Hawaii
Remembering Pearl Harbor: How a Gilded Age Scoundrel Waged a War of Words over the estuary that became Pearl Harbor
In the early hours of Sunday, December 7, 1941, seventy years ago, Japanese bombers launched a surprise attack against the US military base at Pearl Harbor. The devastating attack on Hawaii, which was then an American territory, profoundly shook the nation and hastened its entry into World War II. But nearly seven decades before “Remember…
Read More“The Descendants” at the Napa Valley Film Festival
Opening night at the inaugural Napa Valley Film Festival began with a walk along a red carpet into the city’s refurbished Napa Valley Opera House, a grand name for a frontier theater dating back to 1880. Screen actors, a few industry executives, and a good sampling of Napa locals (some dressed glamorously in boas and satin evening gowns, others…
Read MoreMy Conversion to Liking Breadfruit: “I’ve been ulu-cized!”
When I arrived at a garden near the town of Captain Cook, on the big island of Hawaii, to attend a Breadfruit Festival in late September, I was a skeptic. Beforehand, I’d talked to one of the world’s leading experts, the Breadfruit Institute’s Director, Diane Ragone PhD., who had told me she hadn’t cared for…
Read MoreMeeting the Alice Waters of Hawai‘i: Chef Alan Wong
“Be sure to eat on the flight” the oft-repeated joke goes, “because the airplane meal is likely to be the best you’ll have on your trip to Hawai‘i.” Honolulu magazine’s October cover story on Hawaiian regional cuisine traces that jibe about the Aloha State’s supposed lack of gourmet dining to Bon Appetit’s former editor-in-chief Barbara…
Read MoreHow Novelist Kaui Hart Hemmings landed a role opposite George Clooney in “The Descendants”
The statistics are daunting: less than two percent of all the books optioned for the screen ever enter production. Far fewer make it into theaters. My first book, The House of Mondavi was optioned twice, but never came close to becoming a movie. That’s why it’s been a vicarious thrill to watch Kaui Hart Hemmings’…
Read MoreKava in South Kona
I caught a glimpse of the sign out of the corner of my eye: “Ma’s Nic Nats & Kava Stop.” I made a quick U-turn on the Mamalahao Highway in South Kona and headed back, pulling across from a laundromat where children chased each other outside as their parents waited for clothes to dry. From…
Read MoreAn Afternoon with a U.S. Poet Laureate
As a long-time reporter, I’ve met a lot of people. Perhaps the most inspiring was our current U.S. Poet Laureate, William S. Merwin.
Read MoreSinging with the choir
So it was with delight and some trepidation that I accepted an invitation to sing along with the choir at a Sunday service, directed by “Auntie Nola.” I joined the soprano choristers, who wore formal mu’mu’u dresses in a pattern of green, black and white brightened with sprays of delicate orchid blossoms. It was an opportunity to sing the last queen of Hawai’i’s songs in her own church with people who’d grown up with her music. And the experience profoundly moving — joining together with these beautiful voices to perform the queen’s own songs. It touched me in a way that no amount of reading or writing ever could.
Read MoreMy Dinner with Amy
I knew I’d found a soul sister who also loved research when I clicked onto Amy Stillman’s blog and found her posting, “Adventures in Archives.” For the past three years, I’ve been making trips to the treasure trove of Hawaiian historical archives located in Honolulu. Amy Ku‘uleialoha Stillman, a Harvard-educated associate professor of music and…
Read MoreSearching for Kau Kau
I first came across the word “kaukau” in a note that the Hawaiian Princess Ka‘iulani wrote to Robert Louis Stevenson more than a century ago. The Scottish novelist and his family had arrived in Honolulu in the afternoon of January 24, 1889, and the beautiful princess dropped them a short note, inviting them to her family’s estate and adding that “Papa promises good Scotch kaukau….” Arnold Hiura’s new book, titled Kau Kau: Cuisine & Culture in the Hawaiian Islands, explains the origins of this word and a lot more.
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