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Submarine or monster?

» Kona Coast

Randy Makapu'u and Tokelani Green flew into Kona and spent the night at the newly renovated Sheraton Keauhou (the old Kona Surf). In separate rooms, to his dismay. She was totally hot.

But it hardly mattered. Randy was so excited about getting to see -- to actually walk! -- the land that could be his, well, he was the happiest kanaka in the world. And once he got the land, ho, get plenty wahine then, garans.

The next morning they met for an early breakfast in the Kai restaurant, and Randy thought he'd died and gone to heaven when he tasted the Kalua Pig Eggs Benedict.

"I can build one hotel like this? Get one chef can cook like this?" he said.

"Short of building a nuclear reactor or setting up a brothel, you can do just about anything you want, Mr. Makapu'u," Tokelani chuckled. She loved her job with the Pono Commission, righting old wrongs for Hawaiian people. Randy was a perfect example. Full Hawaiian, he'd barely graduated from Nanakuli High, was lucky to work as a security guard with Portagee Protective and had zero chance of owning land. Until now.

"Oh my goodness, look at this," Tokelani said, pointing to a headline in the newspaper that had been left on her door and she brought down.

Submarine or Sea Monster?

The AP story reported that three guys fishing a couple of miles off Kawaihae were shocked when they thought they saw a submarine surfacing right beside them and -- thinking "Ehime Maru!" -- nearly wet themselves.

" 'But da buggah no come straight up,' the boat's owner, Shigeki Guerrero of Kailua-Kona, was quoted as saying," Tokelani read aloud. "'It kinda glided up and across the surface, so then I think it's one humpback. It's the season, yeah? But then, ask my friends here, it just kept coming and coming. Must've took a minute or more for all of it to pass us by. It was big as one submarine, for sure, but curved, and kinda splotchy, like one eel.'"

Randy laughed, Tokelani read ahead and summarized: "AP checked with the Navy, no subs in the area, although even if there were they wouldn't say so. They also checked with a prof in Hawaiian Studies at UH, who mentioned the legend of a 300-foot eel, the embodiment of Keko'ona, a Molokai chief in ancient times. Hmmm ... Oh, and get this. The story ends, 'Police say alcohol may have been a factor.'"

They both had a good laugh.

Randy washed down the last of the kalua pig with some fresh-squeezed orange juice. "You know, I think I could get used to this kine life."

Tokelani smiled, sipped her Chinese white tea, glanced at her watch, said "The chopper should be here soon."

"I'm ready!" he said, jumped up. "My life's about to change!"

In ways, Tokelani knew, he could never guess.

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