Keeping Score
No lei good enough
for great manHow to choose a lei? It's such a personal gift. But what if it's for a statue?
This was the dilemma Friday when shopping for a lei that would become part of the 112 (temporarily) draped on Duke Kahanamoku's statue on Kuhio Beach. It took longer to decide on it than it lasted on his left outstretched arm, thanks to the city workers who removed mine and about another 100 before they punched out for the weekend at 5 p.m.
But back to Kahanamoku ... What did he like? Fred Hemmings said he didn't know, and he was one of Duke's boys, one of his traveling surf team.
"I always saw him wearing maile at functions but those were probably given to him," said Hemmings. "Maile is a man's lei. It suited him."
The 15-foot maile lei created by the inmates of the Kulani Correctional Facility on the Big Island was a perfect fit. A larger-than-life lei for a larger-than-life man.
It was a touching ceremony Friday, begun with a procession from the Outrigger Waikiki with the majority of the leis transported on surfboards. It was led by Richard "Babe" Bell, the pu (conch) blower.
"His boat was down at the yacht club," said Bell. "I didn't know him personally, but he always said hello when we paddled by. He knew our names."
And, of course, they knew his. As did the world.
Pictures often show him wearing the double red carnation lei made famous by former Gov. George Ariyoshi, Elvis Presley, Alfred Apaka and Jack Lord. That lei seems to symbolize the Hawaii of the 1960s, particularly for someone whose working knowledge of the islands was based on Father Damien, Gidget and a stop before Vietnam. (But I knew enough in 1964 to name my female chihuahua "Wahine." Our current dog is named "Duke.")
Kahanamoku passed away on Jan. 22, 1968. It was a tumultuous time in the U.S. and the world; he didn't live to see the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, nor the death of innocence of the Olympics he loved and represented so well.
Some eight months after Kahanamoku's ashes were scattered off Waikiki, the Games became a political statement. Black Americans Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who finished 1-3 in the 200-meter race, bowed their heads and gave the Black Power salute during the national anthem as a protest against racism in the U.S..
Kahanamoku had experienced racism first-hand as a native Hawaiian traveling the U.S. in the days of segregation. Those who knew him said he never dwelt on the treatment, that he wore an aura of aloha like a lei.
So what to buy to honor this great man? Yellow plumeria to match his three gold medals? There were dozens of those Friday --trust me, there were. It created a scent of Waikiki reminiscent of the time when Kahanamoku rode the surf.
One lei called out from behind the refrigerated doors. Crown flower and he'e.
Crown flower. Queen Liliuokalani's favorite, the queen who came to power five months after Kahanamoku's birth. And he'e, from the octopus tree. While he'e means octopus in Hawaiian, it also means to slide or surf.
As in he'e nalu.
As in Duke Kahanamoku.
And to whoever ended up with my lei, please wear it in the spirit of which it was given. With aloha. For Duke.
Cindy Luis' column appears periodically.
E-mail Cindy at cluis@starbulletin.com