he weather was spectacular during the
ASTA meeting in Hawaii last week. The temperatures were in the
mid-80s during the day and dropped to the comfortable 70s in the
evenings.
On my last day in Honolulu, I had a little free time and walked
along Kalakaua Avenue in the heart of Waikiki. The old Hawaiian
Regent hotel, whose opening I had attended in 1971, is now a
Marriott. I stopped there briefly, remembering another time in the
late 1970s when I was there with my young sons. It was hard to
believe that those boys, then 10 and 7, are now 35 and 32.
Just inside the hotel, I found a store specializing in Hawaiian
art and bought a small print with a view of Diamond Head by a local
artist.
I took a taxi to the Ala Moana Shopping Center where I searched
for CDs of Hawaiian music to bring home to my daughter. I try to
bring her recordings of the local music from wherever I may be.
There was a kiosk in the mall devoted to the music of the locals
including recordings by two fine musicians who had just performed
at the ASTA meeting, a young electric ukulele performer named Jake
Shimabukuro and a singer named Amy Hanaiali'i Gilliom.
Shimabukuro had given, no pun intended, an electrifying
performance at the convention, turning his ukulele into a symphony
orchestra, and Gilliom had sung a few Hawaiian songs with great
warmth. I bought albums by both of them.
Incidentally, if you want to order Hawaiian music from the store
I visited, they have a Web site at hawaiianmusicstore.com with their full inventory.
That evening, I attended a dinner sponsored by TravelAgeWest at
the Halekulani Hotel, one of the great hotel gems of the world.
I arrived well before the hosts and their guests and had time to
sit on the terrace and listen to a Hawaiian band playing alongside
the beachfront.
The breeze was soft and warm and the Pacific was there before us
in its quiet majesty.
For just those few moments, before the crowd arrived, I had the
luxury of feeling good to be alive, and grateful to be in such a
beautiful, peaceful place.