Big Island, Small Town
Walking down Piha Kahuku Road in Nīnole on the Big Island of Hawai’i, half an hour north of Hilo, the Pacific Ocean stretches as far as the eye can see. The sloped residential road is lined with guava trees. Vividly green rolling hills extend in every direction before the blue backdrop. Cows graze peacefully and the occasional wild pig can be seen scuttling across the road before taking shelter in the tall grass on the other side. Dogs bark and run alongside fences, chasing any moving object as far as their yards allow them. The road is quiet, with only the sounds of nature filling the early morning air, except for the occasional car as it slows down to approach the lone walker and offer a ride back up the hill.
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It’s Tuesday afternoon in nearby Hakalau, which means it’s Food Share day. The Hakalau Food Share is similar to a farmers market but more low-key, as no vending permits are required. Fifteen small tables line the edge of a soccer field, each table accompanied by a vendor in a folding chair under a tent. A Thai lady cooks vegetable spring rolls and banana lumpia on two deep fryers as her four children collect one dollar bills and distribute the food. Everyone seems to know each other on a first name basis. Mothers with wicker baskets stroll in with waddling toddlers trailing behind and older couples shuffle from one table to the next, conversing with neighbors and catching up with friends they see every Tuesday at Food Share. Twenty some-odd Central American guys yell “aquí” and “detrás” at each other in Spanish as they kick the ball around the field in a feisty game of pickup soccer. Nobody is in a rush and time crawls.
A man sits behind a collapsible table with a variety of colorful fruits displayed in front of him. A line of plastic ziplock bags filled with red, round fruits draws my attention. Lychees.
The man behind the table is so many shades of tan darker than me that he could be a different race. Framing his weathered skin and black sunglasses, an untamed mane of dark brown, curly hair explodes in every direction. Adam, he says, reaching his hand across the table. He tells us that he quit his job as a professor of neuroscience in California in search of a more authentic life. “I miss and crave academia, but students don’t have intellectual curiosity anymore. They are stuck in an endless cycle of cramming for exams, spitting out the information like robots, and then forgetting everything they just learned,” he explains. “We are so caught up in the superficial that we lose sight of our true passions, values, and desires.”
Life on the farm is slow-paced. When I feed the chickens, I focus on not stepping on their bony feet as they swarm around me in a frenzy of hungry anticipation. When I squat in the rows of cucumber plants in the greenhouse, I feel the sun’s warmth soak into my skin through the translucent, polycarbonate roof. On my daily morning walk down the hill, I absorb the vastness of the Pacific Ocean laid out before me, allowing the image to imprint in my brain. I am forced to live one day at a time. It’s that simplicity of farm life, I think, that forces me to slow down. That simplicity, normally masked by the distractions of consumerism, competition, and greed, is a gift.
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From the road overlooking the black sand Honoli’i beach on the Big Island’s east coast, I watch the specks resembling people as they ride the waves in toward shore. The sky is painted a swirl of pastel pinks, purples, and blues. The surfers look elegant, some of them taking two graceful steps backward and another two forward on their boards, and others fluidly dropping off their boards into the water once the wave has run its course. I stand mesmerized watching the water ballet. It’s just before 7 o’clock and the sky is a canvas of pastels as the sun begins its retreat over my shoulders, casting a warm light on the ocean below.
Laughter floats into my ears as I stand under the tent surrounded by seven or eight locals and my two friends from the farm. The voices overflow with energy and life, and people gather under the tent, helping themselves to sausage fresh off the grill and dripping drinks from the cooler. A little boy, supposedly someone’s cousin, rolls past barefoot on a skateboard. Reggae fills the air. A middle-aged guy with Rastafarian dreadlocks gathered in a ponytail at the back of his head sits in the bed of the pickup truck, legs dangling off the edge. He faces a hefty, smiling man holding a beer in one hand and a joint in the other.
I inhale the rich aroma of the sausage and, for the first time in a long time, my pescatarian palate craves meat. Right here, under this tent, watching the surfers dance on the waves below and listening to the laughter fill the air around me, I have a “how is this my life right now” moment. I’ve been having a lot of those lately. A week ago, my friends and I met a guy at a nearby river. “LJ, short for Leeroy Junior,” he had said eagerly as we stood on the wooden bridge, the river rushing and gurgling below us. He talked our ears off for about 20 minutes and a couple of days later, we decided to take him up on his offer for a surf lesson. “How about Thursday afternoon?” he had suggested. “My friends and I will set up on the road above the beach.”
