Of the key talent shows in prime time, do you regularly watch “The Voice” or “American Idol”?
In the early seasons of “Idol,” I watched weekly. Back in the day, that was the TV show to tune in to, because of Jasmine Trias, who was Hawaii’s key “Idol” competitor to make the Top 10 in 2004, and I was a working reporter at the time so had to monitor her week-to-week performance and status.
“Idol” set the highwater mark for vocal contests. A handful of winners or even finalists have made it in some aspect of show biz. Kelly Clarkson, the first winner in, 2002, has built on her fame via important brand-creating hit songs, and parlayed radio and YouTube hits into a daily talk/sing show. Her latest coup is inheriting retired Ellen DeGeneres’ daytime slot and whoa, she’s judging “The Voice.” Can’t get better than that.
Carrie Underwood, season four victor, in2005, is the most successful former “Idol.” Her hits made her a country music hottie, and her reign as the NFL’s Sunday Night football them singer hasn’t hurt, either.
However, the biggest show biz “name” originating in “Idol,” was not a winner but a Top 10 finalist in 2004, the year Fantasia won and Trias was second. Jennifer Hudson has emerged as the most visible and singer and actress, sought-after celeb because she had the voice and since has been groomed as a bona fide Hollywood figure. She’s also an EGOT – Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony winner, conquering all prizes in the show biz orbit. Well, she also is a GG – Golden Globe winner.
Cassadee Pope, who won in 2012, in the third season, is the most successful winner from “The Voice.” But clearly, for all its fanfare, “The Voice” winners have not prevailed as well. Frankly, the rotating judges – including the likes of Blake Shelton, John Legend, Clarkson, Adam Levine, Christina Aguilera, Gwen Sefani, and Pharrel Williams — are better known than the talent they pick. FYI, Shelton has been the only judge for all 14 seasons. Javier Colon was announced as the winner of the inaugural season, marking Levine’s first win as a coach.
The Makaha Sons, led by Jerome Koko, will be joined by island songbird Robi Kahakalau, in performances at 6 and 8:30 p.m. Friday (Sept. 17) at Blue Note Hawaii at the Outrigger Waikiki resort.
The concerts are emblematic of these pandemic times; folks want to periodically go out for a night of island music, but cost might be a factor. So if there’s an option to attend without the customary admission, it might be easier to take in a show.
Here’s the rub: residents who are fully vaccinated, with proper validation of the vaxx card along with a photo ID, may attend the shows at no cost.
The hope is that with free admission, fans and other show-goers will make donations to the Makaha Sons Foundation to help raise funds for the organization.
The Makaha Sons (left photo, L-R: Artis, Koko and Ka’anapu) and Robi Kahakalau, right.
Along with Koko on vocals and 12-string guitar, the group now features Kimo Artis on vocals and electric bass and Hanale Kaʻanapu on vocals and 6-string guitar.
Saks Fifth Avenue Hawaii and One Community are presenting the Blue Note shows with a win-win prospect for all involved.
Admission normally is in the $25 range; drinks and meals are extra. Still, with free admission, it’s a bargain – for attendees and sponsors.
Doors open at 4:30 and 8 p.m. For information and reservations, visit www.bluenotehawaii.com
The Makaha Sons Foundation is a Waipahu-based arts and cultural organization supported by the Makaha Sons. It supports Hawaii police officers and families afflicted with illness, and awards scholarships to high school seniors.
One Community is a consulting company that assists their clients in presenting their business objectives to key officials and decision-makers in Hawaii’s government and community.
‘Superstars’ reunited
Teddy Neeley (who played Jesus) and Yvonne Elliman (who was Mary Magdalene) in the film version of “Jesus Christ Superstar” are reuniting this weekend in Boston for a reunion concert as well as a screening of the film.
Yvonne Elliman, in a rehearsal photo shared by her husband, Allen Alexander.
Neeley and Elliman also had music careers outside of the film and they’ll share their repertoire of faves, backed by an all-star band. Elliman, of course, is the Roosevelt grad who became a global sensation when she recorded the “concept” LP of the rock opera aka “Superstar” that also resulted in a Broadway stage musical in 1971 and a Hollywood film in 1973. Elliman is the lone lead who did the original recording (earning a Grammy) and the subsequent stage and movie versions.
