THE KAHUNA WOMAN OF MOLOKAI
The morning after the tsunami sirens, Gramma drove us to Kamehameha Highway and headed east. Ben sat in the jeep’s passenger seat and I was in back; we wore Boston Red Sox T-shirts, jeans, and rubber slippers. The tires shook the wooden slats of the bridge at Kainalu Stream. There were no churches east of the ranch and locals were reading the Holy Bible handwritten in the Hawaiian language. Kiawe and kukui nut trees grew on the mauka side of the road. Telephone poles were smothered by vines. Our tires squashed guavas and lilikoi that had rolled down from the mountain. The air smelled tangy. Red and yellow torch ginger flashed in the underbrush. I spotted purple orchids and the snowcaps of “Chinese” pikake. On the makai side, kuleanas were fenced in by rusty posts and barbed wire. Dirt roads led to plywood shacks with tar paper roofs. Men drank beer on doorsteps. A woman stood in a loi cutting taro leaves with a sickle. Children chased one other through a gauntlet of coops, pigpens, and mounds of tires. Poi dogs barked. Families on the east end were so large that, when they ran out of Christian names, the parents named boys after cars. I’d met Mercury and Dodge when I was catching pollywogs in Kainalu Stream and we watched their brother Plymouth spear a Samoan crab.
We passed the last big fishpond on the east end. Peace Corps tents squatted on the land beside the pond. Volunteers had been sent from California and Oregon to cut trails from Kaunakakai to Wailau Valley. The volunteers were supposed to educate islanders about planting and survival but the locals were the ones bringing them food and teaching them how to fish. Gramma pointed at the encampment. “Monkeyin’ in those tents,” she said and launched into the benefits of abstinence. She said sagging breasts signaled low morals. A girl was letting boys “monkey” with her if she sagged.