A Note from Auntie Logy

[Eds. note: This is the fifth is a series by Gae Rusk under the column, "A Note from Auntie Logy." To read more from Auntie, scroll down or click on the link in the sidebar to the right.]


on SHAME

Auntie Logy returned from the mainland yesterday. It was a stressful trip back to Kauai, but Auntie recovered happiness after arriving at the family’s orchard outside Kilauea, and Auntie stayed happy to be home until picking up a copy of The Garden Island. That’s when Auntie Logy had one big hissy fit.

When Auntie could breathe again, she asked herself, Is Kauai now third world? Is Kauai now Haiti-West? Are cronyism and palsy-walsyism now a given? Auntie is thinking maybe Senator Barak Obama should come to Kauai to present the same anti-corruption speech he gave in Kenya.

Auntie is ashamed of all the self-centered special interests who want to run this island. For the last four decades, Auntie has been ashamed of County officials who awarded heinous building permits, sometimes secretly and illegally. Auntie has felt shamed by power struggles that make no sense to anyone watching.

There are other shames alive and well on this island, it’s true, like that judge, the one who dismissed charges against Kauai’s most well-connected career criminal in the face of all evidence of guilt? Maybe that judge lives on Oahu? If so, it’s of no matter to her who roams free to trash this island.

And Kauai’s youths, those angry boys who flap around in clothing ten sizes too big for their bodies? Auntie sees them dressing their egos, not their waistlines. And the way they talk, are they as dumb as Auntie’s tree line? Has Kauai dumbed-down to accommodate the slow and dysfunctional, so the whole island is becoming slow and dysfunctional? This is a scary thought that Auntie has tried to avoid for a long time, but articles in The Garden Island always put it front page center.

Auntie Logy is ashamed of being ashamed of so much about this new Kauai. Auntie is afraid she sounds old-fashioned and whiney, but Kauai is Auntie’s home! Auntie’s ohana, Auntie’s calabash family, all live on Kauai, and now it is difficult for any of us to thrive here. It is stressful to give aloha to malahines who steal our beaches at night and put in gated communities without asking. It is impossible to think kindly of absentee landlords who turned Hanalei and Kapaa and Waipouli and Wailua into time-shared, strip-malled hells. It is hopeless to have any respect for officials giving out permits to pave over Kauai.

Stir these crimes against Kauai’s communities into the brew of Kauai’s future grownups, those clothes-flopping, moronic-sounding youths with cars and money and no self-discipline, claiming freedom without training or responsibility. Stir all this together and what do you have? Something worse than Maui. Something like Haiti, a toxic, urbanized atoll in a shallow, torpid ocean.

It is exhausting for Auntie to keep making protests that are no doubt ignored and discounted. It takes a lot more effort to live here than ever before, and this is wearing Auntie raw, and Auntie is not alone. One neighbor said to Auntie, There is so much to protest! Suddenly everything’s going bad at once!

Auntie’s neighbor, he’s right. He’s smart too, so he protests when he can, just like Auntie, and everyone’s tired already. Who let things get so bad so fast? Kauai is going crazy, ho’o pupule, just like Maui. Going garbage, ho’o pilau, just like Haiti.

Which brings up a question Auntie has asked before: Where is Kauai’s Chief? Please, Kaumuali’i, come home soon! We have our backs to the sea cliffs now, dear Chief, and we need you.

Oops, Auntie has to run! One blasted red helicopter is chopping overhead. Auntie has to go outside and curse it forever and calm the dogs. But Auntie does feel better for talking to you. Mahalo nui loa for listening. A hui hou.



Please note, antilogy is an inconsistency or controversy in terms or ideas, causing controversy and discussion.


Gae Rusk copyright 2006