If you’re in the vicinity, the concerts will be at the Regent Theatre in Arlington at 8 p.m. Friday (Sept. 17) and Saturday (Sept. 18).
The two stars will host a screening of a new digitally remastered version of the 1973 film at 6 p.m. Sunday (Sept. 19) at the same venue, with both Neeley and Elliman participating in a meet-and-greet after the showing. Elliman’s husband, Allen Alexander, posted this adjoining pic of Elliman on Facebook. …
Kokua with prayers
Al Harrington
Al Harrington, veteran entertainer, has been hospitalized with multiple medical issues. Fans and friends may want to send prayers of support.
You know him as “The South Pacific Man,” a Waikiki singer and star of his own Polynesian show, back in the day when most hotels had showrooms, and as Det. Ben Kokua, in the CBS-Jack Lord original of “Hawaii Five-0,” and Mamo Kahike in the Alex O’Loughlin “Five-0” reboot. Some may know him as a former football player at Punahou, from where he graduated in 1954, and later became a Punahou school teacher. …
Power couples are normally a famous duo married to each other, or partners with individual or joint accomplishments. Wealth is not a factor; fame could be the game; however, singular achievement matters most.
The other common requisite of a power couple, whether wholly or individually: they are bold-faced names whenever they’re mentioned in columns like this one.
These folks are newsworthy because they make news or are commonly in the gossip mill. In my world of dealing with bold face names, if you’re a somebody, you earn b.f. status.
This compilation/discussion/reflection is the result of brainstorming about PCs – with recognition a key for inclusion. If you know their names, you know why they’re powerful and popular, without a descriptive tag.
Famous politicos
Michelle and Barack Obama
Politicos easily are PCs: Barack and Michelle Obama. Bill and Hillary Clinton. Perhaps George H. and Laura Bushand George H.W. and Barbara Bush, Richard and Pat Nixon, Jimmy and Rossalyn Carter. Indeed, John and Jackie Kennedy, too! Clearly, presidents and their FLOTUS easily fall in this PC. category. Joe and Jill Biden certainly are newbies in this elitist realm, a work in progress still earning stripes; Donald and Melania Trump are a dubious PC, since he was dominant and she remained in the shadows, survivors amid the political snipes.
The Hollywood crowd
Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman
Power couples are especially plentiful in show biz or in the performance arena. In no particular order: Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck, Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta Jones, Beyonce and Jay-Z, Rita Wilson and Tom Hanks, Amal and George Clooney, Michelle Pfeiffer and David E. Kelley, Victoria and David Beckham, Gisele Bundchen and Tom Brady, Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds, Chrissy Teigen and John Legend, Oprah Winfrey and Stedman Graham, Emily Blunt and John Krasinski, Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban, Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi, Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick, Blake Shelton and Gwen Stefani, Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell, Katy Perry and Orlando Bloom, Lisa Bonet and Jason Momoa, Jada Pickett Smith and Will Smith, Aaron Rodgers and Shailene Woodley, Scarlet Johansson and Colin Jost and Neil Patrick Harris and David Burtka.
More power couples, you ask? How about Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz , Ryan O’Neal and Farrah Fawcett, Carrie Fisher and Paul Simon, Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman, John Travolta and Kelly Preston, Reese Witherspoon and Ryan Phillippe, Sean Penn and Madonna, Demi Moore and Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenneger and Maria Shriver, Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, Johnny Depp and Winona Ryder, Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson, Sonny and Cher? And you could include partners, or exes, of Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Britney Spears, Justin Bieber, Robert Downey, Ben Affleck, J-Lo, and, well, you get the idea. A few have died; some relationships have dissolved, but these folks were relevant in their prime.
Prolific and creative
Bernie Taupin and Elton John
Surely, a few PCs are mighty prolific and creative, too: Elton John and Bernie Taupin, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, and Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schonberg.
