• Wahine Kahiko:

Halau Hula ‘O Kamuela

Halau Na Mamo O Pu’uanahulu

Halau Hula Olana

Ka Pa Hula O Kauanoe O Wa’ahila

Halau Mohala ‘Ilima

• Wahine ‘Auana:

Hula Halau ‘O Kamuela

Halau Na Mamo O Pu’uanahulu

Ka Leo o Laka I Ka Hikina O Ka La

Halau Hula Olana

Halau Mohala ‘Ilima

• Wahine overall

Hula Halau ‘O Kamuela

Halau Na Mamo O Pu’uanahulu

Halau Hula Olana

• Kane Kahiko

Halau Na Mamo O Pu’uanahulu

Ke Kai O Kahiki

Kawaili’ula

Halau Keali’i ‘O Nalani

• Kane ‘Auana

Halau Na Mamo O Pu’uanahulu

Ke Kai O Kahiki

Kawaiili’ula

Halau Ke Ki’ai A O Hula

• Kane Overall

Halau Na Mamo O Pu’uanahulu

Ke Kai O Kahiki

Kawaiili’ula

• Overall winner

Hula Halau ‘O Kamuela

Wanda A.

This is pretty much all I got for now. I gotta go buy major omiyage for the office and stuff, and I need to sleep before tonight’s marathon. … And for the first time in covering MM 5 years, I have no idea, none, puka, a’ole, who is going to win tonight. So I gotta get my game face on.

Mahalo for reading The Honolulu Advertiser and my blog and enjoy the hula tonight!!!!

Let’s talk hula.

Random notes from Miss Aloha Hula night:

I wrote this: “You know how every little girl wants to be a bride in a fabulous white dress. … Every Island girl wants to be Miss Aloha Hula, dancing in a dress with a fitted top and a full skirt flowing around her and the Makaha Sons or the Caz or that hunky Kaumaka’iwa Kanaka’ole singing their hearts out for you.” And right after I wrote that, I turned and, behind me, was the most gorgeous little girl, watching Miss Aloha Hula with her mother (who was a great help to me in identifying flowers as we watched the dancers). I asked the little girl if someday she wanted to be on that stage and she said, “No, everyone would be looking at you.” So, so much for my deep insights into the minds of young women.

Possible color trend (not as clear as in some years): red/russet/maroon/burgundy….moving over into fuschia/pink/rose. (Of course, this year, the official T-shirt is red, for the lehua, flower of Hilo.)

Possible flower trend: Pikake. The scent is everywhere and numerous gorgeous pikake colors and longer lei were seen on competitors as well as spectators. Although puakenikeni did make a big showing: There was one contestant that had like 6 strands, maybe 8, to her knees!

Best overheards of the day: Tehani to Paula, “Just put your head down and keep going.” To understand how funny this is, you have to know that Tehani and Paula are TV personalities and they’re trying to get to the bathroom during a station break and people keep stopping them to talk story. And the bathroom lines at Merrie Monarch? Even for VIPS, who have a special lua; even if you have access to the honey buckets in the back … it can take a while to go benjo. I missed a whole song!

Another overheard: Just before Miss Aloha Hula first runner-up Kapalai’ula de Silva put her foot on the ramp to go on stage, her mother, who is also her kumu hula (teacher), Mapuana de Silva of storied Halau Mohala Ilima, whispered, “Have fun.” I was a few feet away, and I may have heard it incorrectly, but I think that’s what she said. Even if that’s not exactly right, you could not mistake the love that infused her expression and flowed out from her. I’ve been privileged to watch Mapuana de Silva in rehearsal a few times and she is so quiet and so centered and so expressive of positive values as she gently but firmly teaches. She is the mother all of us have wanted to have.

