Kokua, chill out and enjoy life.

It seems that the place to learn about Hawaiian culture and way of life is on The North Shore. So the sister, Emma her friend and I packed our stuff in our newly rented Toyota Corolla ("uhhh, the accelerator dont get stuck to often on these ones...") and headed north. Hawaiian culture is all about showing "aloha" and "kokua". Now "aloha" is commonly used to describe pretty much any kind of welcoming or friendly gesture. It also doubles for hello and goodbye. Kokua is a bit more tricky to define. The automated voice on the bus says "Please kokua, give room to the elderly and disabled". Roughly translated this comes to "Please; "extend loving, sacrificial help to others for their benefit, not for personal gain..." give room to the elderly and disabled". (If you click the link it will take you to another blog concerned with Hawaiian culture and language). As the quote suggests "aloha" and "kokua" actually comes closer to discribing a way of life rather than just being terms for good behaviour. Sadly in the hands of american cultural imperialism these words are reduced to tourist friendly quasi-authentic fully-bullshit catch frases meant to make your stay more unique. Of course it has just the opposite effect. This rather long digression was leading one way; North. It seems to me anyways that the North Shore is the place to go to experience the aloha lifestyle. Here money matters less, people are not primarily concerned with selling you something and you give the right of way to others. Except when surfing. Here you just get a punch in the face if someone else wants the wave you are on: "You try to take another mans wave brah?" and BANG!. To the locals waves are like women apparently. Need less to say its difficult to convey the feeling of the North Shore in text, but I did find this sign in the local Coffee Gallery that might get us some of the way:




Every other café in Hawaii has one primary concern: Dont get sued! And so the signs there read: "We accept no responsibility for lost children, in fact we shall ignore them to prevent an damage or injury..." and so forth. Everything on the North Shore seems a little worn down as well. Which is probably why people arent so concerned with protecting their property. On our way home we had shrimp at the most famours shrimp place on The North Shore: Giovannis. As you can tell by the pictures its been a while since the good people of the Michelin Guide came by, but the shrimp was awesome! Big nasty garlicky bastards. And the place was definitely something else. Check it out:




Until next time: Please kokua.