In many instances, PCs don’t have to be married to each other but are prominent nonetheless, because of compatibility and creativity. First names not necessary, too, when you think of Abbott and Costello, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Bacharach and David, Lennon and McCartney, Astaire and Rogers, Garland and Rooney, Simon and Garfunkel.
Infrequently, a PC could have a pseudonym, like The Property Brothers, who are actually twins Jonathan and Drew Scott, and The Blues Brothers, Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi.
Extend this concept, and you can also have fictional PCs with individual potency and presence: Tom and Jerry, The Phantom and Christine, Romeo and Juliet, King Arthur and Guinevere, Batman and Robin, Jack and Jill, The Lone Ranger and Tonto, and Miss Piggy and Kermit the Frog, or expand to real life, with Susannah Guthrie and Hoda Kotb, Pat Sajak and Vanna White, even Barnes and Noble. (Yes, real people; go to Wikipedia, to track who’s who).
One PC duo lacking last names: Barbie and Ken; another PC duo have last names you don’t know: Ben and Jerry are real people, whose surnames are Cohen and Greenfield, respectively.
The island list
Beverly Noa and Ed Kenney
Hawaii has had its share of winsome twosomes, too. In the distant past, PCs included Duke and Nadine Kahanamoku, Eddie and Peggy Sherman, Jack and Marie Lord, Ed Kenney and Beverly Noa, Kimo and Betsy McVay, Fred and Myrtle Lee, Wisa D’Orso and Jim Hutchison, John and Beatrice Burns, Neal and Lucy Blaisdell and Frank and Joyce Fasi. All but Joyce Fasi are deceased.
Denise Hayashi Yamaguchi and Roy Yamaguchi
Current island PCs qualifiers include Ben and Vicky Cayetano, George and Jean Ariyoshi, John and Lynne Waihee, Jack and Cha Thompson, Henry Kapono and Lezlee Ka‘aihue, Paul Theroux and Sheila Donnelly, Thomas and Mia Kosasa, Denise Hayashi and Roy Yamaguchi, Alan Wong and Alice Inoue, Wade Ueoka and Michelle Karr-Ueoka,
Kuana Torres Kahele and Marc Turner
Troy Terorotua and Lisa Kim, Guy Hagi and Kim Gennaula, Kathy Muneno and Nainoa Thompson, Nina Keali‘iwahamana and Gordon Rapozo, Akemi and Rene Paulo, Han and Meredith Ching, Keali‘i Reichel and Fred “Punahele” Krauss, Kuana Torres Kahele and Marc Turner, Steven Ai and Carol Ai May, Keith and Carmen Haugen, Indru and Gulab Watumull, Michael W. Perry and Larry Price, Judge James Burn and Emme Tomimbang, Jack and Maydelle Cione, Cecilio and Kapono and Eddie and Myrna Kamae. A few aforementioned — Judge Burns, Maydelle Cione, Eddie Kamae and Gulab Watumull — are deceased; Kapono continues on as a soloist, ever since Cecilio had legal issues; Price retired, ending his partnership with Perry.
This remembrance is chockfull of lovely moments of life in Hawaii; it came my way the other day, credited to Greg and Gerri Delos Santos, whom I don’t know, and their reflections hit a nerve.
So I’m happy to share it here, under my “Down Memory Lane” format that appears here periodically.
They titled the piece “Just in Case You Forgot: For the Young Ones, This Is How It Was in Good Old Hawaii.”
There’s so much heart and honesty in these remembrances; the terms, the places, the people, the emotions, the candor, the innocence, the simplicity of the panorama of Hawaii Nei, back in the day. Following the Delos Santoses’ recollections, I’ve added a few more that they might have forgotten, and feel free to further brighten the pot with long-gone, but-not-forgotten elements.
So, here are their flashback thoughts of Good Old Hawaii; the language and spelling are theirs; if you feel there’s a bit of racism among the memories, do know that some terms were utilized back in the day, minus the shred of hatred prevailing today.
So take this journey into the distant past …
*. *. *
When you could buy one big sack of See Moi for a nickel… and then you ate the whole thing and licked the bag… Gramma said, you go Chinese School, you say ‘NO!’ she said, you go, I buy you see moi, you say OK.