And “have fun”… what an enlightening thing to say to someone who is about to do something so demanding and frightening and potentially life-changing. There is no technical correction that can make a difference at the last minute. They’re ready or they’re not. So giving the person permission to have fun … how right.
It looked to me like Ms. De Silva did have fun, because she finished the night in a flat tie with the winner and it was only the complex numerical tie-breaker system that Merrie Monarch has in place that was able to mke a decision between winner Kalimakuhilani A. K. Suganuma and de Silva.
Both of them delivered performances that had me — a hula lover but very far from a hula expert— gasping out loud.
Among my notes is one that says”hands to face!” I was making note of the number of times I unconsciously slapped my hands to my face, dropped my jaw, cried out in awe … watching these Miss Aloha Hula competitors.

Another note says, “How good can we get?” — meaning how much more can these dancers achieve? Although we can quibble about song choice and such, the quality of the language usage, the depth of research, the chanting technique. … I’ve only been covering MM for five years and the increased sophistication, dedication to delving into the deeper meaning and ability to even play with the language in the way pre-contact Hawaiians loved to do is astonishing today compared to just a few years ago.
When Kalimakuhilani Suganuma was dancing her kahiko number, my notes read: “This is one of those difficult moments when, if you don’t speak the language, or know hula intimately, you can’t be sure how good the dancer is. But it looks to me like she’s very, very good. She has become the dance.”
It’s not that there was no one writing mele or doing research or playing with words five years ago (just think back to the year one of the men’s halau used Puakea Nogelmier’s nematode song). What’s different is that there are so many more people able to do it, as the Hawaiians so eloquently say, who are ma’a to it. The language, and with it the whole complex thing that is a culture, is seeping through our lives like water, spreading, finding its level, rising. It’s beautiful to see.

And speaking of beautiful … I’m going to file this now. It’s just before 7 a.m. Poli’ahu the snow goddess is doing things on top of Mauna Kea that are illegal in five states … the rosy tint of the dawn, the trailing line of mist, the bright white shining snow … ohmigosh. If only you could all be here with us!

You know you really love the oxtail soup when you find yourself trying to figure out a way to distract the sophisticated French chef across the table from you so you can pick up the bones with your hashi and slurp on them!

Mavro and Donna came into town to experience for the first time the free ho’ike, a gift each Wednesday night of Merrie Monarch week from Halau O Kekuhi to the people of Hilo. Which led to an interesting thought: Which is your favorite night of MM?

For me, when I’m watching in person, it’s the non-televised ho’ike that I love the best, which is always extremely lively, varied and exciting, with Halau O Kekuhi doing their ai haa (low, gutteral, energetic hula style) and their extremely honored and absolutely terrified invited guests (which range from Japanese halau to Maori and this year’s Tahitians and a Mexican dance troupe which also dances hula).

Plus, ho’ike also includes people who aren’t competing; it’s been the only time in some time that we’ve been able to see Johnny Lum Ho’s Ka Ua Kani Lehua troupe, for many, many years a perennial MM crowd pleaser and winner.

I asked my friend Tommy Boyd, who works for Bishop Museum and whose brother, Manu, has been both a commentator and a competitor on Merrie Monarch, about his favorite hula. His answer was: “’Auana, because it reminds me of the old days, the old Na Pua Lei, the old Mapuana; that’s what I used to love, the fabulous lines where not one inch of hair or body movement was out of place. If you had 50 girls, all 50 girls moved as though they were one girl. . . . the old old, party days, the old lu’au.”

I called my friend Marylene Chun, who arrived today from Kailua to attend MM, one of her favorite things — “hula heaven,” she calls it — and she said: “It would be kahiko, definitely. I love it for the ancient connections, the costuming. That’s where it all came from; the purity. So, hands-down, kahiko.”

I asked a Japanese national, who dances hula in Tokyo, who loves the art enough to have traveled across the ocean four of five times to see Merrie Monarch, Masako (she didn’t want to give her last name) and she said Miss Aloha Hula because (assuming the interpreter and I were in synch) “ in my dreams, I would like to do that.”

