WALKING STORIES
By Cynthia Oi, Star-Bulletin
Siu Angilau from Tonga sells bananas near
Waiale'e beach park.
North Shore is
By Cynthia Oi
still country
Star-Bulletin
Day 7: Malaekahana to Sunset Beach, 8.4 milesWith the light rain and dimness of dawn, the hills above Kahuku are barely visible. So when the real rain starts -- noisy, splashing drops -- the ridges disappear completely, becoming only smudges of green.
The tearing wind whips through branches of ironwood trees, scattering pine cones along the roadside. It sets the mane of a horse to dancing while the unperturbed animal grazes calmly in a pasture at Gun Stock Ranch.
The ocean air mixes with the peaty scent of cut grass, bushes and shrubs; the clouds shift one layer over the other. It is cold, wet, windy and beautiful.
The walk from Malaekahana Bay to Sunset Beach is one of contrasts. While houses crowd the shoreline, the acres inland recall Oahu's agricultural past. Cultivated fields hide behind wind breaks of ironwood and other trees. Across the Turtle Bay Hilton golf courses, bananas trees and corn stalks quiver in the wind. Further down Kamehameha Highway, soy beans, papayas and ti plants stand in straight lines.
Kaui Tano likes the agricultural nature of his neighborhood. He helps his uncle raise tomatoes, greens and "indigenous plants" at a farm behind the Cackle Fresh building in Malaekahana."I get one job, braddah!" the 15-year-old sophomore yells out to his friends. It is an hour before classes begin and the teenagers have gathered at a drive-in across the street from Kahuku High and Intermediate School. Some gobble down breakfast, others others smoke cigarettes and whisper conversations.
Tano is pleased with himself. He was working for free but convinced his uncle that he should be paid. "I get $3 a hour," he says, a goofy grin of pride on his face.
He likes the rural lifestyle as does Kehau Kaahu. Kaahu, 15, lives in Hauula, and doesn't like to leave her neighborhood.
"I no like town," she says. "Boring, no more nothing to do in town. Here, we can go cruising, go beach, play volleyball. My friends go clubs on the weekend, but I no like."
Kaahu's friend, Judah Perez, 15, also likes "the country kind living."
"Here, we get everything we need," he says. Perez moved to Hauula from North Kohala on the Big Island a year ago. He misses his friends, the horses he used to ride and the hunting.
When a friend suggests he go hunting here, he shakes his head.
"I no hunt here 'cause I don't know where get pigs," he said.
Sina Ross, a junior, wants to live on the mainland after she graduates from high school. Travel industry is what she's interested in because "I want to fly free." Her companions laugh.
"There's more stuff to do on the mainland, more people -- more stores." Again her friends laugh and chatter about how they'd like to live on the mainland, too.
A quiet "not me" comes from the other end of the table.
Joneau Melancon, a senior, says she would miss her friends and the lifestyle if she moved to the mainland.
"I want to stay here all my life," she says with the assurance of the young. "There's no place else for me."
Ah Han Silva, 16, sums it up: "We live out here because it's beautiful."
She's right. At Waiale'e beach park, the clouds recede for a few minutes and the rays of sun shimmer on the waves while a young woman and a boy sift their hands through the sand.
By Cynthia Oi, Star-Bulletin
Sheep graze at the University of Hawaii Livestock
and Poultry Research Facility between Turtle Bay and
Sunset Beach.
Across the road, Siu Angilau turns her brown face toward the sky to catch some warmth, her hands resting on the counter of her vendor's booth. She sells bananas, papayas, passion fruit and pineapple along the highway, patiently explaining what's what to tourists who stop on their round-the-island drive.The Tongan woman works in the booth almost every day, she says, even when the weather is bad. As she speaks, the rain begins again, but she just smiles.
The animals at the University of Hawaii's livestock research facility don't seem to mind the rain either. The cows are oblivious to everything as they bellow and jostle each other to get at a stack of hay. The sheep chew on, disturbed only when a human comes near. They scurry away to a safe distance, then turn skeptical eyes on the intruder.
The rain dwindles again, but puddles remain in front of Sunset Beach Market and Ted's Bakery. Cars send muddy waves splashing against the store's concrete walkway. Two men sit on the narrow bench in front of the store while a woman yells at one of them.
"Buy me a soda, c'mon, buy me a soda," she shouts. The man, a thin fellow with a baseball cap and backpack, ignores her.
Later in the morning, the woman has acquired a cheeseburger -- and a can of soda -- and tries to feed the thin man.
He slaps her hand aside, angry not at her but at another woman he is arguing with. What the argument is about is muddled, but the two exchange obscenities: he calls her a "C" word, she calls him another "C" word.
Other customers, mostly surfers, surfer girls and wannabe surfers here for the contest going on at the beach up the road, become an unwilling audience.
The angry woman goes into the store, but when she comes out, the obscenities continue until another man comes to her rescue.
"Chill, chill," he says to the thin man who will do nothing of the sort. He continues to rant even after the woman has driven away.
Cheeseburger lady tries to calm the thin man, but after several rebuffs, she gives up.
Thin man, muttering to himself, retrieves the branch of flowering bougainvillea he had flung on the ground in his rage. Rummaging through his backpack, he finds a length of green dental floss. He ties each end of the branch with the floss, then drapes the garland over the bill of his black baseball cap. He appears pleased with the result and dons the hat, hauls his backpack to his shoulder and shuffles off. The rain batters the pink blossoms as he goes.
