn’t that have spoiled it? I don’t know. If I had read it ahead of time, my intellect might have been more involved with my experience of the play rather than my emotions.

If I hadn’t already been feeling that emotional impact, perhaps the closing monologue by Liliha, the spirit member of the cast portrayed by cast member, Mane, would not have been as capable of bringing me to tears. I already felt anger so the pain and subsequent restitution experienced by the wronged spirit of Chiefess Liliha was no problem for me to assume and digest.

Worth seeing? Absolutely. Advice? Read the newsletter so you know what it is you’re watching! You won’t spoil the story, so don’t worry. What it will do is help you to understand and appreciate the humor in it a little more.

One more tip: bring a napkin or tissue, just in case you need it. In a short little essay, Justina Mattos calls Ola Na Iwi a postmodernist look at science and culture. I have to agree. Mattos also quotes a portion of the closing monologue that we get from our ghost, the spirit of Liliha, which wraps it all up nicely and brings us emotional people to tears as it brings Liliha home. The part of that monologue that gets me even now:

“Lay me there on a bed of green ferns, of palapalai and laua’e, and maybe a bit of maile you found along the way. Hide the resting place with rocks and branches, hide it so only the birds know where I am, and then leave me. Leave me in the breathing, beating heart of my beloved ‘aina.”

The play continues through December 2nd. Check out the schedule of performances here.

Kumu Kahua Theater
46 Merchant Street
Honolulu, HI 96813
Phone: 808-536-4441

The memory of a man who loved Hawaii, as much as Hawaii loved him, was made tangible at the Neal S. Blaisdell Center in Honolulu last Thursday.

There are few places across the country, and maybe even across the world, that wouldn’t boast a fascination and admiration for this pop-music icon. But, I don’t know how many of these places could say that the feeling was, and still is, mutual.

There are many who have memories of his visits and many who tell stories about the concert that this statue commemorates. These 1,100 pounds of bronze immortalize the “Aloha from Hawaii” concert that took place in 1973.

According to some news reports, the concert was broadcast via satellite feed to 40 countries and had an estimated 1.5 billion viewers.

So who’s behind this? TVLand.com, with the permission and participation of Elvis Presley Enterprises, Inc., enabled this life-sized look alike to make its home on the grounds of Blaisdell Center.

There are still women who remember getting close enough to touch him or people who still have an article from that concert. Even after more than thirty years, the parking lot at Blaisdell was full of several hundred fans, all waiting for the unveiling of our newest tourist attraction.

People still have his pictures and memorabilia decorating their homes. Even at my house there’s a picture on the wall, with a piece of paper with what portends to be an original Elvis Presley signature.

Putin was the driving force behind the reunification of the Russian Orthodox Church in Russia (the Moscow Patrirchate) and the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia (ROCOR). For nearly a hundred years an ugly rift has existed between them because communism reared its ugly head in Russia in the early 20th century. On Thursday, May 17th, the Feast day of the Ascension, this separation was ended.

This is Honolulu. What does this have to do with us? Well, tonight there will be no vespers at the Russian Orthodox parish, and tomorrow we will only have a lay service. Where’s the priest of the Russian Orthodox Community of Hawaii? In Russia, of course! This is an historical event that clergy from all over the world, if at all possible, would and did make every effort to attend.

Time Magazine reports the story as follows:

Putin’s Reunited Russian Church
by Yuri Zarakhovich/Moscow

The Russian Orthodox Church was torn in two by revolution and regicide, by the enmity between communism and capitalism, nearly a century of fulmination and hatred. That all formally ended on Thursday in Moscow. Thousands of the Russian Orthodox faithful — including several hundred who flew in from New York — lined up under heavy rain to get into the Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior. There, they witnessed the restoration of the “Canonical Communion and Reunification” of the Moscow-based Russian Orthodox Church (ROC), which claims more than 70 million adherents, and the U.S.-based Russian Orthodox Church Abroad (ROCOR), which is believed to be 1.5 million strong. Many among the clergy and laity wept at the end of the 86 year-old schism brought about by the 1917 Bolshevik revolution, and the ensuing murder of the dethroned Tsar and the forced emigration of hundred thousands Russians defeated in Civil war.

This story of course goes on to talk about how Putin has only political reasons for this, but just to watch a man of this political stature cross himself in an Orthodox manner is something to behold! To view the entire service you can go here. Thank you to Reader Nectarios for that link.

Political Science major, Zachary Williams, on his blog at otium cum dignitate does a much better job of painting a background for this article than I can. Much of Zachary’s feelings mirror my own. There were many people in favor of this reunification and many people against it. I can see both sides since they both have very good cases for their positions.

Zachary can correct me if I’m wrong but I think that, for most Americans, being Orthodox is not about ethnicity — it’s all about the truth of Faith and the Church’s preservation and adherence to that Faith. Anyway, I digress. This is just another historic moment that Honolulu has some, albeit very small, amount of participation in, or is impacted by, the events of world history.

Talk about hidden treasure! I was out running one Saturday afternoon and caught site of this little place we must have passed a million times. I got closer to see just exactly what it was. A gift shop? It’s right next to Aloha Tower Marketplace so it must be. No, it’s not. It’s a museum! OMG, I love museums!