Windward side… taro patches… rice paddies . water buffalo…
When you mentioned Kaneohe, everyone knew you were talking about the pupule house.
J. Akuhead Pupule
When the tallest building in Honolulu was the Aloha Tower…
Radio personalities like… J. Aku Head Pupule on KGMB in the mornings saying ‘OK, all you SLOBS, it’s time to GET UP!!!’ Hey, no foget Lucky Luck’s ‘Lucky you come Hawaii!’ and remember Don Chamberlin and ‘Don in the fishbowl’ from Fran’s Drive Inn…
When you lived in Honolulu, T.H…. Signs on vacant and private property that said KAPU… When the site of Ala Moana Shopping Center was a big swamp. Waialae-Kahala was mostly pig farms. and the area next to the airport was a neighborhood called Damon Tract…
Kids chanting… Ching Chong Chinaman, Sitting on a fence, Trying to make a dollah, Out of fifteen cents… Red, White and Blue, Stahs ovah you, Mama say, Papa say, you pake… Grade school JPO’s… Junior Police Officers in their white shirts, khaki pants, polished black shoes, red helmets and arm bands… 25 cents going Saturday Matinee, Queen Theater. I remember 9 cents at Varsity Theater and 25 cents could get you movie, soda, and popcorn at Golden Wall Theatre….Wearing Band-Aids and a ‘limp’ to get into the Saturday matinee without shoes…
Jan ken po — scissors, paper, stone game.
Flipping milk caps on the sidewalk during recess… and deciding who got to go first by playing Jung Ken Po… And when you did something dumb everybody yelled…’Bakatare You!’ And when you did something naughty they shook their finger and said…’ A hana koko lele!’
Moonlight swimming… Bonfires on the beach… Strumming ukuleles, singing and everyone knew the words to all the old Hawaiian songs… You were greeted with… Ei, bu!… Ei buggah, how you stay? or Ei, blah-lah… Going to Maunakea Street to buy ginger leis… The old Pali road with the hairpin turns… and if it was really windy, the hood of the car blew open…
The bestest freshest poi at Ono on Kapahulu Ave… Also, bestest Laulau, Kalua Pig, Opihi, sticky rice, Lomi Salmon, Pipikaula, Na’au Puaa, Haupia.Broke da mout’! Dollar bills with HAWAII printed across them…
Going to high school football games at the ole stadium — lovingly called the Termite Palace. Guys getting their kicks sparking the wahines from under the stands… soggy bags of boiled peanuts sold by squatting sellers… and Football players smothered with leis and lipstick walking off the field…
Termite palace — the old Honolulu Stadium
Harry Bridges, Teamsters Union leader, calling union dock strikes…causing food shortages… Sad Sam Ichinose… Kau Kau Korner, the meeting place with the ‘Crossroads of the Pacific’ sign out front, the most photographed sign in the world… The waitresses wearing short skirts, soda hats and skates bringing your order to the car on a window tray…How good those hamburgers smelled! Aloha ‘Oe… eat fish and poi…
When those lucky people who lived in Waikiki sold their lots for $5.00 a square foot and we all thought they were getting rich… Everyone discussing the ‘Mauka Arterial’ and when it was finally completed we all got lost because we didn’t know East from West… All I knew was Ewa side and Diamond Head side… Mauka and Makai. Holding the 49th State Fair year after year. And finally becoming the 50th state in 1959…
Looking at Diamond Head… when all you could see from Waikiki was the Natatorium and the Elk’s Club. Hey, don’t forget the Town & Country Club Riding Stables and the taro patches. Old Chinese ladies with bound feet shuffling along wearing dark grey tunics and trousers… Japanese men in Kimonos carrying a towel and a bar of soap walking to a stream in the evening… Filipino men from Waipahu on the bus with their game cocks in cages… Elderly Japanese squatting, waiting for the bus…
Trying to find the coins wrapped in red paper and pieces of tissue (with holes in them that the evil spirits had to go through)…from Chinese funerals.. Watching Duke Kahanamoku surfing at Waikiki and shaking hands with him.