Doesn’t this say something about why this event is so popular and important? It reaches out to people who know and love hula in different ways and for different reasons.

Probably at some plate lunch or other.  All I seem to do in Hilo is eat and shop when there isn’t hula going on. (Well, actually, there is hula going on — rehearsals for the Merrie Monarch hula competition — and that is one of my reasons for coming here early. However, I haven’t seen many rehearsals, except for the Mexican “halau” I happened to catch when I dropped by the Stadium to get my press credentials.

(OK, now I have to explain the Mexican thing. You know how hula has become this huge thing in Japan? Well, it’s also now huge in Mexico. And this year, for the free ho’ike (demonstration) Wednesday night, Halau O Kekuhi invited a Mexican dance troupe.)

I’m not going to tell you everything I’ve done because I want to leave something for the print edition — but look foward to a where-to-eat-and-buy-omiyage in Hilo story, coming soon to a Honolulu Advertiser near you.

OK, so Monday of Merrie Monarch week is when you find out who is a serious MM fan, because these folks are already in town, even though the hula is three days off, and you run into them on Kamehameha Avenue, the main shopping drag of Hilo across from the Bay.  After an epicurean evening with my friends Sunday night (we cooked at their house and I tested recipes on them for the “Island Plate II” cookbook that The Advertiser wil publish next fall), I woke early Monday and went holoholo.

I visited my friends at Pua Lane flower shop, right next to the Hilo Hawaiian. I had ordered a lei poo for my papale and I went over there to pick it up. (And every last person who has seen it since has asked me about it praised it and wanted to find out where I got it — it’s a gorgeous, but not over-ostentatious, mixture of liko and liko hehua and other stuff.)

Then, after doing some work, I decided to check out the shopping opportunities on Kamehameha. I found a parking place, thinking about picking up something new at Sig Zane’s and Hana Hou and checking out the rather cool Salvation Army story they have here and poking my head in Basically Books. … And what happens is, I see this gorgeous guy with long ringlets and lots of tattoos (don’t get jealous, husband, it wasn’t like that, he was 20 years younger than me if he was a day… but he’s sitting on the sidewalk, with a guitar case open next to him for tips, and singing something (can’t remember what) from the ’60s.

I started to walk by and suddenly, it was like, “Look, you don’t have to be anywhere. You don’t have to do anything. You haven’t sat down with a street musician and sung for 30 years. Do it!” And I did. I dropped myself onto the pavement and we shook hands. He said his name was Dragonfly. … (Well, OK, what else could it be in this flashback to the ‘60s?)

We sang songs by Bob Marley, the Rolling Stones, Neil Young. … He didn’t know “Leavin’ on a Jet Plane,” or we would have done that, too.
Then I have a fabulous lunch at Cafe Pesto (when you look up “consistent” or “reliable” in the dictionary, their name is next to it). Then I run ino my friends Tommy and Juliette at Hana Hou and they talk me into buying a much more daring dress than I would have otherwise. (And you guys were right!) And then I finally land up at Sig Zane’s and, just as he had told me on the phone the day before, his big new thing is MALOS … loincloths, strips of screen-printed fabric to wrap around your … well … yourself.

Zane tells me that Hawaiians tied their malo different ways depending on their pursuits: There was a malo tie for fishing, and one for dancing, one for war and one for surfing and one for working the loi. (And he didn’t stay this, but you gotta figure there was one for when you had a hot date on Friday night, yeah?)

His other introductions: A “sassy” dress they goin’ “buss ‘ out” Wednesday at the hoike and a very small, select collection of relaxed quilted, silk-lined jackets, revival of a concept created when his wife was pregnant the first time a generation ago. I could go on, but this is enough. I am in a light-filled room in a beautiful place with great food and lovely people. And I hope you are, too.