I made a date with my mother to go a week or so after Easter. So, we did. The Hawai’i Maritime Center is a must-see attraction that is certainly not advertised enough! The shows in Waikiki are great but here is a piece of Hawaii’s history put together so nicely with information that is invaluable! I kept thinking about how it should be a requirement that all Hawaiiana teachers go to this attraction. I think I’ll write a letter to the Department of Education. I don’t remember anyone teaching me this stuff! What made me walk into this place to begin with? This big fish! I thought it was strange that they would build such a large model… it’s not a model. It’s a REAL fish. Honest! Then I read signs that said, “World’s Largest Pacific Blue Marlin caught on Rod & Reel in Makaha, Oahu on June10, 1970.” No way! Back to the West side of the island again. Back to my old stomping ground. Well, sort of — I’m pretty sure this guy was out in a lot deeper water than I ever ventured into! I think I would have had a coronary if I suddenly figured out that I was swimming next to something as big as that without knowing it! For you fishermen out there, that is sixteen feet and 1,805 pounds of marlin! Caught with 130 lb test and an angling time of 45 minutes, Captain Cornelius Choy and his daughter, Gail, somehow brought this giant with a 97-inch girth to shore. He was made into a display by taxidermist, Jordon Lee. Anyway, we’re not even in the door yet and already fascinated.
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What is the fascination with lighthouses? Why do artists like Thomas Kinkade paint them all the time? Are they silent sentinels? Are they watchdogs that watch over the coastlines while we sleep? Are they lines of protection that keep passers by from crashing into our skylines? Are they places that harbor the romantic passion of lovers separated by distance or loss? Perhaps they are all of these things.

I have to say that I am going to take the stand that, for our purposes here, Pyramid Rock and Ka’ena Point lighthouses don’t make the cut to be included here or acknowledged for anything more than the light they give. I will only mention them in passing since they are either inaccessible, not worth seeing or both.

Pyramid Rock is a light fixed on top of a rock on a military base so it doesn’t count because not only is it nearly impossible to get to, there is no “house.”

Ka’ena Point has fallen due to coastline erosion and has been replaced by a light on top of a stick. Sorry, I have an attitude about Ka’ena Point because it is part of my old stomping ground as I was growing up. It is the part of the island that is, I feel, ignored and neglected by government officials.

Even the Coast Guard is now guilty of this same lack of interest in replacing/restoring one of its own lighthouses to its original glory.

Anyway, the Ka’ena Point lighthouse is no longer worth the trip unless you want to see the fallen over lighthouse now covered with graffiti; or, unless you want to see the light-on-a-stick which certainly interferes with any romantic sensibilities about lighthouses.

I will only deal here with places of interest that have significant meaning and/or give us something to talk about.

We’ll begin with Aloha Tower as it tops our pictorial story. I never even thought of Aloha Tower as being a lighthouse. I always considered it just a giant clock, and that’s only when I even paid any attention to it at all.

It used to stand as a solitary sentinel but now it has become the focal point for one of Honolulu’s newer, tourist-attracting shopping centers.

Some people will remember it as one of the fly-by photos during the opening sequence of the old TV show, “Hawaii 5-0.” Yes, it has been here that long… longer!

We’ll talk about Aloha Tower Marketplace in another post. I promise.

Did I say, “I promise?”

It seems to get me in trouble when I promise things.

Here we are back at Makapu’u Point so we can get up there and get pictures of the lighthouse.

Some time back I promised readers that I would get pictures of those abandoned bunkers left over from WW II.

Trying to be good to my word, I did indeed run up to the top to take pictures of these things that cannot be seen from the street below (including the lighthouse of course).

I need to note here that if you think you see anything in the waters surrounding this area, you probably do. This is a place people go to whale watch and there were whales in the water that day.

On this day that I went up to get these photos, a gentleman was standing calmly with his camera as he stood overlooking the lighthouse and the water below. He said he was watching a mother and baby humpback whale and he tried to point out a flipper emerging from the water, but I didn’t see it.

Back to my promise…

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You know those times in your life when you flip out? There are times in life when something triggers your brain to behave… differently. Well, mine did just that a couple of years ago. Some of us seek comfort in food (like me), some of us look to nature for quiet contemplation (like me), some of us like to walk in the rain (like me), and some of us are just plain weird (like me). I found a new source of fascination and relaxation - the cemetery.

I told you I flipped out. Of course it does help to have a fascinating one nearby.

I was completely ignorant of any kind of historic significance or stories of interest in connection with any of our cemeteries, except for Punchbowl cemetery of course. I mean, let’s face it, that’s not something people talk about very often. I was ignorant about just what a treasure a cemetery can be. Ignorant that is, until I got my hands on a copy of “Oahu Cemetery, Burial Ground & Historic Site” by Nanette Napoleon Purnell.

As I thumbed through the pages of the book with mild curiosity, I stumbled onto the story of Gil Jamieson, a young boy kidnapped, murdered and buried at the cemetery in 1928. He was only ten. I was suddenly taken back to my childhood when Mom said, “Don’t ever go with anyone in an automobile of any kind - even if they say they say that I have been hurt and they are going to take you to see me.” She said that same line to us so many times as we were growing up, along with the usual “don’t take candy from strangers” thing. So THAT’S why she kept saying that! Now I know why.

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