Beach boys with da kine, ho’omalimali and Hawaiian music under the palm trees at the Royal Hawaiian and the Moana… Surfers with 8 foot boards that weighed a ton… Waikiki sand always washing away and having to be replaced by sand from the windward side…
Old Chinese men playing mah-jongg under the hau trees at Kuhio Beach… Saint Louis boys singing ‘We get ten thousand men steel yet, we gonna ween dees game you bet… ‘ My friend wen go St. Louis but I no tink he remember this. Rubbing maunaloa seeds on the sidewalk until they got hot enough to burn somebody’s arm…
Lurline docking at Honolulu Harbor.
The excitement of the Lurline coming in… Lei sellers everywhere… ‘Carnation lei… fifty cents, plumieria…. three for dollah’… Local boys diving for coins… big beautiful jelly fish… a tangle of streamers from ship to shore… passengers tossing leis overboard as the ship pulls away… if they floated toward shore, they would return…
When KGMB and KGU were the only radio stations… Lots of mynah birds on the sidewalks… mongoose living in a neighborhood tree… Going Pali lookout to ‘spahk da moon’… ‘I took my wahine holo holo kaa, I took her up the Pali, she says ‘too muchee faa.’ Pull down the shade, try to make the grade… Lanikai.. black eye!’
Going Diamond Head or Ala Moana to watch the submarine races… Swimming in the streams and whacking each other on the head with shampoo ginger… Never driving over the Pali with pork in your car…you going get stuck… No need test…I wen test for you and the car engine wen maki.
Going to ‘First View’ at the Waikiki theater! …. eating crackseed… the palm trees and flowers that looked so real. . the usher who wore a feather cape and helmet and ever smiled…Every Friday night at 10:15 and you had to make reservations.
Talking mynah birds…I had one dumb minah bird…never did speak to me. Lights out… clack, clack, clack. what’s dat?… turn on lights… one BIG centipede!
Surfing at Waikiki and watching the outrigger canoes alongside of you full of mainland tourists wearing bathing caps… Surfing Waikiki all day without eating, getting red eyes… going back again the next day… because when you caught those waves and rode them all the way in… it was worth it! Underwater… trying to catch a ride on the back of a turtle… Underwater… trying to look at fish and eels without a mask…
Swimming at Fort DeRussy… trying not to get stung by da Portuguese Man-o’-War…There was a pier behind the Moana Hotel There was a jungle between the Royal Hawaiian Hotel and Kalakaua. And you can go catch Samoan Crab, White Crab, Hawaiian Crab and dig for Oysters and Clams in West Loch. The big tidal wave from Japan that washed up over Kalakaua Avenue…
Being able to tell what month it was by the color of Diamond Head… When inside Diamond Head was opened to the public again.. hiking inside and finding big cannons sticking out of concrete pukas. 1949.. auwe!… a big underwater shelf broke off and shook the whole island!
Webley Edwards with his mike walking along the beach and talking to the tourists… and taking the mike down to the ocean to let everyone listening on the mainland hear the sound of the waves at Waikiki… on Hawaii Calls. When all the tourists were mostly movie stars or rich and came on Matson ships and stayed at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel and wore furs in the evenings!..
Walking down Waikiki Beach and sparking movie stars without their toupees, wigs and make-up… And sell them coconut hats for $10 per hat. Trader Vic’s… Don the Beachcomber’s… the Zebra Room all painted with Zebra stripes outside… Seeing painfully sunburned and peeling tourists at Waikiki.
Doing the Hula in the ‘May Day is Lei Day in Hawaii’ celebration… Using the uli-uli’s, ili ili’s and pu’ili’s… making our own hula skirts out of ti leaves… splitting the ti leaves with our thumb nails and having green hands for a week… 4 digit phone numbers? No, I remember 5 digits.