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Half an hour north, at Laupāhoehoe Point Beach Park, the smell of Kalua pig roasting on grills travels from the campground down to the dock where children launch themselves into the water, screeching with laughter. Laupāhoehoe Park, situated along the Hāmākua coast north of Hilo, is a recreational campground comprised of a large, open grassy area with a bathroom and outdoor shower facility; a ramp, previously used to launch small boats, situated between two wooden docks and leading into the water; a concrete pier jutting out into the ocean; and a shoreline of jagged, protruding black lava rocks. The name Laupāhoehoe, composed of the words “lau,” or “leaf,” and “pāhoehoe,” or “smooth lava,” literally means “leaf of lava” and refers to the lava peninsula on which the village was built. Laupāhoehoe is known for its dramatic coastline and as a warning to all who would take the ocean for granted.
By the late 1800s, the quaint fishing village had grown into a plantation town with a bustling port. The construction of the sugar plantation was followed by the construction of a railroad a few years later to service the web of mills on the island. The town was prospering. But on April 1, 1946, a devastating tsunami hit the Big Island, killing 159 people. Of those, 24 were schoolchildren and teachers at the local school in Laupāhoehoe. Needless to say, the railroad was also destroyed. A monument honoring the children and teachers swept out to sea stands on the rebuilt school’s grounds, reminding people of the ocean’s sheer power.
Today, the craggy rocks and violent surf surrounding most of the park don’t make for the most inviting swimming conditions. However, the pier, serving as a sort of barrier, creates a partially sheltered cove, perfect for swimming and kayaking, conditions permitting. The dock is frequented by local children and their parents, who sit a little distance away in folding camp chairs, fishing poles in hand. Some of the older kids hurl their bodies off the picnic table on the dock and into the water below, while the younger ones play in the waves lapping over the concrete boat launch ramp. I watch one as he bodysurfs in, somehow managing not to hurt himself on the hard concrete, then dives under the surface, letting the magnetic pull of the wave drag him back out so he can repeat the process 20 more times, never once tiring. A couple of older men and women sit at the end of the pier, casting their lines out and patiently awaiting their catch of the day.
The park is busiest on Friday and Saturday nights, when families convene for large barbecues. Mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, cousins, aunts and uncles, and grandparents come together to celebrate the weekend with music, volleyball, good company, and plenty of roasted pig. Children chase each other around the grass, weaving their way between tents, and parents gather in circles talking and laughing.
My host on the farm, Drean, introduced us to the park when we first arrived. Some days after work, he would say, “Boat launch, anyone?” and we’d pile into the green Subaru and head down for yet another afternoon at Laupāhoehoe. Drean is a large, somewhat egg-shaped man in his early 70s. He lives up on the hill in nearby Nīnole with his wife, Pam, and his two beloved (and ratty-looking) little dogs. An avid swimmer - and probably aided by his buoyancy - Drean is always eager to go for a swim at the boat launch.
I paddle around with my two friends from the farm, Janelle and Orchid, ducking my head under every couple of seconds, hoping to catch a glimpse of some fish. I dive down and pop up a few feet away. I push my goggles up onto my head and squint, scanning the water for Drean, but he is long gone. I finally make out a small speck in the distance, swimming even with the pier. Drean fell in love with the island when he moved here in the ‘70s. A few years later, he met Pam and fell in love again. Drean is one of the founders of the Hakalau Food Share. Passionate about organic farming and sustainable food systems, he, along with a couple of other community members, conceived the idea of Food Share, and then got the ball rolling. Every Tuesday, we finish work early to accompany Drean to Food Share. We set up the tent, table, and two chairs and lay out our goods on the vinyl tablecloth. Juicy cucumbers from the greenhouse, Drean’s homemade kimchi (not a bestseller, although Drean is always very proud of it), freshly-laid eggs, and sometimes a few different variations of lettuce from a neighbor who could not attend herself.
During my month on the Big Island, I witnessed and experienced a lifestyle different from anything I had known before. Life in my little corner of New England, as much as I love it, is a world away from life on the eastern coast Hawai’i’s Big Island, both literally and metaphorically, geographically and culturally. We grow up in a fast-paced, individualistic society. A society that prioritizes competition and monetary success over community.
Immersion in a community-centered society was eye-opening for me. As I was graciously welcomed into strangers’ lives, I realized the value of slowing down and connecting with those around me - something that, of course, I always appreciate, but is often overtaken by the galloping individualistic pursuits sweeping us along.