Writers / Catanzariti / Little Sunset Inn

Tales from the North Shore
1. Auflage 2013
ISBN: 978-0-9717956-7-9
Verlag: Aloha Romance Writers
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 264 Seiten

Hawai`i authors and poets took the bait and ran with it: create a poem or story anchored at Sunset Inn, a family-owned Victorian inn built at the turn of the last century on Oahu's fabled North Shore. The result is a delightful collection of historical, humorous, paranormal, and, yes, romantic vignettes sure to please anyone who's ever been to Hawai`i. Or dreams of going there. Or dreams...

Autoren/Hrsg.

Writers, Aloha Romance

Catanzariti, Carol

Little, Michael

Sorenson, Sally

Leseproben

Jodi Belknap Things Aren’t Always
What They Seem “SUNSET Inn! I can’t believe that old place is still standing!” I said to Dad when he told me where we were going as soon as I got home to Hawai‘i. “Of course it’s still standing,” he shot back, in the “I’m-in-charge” voice of my childhood. “It’s the most popular place on North Shore now. You won’t recognize it—new paint, nice big rooms. Besides, I told you, my old friend Joseph is celebrating his birthday at Sunset Inn. I want you to meet him.” In the garage before we left, I asked Dad, “Want to get started driving again? Maybe do a little warm up? The car’s all ready to go. I had it lubed and cleaned up for you.” Dad gave me a bewildered look. “My car? This is my car?” he said. The question jolted me into a thought I was nowhere near ready to deal with. I watched him open a back door for Maka, and told myself that his focus was on the dog, not driving—but I knew better. The reality is my father is not the same. No way. In fact, nothing’s the same. Heading out to Hale‘iwa I’m glad to see Dad in good shape, physically at least. The exercise program his cardiologist recommended after Mom died seems to be working. “Maka takes me for a three-mile walk every morning,” he announced, a little guiltily, when I arrived at our old house in Makiki Heights and saw his aging golden retriever lounging on the oversize futon in the front parlor. My mother never allowed Maka near the furniture, especially not the custom-made futon with its Hawaiian quilt cover. Now the old dog is snoozing happily in the back seat as I drive. Things have changed. Back in the 1970s I spent a lot of weekends with my father helping him and other members of the fledgling Hawaiian Railway Society restore sidetracked old steam locomotives, boilers, warped tracks, and a complicated assortment of rusty train parts for the startup of a vintage train ride service for locals and tourists. Sunset Inn was where we crashed at the end of long workdays. Rates were $12 a night, four to a room. It was a pretty tacky place, but a great hangout for a bunch of tired, dirty guys who just wanted some cold bottles of Primo and a good night’s sleep. Truth is, I’m looking forward to seeing Sunset Inn again and maybe catching up on what happened to those old steam locomotives we worked so hard to get running once more. “Son, did you bring your tape recorder?” my Dad asked, as we reached Hale‘iwa. A travel writer by trade, I don’t go anywhere without my tape recorder and a few extra cassettes. Having it for interviews or just to record my own notes makes my life so much easier. “You know I brought it. It’s in my bag in the trunk. Do you have something special for it in mind?” “Well, I’ve been thinking. You know the friend I told you we’re meeting? His name is Joseph, Joseph Iokewe. He worked on the old Dillingham railroad a long time ago. You remember the Hawaiian Railway Society? I’m still a member, and we’ve been collecting stories for the archives. Joe agreed to tell me about his experiences this weekend, but maybe it would be better if you…” “…could interview this Joseph and get his story recorded? Sure thing. But you better give me a little background before we get there.” “Right. Okay. Joe’s from an old Hawaiian family that goes way back to early voyaging time. He lived with his ‘ohana out Waianae way when he was young, and he knows…he knows all about trains—especially Dillingham’s train.” We’d reached the entrance to Sunset Inn by then and I soon saw that Dad was right; it was nothing like what I remembered. We drove to it on a driveway flanked with blooming yellow and red hibiscus bushes until we reached a building that barely resembled the rundown old house I recalled. Any evidence of what I remembered as a dingy façade of faded yellow was now painted white, with what looked like real New England whitewash. When we parked, a middle-aged guy in what I recognized as a vintage Hawaiian shirt from Reyn Spooner got up from an Adirondack chair on the lanai and trudged down the wide front stairway to greet us. “Aloha Joe,” my Dad said, as the two of them greeted each other before turning to me. “Joe, this is Kawika, my son from New York, who used to come out here with me all those years ago.” “Son, this is Joseph Iokewe; he runs the Sunset Inn now.” “Actually, I’m