English standard schools…Japanese language lessons… When nobody locked their houses or cars…’Right on the kinipopo’… When anything that said ‘Made in Japan’ was junk… When everyone called Plumerias ‘Graveyard Flowers’… (MAKE’ MAN!!) When restaurants were called either Cafes or Grills. Wooden sided station wagons filled with bananas… ‘Banana Wagon’…
Buying Sushi cones on way home from school from the Sushi man and his cart on the corner… Sunday morning, December 7, 1941… masks… air raid drills. backyard bomb shelters… 442nd, ‘Go for Broke’… ‘bobbed waivh’ on da beaches… KILROY WAS HERE… Eating lots of Spam…
Kaimuki red dirt…everything you bought white turned reddish brown… your sheets, your underwear… Surfing in your palaka bathing suit… Fitted Holokus with long trains with a loop for your wrist… Tita dress: cuffed up Levis, Aloha shirt with the sleeves rolled up twice, ear rings and slippahs… Wearing a white sailor hat.. Wooden slippahs with two slats of wood across the bottoms…we called them ‘clop-clops’… when you could buy sox and tennis shoes that came in-between the big toe and the rest of your toes…
Waking up with mo’os in your bed, sometime dead because you slept on them and sometime just their tails were left behind… Shave Ice on a hot day… Finding Japanese green, white and lavender glass fishing balls in various sizes floating in to the beaches on the North shore… ‘Calabash cousins’… Watching sea weed being harvested on a weekend.. Torch fishing at night…
Example of a ‘dumb haole’… driving up Tantalus and Round Top Drive and haole says, ‘I bet these roads are really dangerous when it snows’… Listening to Hawaii Calls… Playing around the mouth of Blow-Hole… trying to guess when it would blow… so you could run… Playing on top of the reservoir in Kaimuki… When there were so many palm trees that coconuts were falling on people’s heads… and owners cutting them down for fear of getting sued…
Arthur Godfrey
Arthur Godfrey playing his ukulele… Hale Loki… ‘Hawai-ya, Hawai-ya, Hawai-ya?’ and Chesterfields… Listening to the Japanese radio station and hearing Japanese men grunting…The traffic cop in a little booth in the middle of the street with an umbrella over it… Uku-pile-a-roaches and FLIT GUNS… later to be replaced by…the SLIPPAH. Servicemen… complaining about ‘life on the rock’, drinking, swearing, hitchhiking, making passes, driving too fast, and sometimes getting blown off the Pali on their motorcycles…
Manoa Valley… swiping painted candles from the Chinese Cemetery… laying on the graves to see what it felt like to be dead.. looking at all the photos on the gravestones and wondering about their lives. sliding down the ti leaf slide and going home covered with mud… going ‘mountain apple-ing’… hiking to the falls in the rain through the bamboo when there was no trail… ‘liquid sunshine’ everyday about the same time… fire crackers and smoke filling the valley and the houses on Chinese New Year..
When everyone had a pune’e and at least one old Koa table in their home.. When Nu’uanu Valley was a thick, lush, tropical rain forest.. with many upside down falls… the monkeypod tree in the middle of the road at Nu’uanu and Vineyard…
Kapiolani Drive-In… Fran’s Drive In ..KC Drive In (for Waffle Hot Dogs & Orange Freeze — umm ono!) alongside the Ala Wai Canal…Kelly’s Drive In… When Kalakaua Ave. was a two-way street… Admission to the Honolulu Zoo and the Aquarium were free… Waialua, Ewa, Kahuku and Waianae sugar plantations…working in the cane fields… cane trains… the irrigation system was up on wooden stilts…
KC Drive Inn waffle dog
Honolulu Airport was on the Diamond Head side of the runway… Jumping into the water holding a Hau leaf in your mouth so the water wouldn’t go up your nose… Working in the pineapple factory and the fields… Riding horses in Kapiolani Park… When the Natatorium was called the Tank…
The Manapua Man…The Lunch Truck at Ala Moana Beach and their ONO chow fun and the curry beef stew over rice when you’re cold from swimming. The Japanese neighborhood vegetable wagon. Lau Yee Chai was on Kuhio Ave. and set off firecrackers every Saturday evening at 6…
Going to dances at the Ala Wai Clubhouse and dancing under the stars (and sometimes raindrops!). Riding the electric boats on the fragrant AlaWai Canal.
Going to the Saimin Stand for a bowl of Saimin for 15 cents and BBQ stick for 10 cents… wonton mein for 25 cents. And, big cone sushi for 5 cents a pc.