HILO, Hawai’i, Sunday afternoon through Monday early morning— “Aia e la i Hilo, /’O ka nani e … There, indeed, is Hilo, Is the beauty.”
And though the skies are low and gray, and there is no view of the mountain summits today, it is beautiful. A calm beauty. Would nahenahe be the right word? I don’t know enough Hawaiian to be sure if that’s right. But it’s gentle and lovely here on a Hilo Sunday, like a sweet Hawaiian song.
What a day I had on Saturday! I packed it with adventures because, when the Merrie Monarch Festival hula competition starts (Wednesday is Halau O Kekuhi’s annual free hoike, hula show; Thursday is Miss Aloha Hula competition), I’ll be so busy I’ll have no time for everything else I love to do in Hillo.
Like eat.
And shop. And walaau (talk or gossip) with people with whom I’ve now had enough time (this is my fifth MM) to start to call my friends, like clothing designer Sig Zane and Richard Ha the Hamakau Coast banana and tomato king, and a guy I just met but consider already a friend, Derek Kurisu of KTA Stores.
Plus, of couse, I gotta call back to Oahu and tell all my friends and family what I’ve been doing. Like… I’m in Hiiiiiiiloooooooo … and you’re not!
And eat. Did I say eat?
Ohmigosh, I got in at like, 9 a.m. Saturday, and went directly to Cafe 100 for have cutlet moco and met up with the winner of our Advertiser Travel section drawing, Na Wahi Heke, The Best Places in Hawaii, which runs next week; she gets a trip for two to a Neighbor Island. … but who would want to leave Hilo???
… Anyway, she just happens to be a daughter of the original Cafe 100 restaurant family, renowned for inventing the loco moco although it probably wasn’t actually them, though their restaurant did make the moco an institution and does serve an amazing variety of mocos. (This week, the special is salmon moco.)
Her name is Gloria Kobayashi (but the family name is Miiyashiro). She’s a school teacher and writer and historian who introduced me to a beautifully written book about Hilo history that she helped prepare along with elders in the Hilo Japanese community. It’s about a densely poulated neighborhood where many Japanese lived, where KTA stores originally started.
It was called Waiakea. And though technically it was the little right elbow of Hilo, it was key to the 20th-century develpment of many Hilo institutions.
You know what it is now? Liliuokalani Gardens, the lovely park at the edge of Hilo.
So, between bites of moco, I got all this Hilo history (and history of any kind is the thing I love second only to food to any kind). More on this in the print edition, when I can get it written.
Then, I drove up the hilll to meet the Merrie Monarch’s pageant queen, Leilani Kerr, and what a lovely person she is! She does, in fact, meet the criterion for this odd bit of only-in-Hawai’i pageantry: She doesn’t have to DO very much (except keep still for hours and hours), but she has just what they’re looking for — a beautiful carriage, a beauiful character and a beautiful soul.
We met at Starbucks (well, of course, where else does anyone meet these days?), across from Sears, not too far from Borders — see? Hilo is definitely in the 21st century.
We talked about how a person who has only lived in Hilo three years and — get this — has NEVER physically been to Merrie Monarch, can come to portray the wife of Kalakaua, the person for whom the festival is named (more of this story in our print edition).
Thursday night, she will walk that stage in her holoku with the train and she will embody the queen.
Okay, so den I w’en go talk-story wit’ Derek Kurisu, who is the face and voice of KTA, the most amazing grocery store chain in the Islands. Other local stores have things to recommend them, but KTA manages to be completely local while also carrying Greek yogurt and hummous, to sell the most wholesome whole-grain breads while also offering indulgent coconut cheesecake, to live up to a commitment to local products — milk, meat and more — while also bringing in anything you want.
When I come to Hilo, I don’t turn right from the airport, I turn left, up the hill and go to KTA and buy a cooler and all kine local stuff fo’ grind in my hotel room while I’m here.
First thing he says, it’s about 12:30 in the middle of the day. He says, “Did you eat?” I say, “No.” He says, ‘Kay den, we go eat. Whea you like go?’ ”
Okay, this is like a major almost-top guy in a good-size company and he stay talking like my cuz. And not only that, he stay talking talking to ME, Miss Haole Face But I’m From Here, Garanz, I No Lie. (Most locals just look at me and assume I’m from somewheah else.)
And we walk a few doors down because my girlfrien’ tole me was good, Hiro’s Place, just Puna side of the Big KTA, the one at Puanaiko where we was.
And I think it was when I ordered the dinaguaan (Filipino blood stew, which was broke-da-mout’) AND the Chinse eggplant with chicken that he actually accepted that I was in fact a local girl.
“Good girl! Smart girl,” he said (which is nice to hear at 56). But I noticed he said similar things to people all day long. This is a man who loves to find the positives in others and praise them to the skies.
That day, we talked and we ate (not too much but all good stuff), and we drove around Hilo. He introduced me to so many of KTA’s “partners” in business. These included people who sell to them, like the Two Ladies (Mochi) Kitchen, or who work with them (like Kawamoto Lunch Shop, which sometimes does catering for them — and which is an old-style okazu-ya that may be the single reason I will move to Hilo someday).
I’m supposed to go to dinner tonight and all I can think of is the leftover nori chicken (more on this later in my food columns in the print edition) from Kawamoto’s that’s sitting on the bureau of my hotel room.
Oh, gosh, I’ve been writing for hours and I haven’t even finished my day. After traveling around with Mr. Kurisu, I THEN checked into my hotel and ironed all my clothes (because that’s what women do when they check into a room, especially Portuguese women), and then I went to Hilo Bay Cafe with my dear friends, Randall and Clarysse Nunokawa (who just opened a tiny little wine shop caleld Grapes in Hilo a few doors down from Kawamoto Lunch shop).
At Hilo Bay Cafe, my dear friend Josh Ketner is still the chef and still producing food that causes me to make embarassing noises in public (good ones, like mmmmmmmm and ooooooooh). Try the specials. The Dish of the Day for me Saturday was an appetizer, Parmesan custard (technically a budino) with artichoke hearts, roasted  peppers, sun-dried tomaotes and lavosh ($8). Num, num, num.
And, friends, that was just Saturday.
Sunday I went to church (New Hope Christian Fellowship in Upcountry Hilo, and how inspiring it was), picked up a big bento at Kawamoto’s, came back to my room, turned on mindless TV, ate awesome shoyu pork and CRASHED for hours of sleep beore writing this. And Monday, many of my friends and hula sources begin to arrive here. I’ll be attending hula rehearsals!
And I get paid to this?!