assistant manager,” a man who was a lot younger than I had anticipated said as we shook hands. “Aloha Kawika,” he said. “Welcome to the Sunset Inn…again.” “Glad to meet you. Glad to be here, too. My Dad’s been talking to me about you. I understand you’ve got a good story to tell about old times and the OR&L, Dillingham’s railroad. I’m looking forward to hearing it.” Joseph Iokewe looked at me oddly and then he laughed. “My story? Oh, I see. The railroad! Kawika, I’m Joseph number four. It’s the first Joseph Iokewe who wants to tell you folks about trains. He worked on the OR&L years ago. Let’s get you settled in your room, and Maka, too. There’s a grassy fenced-in lanai for him. Then we’ll join k?k?k?ne, my great-grandfather. He’s waiting for you in the Queen’s Parlor. I know he wants to get everything down that he still remembers. Oh, and your Dad probably told you already, tomorrow is his birthday, and you’re both to be honored guests at the party we’re holding for him.” After Maka was settled, we followed Joseph number four to a room in the center of the hotel surrounded by elegant glass panels etched with Hawaiian themes. I recognized a pahu, a drum, and what looked like Queen Lili‘uokalani’s favorite crown flower plants. There was something eerily familiar about the room and its fine furniture that I couldn’t get quite straight in my mind. The centerpiece was a round wood table I knew I’d seen somewhere before. An elderly gentleman rose from a chair beside it to greet us. “Aloha, aloha, my good friend. And you must be Kawika, the son who is a writer. Aloha kakou. Please…please sit down. You’ve had a long journey. We’ll have something pono to eat for lunch and then you can help me share my story.” We joined the first Joseph Iokewe, and after an hour of visiting and dining on a lunch unlike any I remembered from the old Sunset Inn, I set up the tape recorder. What follows is the story Joseph Iokewe shared with us the day before his birthday, word for word, exactly as it was told. Mr. Dillingham’s Fire Wagon
by Joseph Iokewe
Recorded at the Sunset Inn, Hale‘iwa, Hawai‘i I thought about it the first time I heard of the hotel Mr. Dillingham was building on the north shore of our island. He named it Hale‘iwa Hotel, house of the ‘Iwa, after the great birds that fish offshore. Hale‘iwa also means “beautiful home.” Benjamin Dillingham built his hotel so people would ride his train to stay in it. Even Queen Lili‘uokalani rode the train to the hotel, and though she hadn’t been Queen since 1893, she remained Queen in our hearts. But it wasn’t the hotel I thought so much about the year I was old enough to go to work for our family. It was the train that interested me. I wanted to be the engineer on the train that went to the hotel. A kua‘aina, a country boy like me? How could that be? So now I’ll tell you from the beginning about Mr. Dillingham’s fire wagon and me. When I was growing up life was very peaceful where we lived in Wai‘anae on the leeward side of the island of O‘ahu. Our whole family, all eleven of us, lived in a big house made of wood and stones with a lanai all around. Some days from the front of our hale you could see honu, turtles, swimming off shore, and kohol?, whales, down from the cold north seas to have their young in our warm waters. At the back of our house the Wai‘anae mountains kept us cool. Mango and papaya trees planted for shade and fruit edged one side of our house. Tutu’s garden of healing herbs grew on the other. Tutu could fix anything with her mixes of dried leaves, roots and berries. People came from all around the island to see her. She was a very wise healer. The best thing about our house was the ocean in front of it where we went swimming and fishing. Our family name is Iokewe, which means curved or crescent, like the curve of a wave when it reaches the sand on shore. Tutu said our family had lived beside the sea from first times. She said I would understand how important that was when I learned the chant that traces our genealogy from the beginning. Then and now I loved where we lived, and I loved my family too, from Tutu to my best friend and cousin Kalani. It used to be peaceful there, but changes began long before I became a man. The biggest was in 1889. That year Mr. Dillingham’s men finished laying long sticks of steel across blocks of wood they put on the ground all along the coast from Honolulu to ‘Aiea, a town about fifteen miles south of us. They said it was for a new way to travel that was much better and faster than the horse and wagon we used when Tutu and my mother and sisters went to Honolulu. That took all day. The new way would be by ka‘aahi, a fire wagon, or what Mr. Dillingham and his men called a locomotive. It was like a big cart made of steel but without horses to pull it. Instead it had an engine fed by burning coal that heated up water to turn into steam. The steam made its wheels go around. The ka‘aahi moved fast along those steel sticks called rails, pulling cars behind it for...