Dose were the good ole days!!!
— Julie & Paké
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So here are a few of my additions to the lovely recollections above:
HRT trolley bus
Quite an extensive list of memories, but perhaps these were forgotten and should be added to the compilation:
The HRT trolley buses, cruising down the streets to downtown and back; sometimes, there were pauses, since the overhead hook-ups fell off and the driver had to rehook ‘em…
Pineapple watertank
Dole Cannery, then the Hawaiian Pineapple Co., had the world’s largest pineapple –a watertank symbolic of one of Hawaii’s biggest industries..
Waikiki Sands was Hawaii’s first buffets – so yep, locals became instant chowhounds, and a new form of dining was launched. … Spencecliff was Honolulu’s “chain” restaurants, from frankfurter joints downtown to family dining (The Ranch House) in Aina Haina …
Maurice Sullivan, who also launched the Foodland brand of supermarkets, brought the first McDonald’s franchise, to Aina Haina; officially launching the birth of fast food … Liliha Bakery had two smaller locations in Liliha, before moving its counter-service/bakery operations on Kuakini … Fine dining was the finest at Canlis’ restaurant in Waikiki, where waitresses donned kimono as the required service dress. Years later, the Maile Restaurant at the Kahala Hilton would adopt the kimono as house policy …
Lippy Espinda, proprietor of a gas station on Kalakaua Avenue, might be the creator of the shaka sign (some dispute this honor), but the area’s nighttime “name” was the rauchy, infamous queen of wee-hour dining, Hot Dog Annie, whose Kalakaua stand was frequented by the likes of Don Ho pau hana time …
KGMB was Hawaii’s first TV station, on air since Dec.1, 1952; it showed a test pattern on screen; initially, the station televised programming from three of the four major nextworks, but was primarily CBS; it lost NBC when KONA (now KHON) went live two weeks later, and relinquished ABC when KULA (now KITV), was launched in April 1954. …
Carl Hebenstreit, whose on-air name was Kini Popo, was the first to be seen on local TV; he was a morning drive personality on KGMB (preceded Hal “J. Akuhead Pupule” Lewis), and was hired to host a morning TV show on KGMB, “Sunrise,” with Lei Becker; thus, a.m. programming was launched. Later, “The Kini Popo Show” became the handle …
Robert Cazimero’s the first to announce a round of Christmas shows…at Chef Chai’s, his sorta home base for a couple of years now.
Cazimero dropped the dates — Dec. 15 through 19 at Chai Chaowasaree’s restaurant — in a conversation when he guest-performed at Blue Note Hawaii over the weekend. Chef Chai’s becomes a sometimes nightclub, when the popular Hawaiian singer-pianist takes over at least once a month, for his ongoing Full Moon Concert. Next one is Sept. 19, so make plans to save a table.
Robert Cazimero
Christmas is Robert’s favorite holiday, and while the limited Chai’s space — cozy and hip — won’t allow for a line of hula dancers and halau crooners like in earlier Cazimero holiday spectacles in traditional showroom or nightclub venues in the past, he’s truly capable of filling the room with a bounty of festive yuletide and Hawaiian cheer even with a minimum of performing colleagues. After all, the spirit’s the thing..
With the surging pandemic, who knows if anyone else in any other venue, large or small, will venture to deck the halls with boughs of maile and share yuletide melodies and carols with an island undercurrent. The scaled-down barometer in place currently might mean fewer or smaller holiday concerts. However, if you’ve booked a show and can share the news, please advise, pronto. …
Akemi Paulo
Personalities
While pianist Rene Paulo has been released from the hospital on the mainland, following his recent bout with COVID-19, sorry to to report that his wife Akemi Paulo, who used to sing while Rene played keyboards, now has caught the virus and is in quarantine. Rene and Akemi are the parents of jazz musician Michael Paulo and sister-singer Kathy Paulo, so offer prayers once again for a speedy recovery. …
Speaking of wellness: Horace Dudoit III of Ho’okena has weathered through his coronovirus isolation, and is back in the saddle again, performing in limited engagements. …