Whine, whine, whine, yeah?

Here I am, being paid to cover the most important hula competition in Hawai’i, with a seat in a good spot, a pair of great partners to help me (Rebecca Breyer, photographer and Scott Morifuji, who will edit our videos and help in other technolocigal ways), many friends in the hula world that I’m looking forward to seeing and….. ahead of me…Hilo!!! Which is one of my favorite places on the planet: so friendly, such great food and shopping (watch out Sig Zane, I’m on my way!) and I’m whining because it’s 11 p.m. and I haven’t packed yet?

Oh, please. The clothes will get in the suitcase somehow. And tomorrow, I’m interviewing Leilani Kerr, who will portray Kalakaua’s queen in the Merrie Monarch Royal Court (think about having to look dignified and royal for hours and hour and hours), and also getting a tour of the KTA grocery store (best grocery in Hawai’i, hands down, no contest) and then checking in on rehearsals at the Edith Kanaka’ole Stadium and seeing Auntie Luana Kawelu and other old friends beofre going to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, Hilo Bay Cafe.

So, night all, I’ll be online again Tuesday (when my Merrie Monarch blog officially starts…but don’t be surprised if you hear from me before then…because once I hit Hilo, I get excited and I just have to share).

Kaulana mai ne ‘ o Hilo ‘ea… Renowned is Hilo…