Ua Mau Ke Ea O Ka `Aina I Ka Pono

“The life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness” is the state motto of Hawai’i and allegedly the motto of the Great King, Kamehameha I. I have memorized the words of the original, but somehow the translation never seemed to make a lot of sense, neither as a sentence, nor as the motto of a king.

Now that I have been learning Hawiian a little, the translation makes even less sense, because I have the underpinning to understand a little more of the structure of the sentence. I’ll reveal my new tentative translation at the bottom, but give me a little time first to explain how I got there.

Learning Hawaiian

While in Hilo last time, I decided to buy an 8 CD course of Hawaiian. It promised to be full immersion, so I decided to put it in the car CD changer and devote time to it on my way to work.

After a funny incident at the beginning, when I put in CD 6 after CD 1 and almost died of language shock (that’s what you get for being smug!), things are progressing well. The amount of time I spend with the course is not sufficient to learn the vocabulary, and it’s sometimes hard to really hear the exact spelling of words, but otherwise it’s helping me a lot.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

An exercise in complicatedness. That’s what it felt like, especially after coming home from work on a very long Friday.

The movie is clearly meant to be viewed a few times before you can piece together the whole scenario. DVD viewers (thanks to the commentary) have the upper hand, and if you think you are going to get into something funny or romantic, it’s going to be a startling revelation.

Missed Katrina Until Wikipedia Told Me

I am astonished. Due to the trip to Hawai’i and to the lack of TV, I almost completely missed Katrina. I heard people say about the disaster, but I had no idea until I finally decided to check for myself on the web, and found just how horrible the situation is.

Partially it may be because I was in Hawai’i, an island chain so remote from the mainland, an event in Japan is more likely to cause a stir than a hurricane in Louisiana; partially I was completely cut off from news there, seeing how I had no access to news media at all; and finally, partially my utter lack of TV access removed me from the worst of the sights.

The Aviator (2004)

Howard Hughes seems to have been quite the character. A multitalented virtuoso of money-making, he ended up being one of the richest men in the first part of the 20th century, rivaling in power other tycoons like W.R. Hearst. And maybe it’s the analogy with the latter that moved Scorsese to create this movie. Once in a while, you are reminded of “Citizen Kane”, and it’s not only because of the decor.

Joomla?

What do I read on SlashDot? Well, what do you know, the last major contributor to Mambo left Miro (the company that created Mambo Open Source) and now the project is being rebuilt from the outside.

That’s how Mambo is getting a new name, a new site, and new people. It’s going to be called joomla, which supposedly stands for something somewhere, but I am sure is somehow related to the oo craze. Too bad the initial ‘j’ can’t stand for Java!

Me Talk Pretty One Day (D. Sedaris)

Yet another humorous gay book.

David Sedaris is very well-known in this city (San Francisco), as one of the funniest of the bunch. This book, in turn, is quite well-known for being one of his masterpieces. So it goes.

Let me tell you: it is funny. More the grin-and-smile kind of funny, witty, articulate, smart in places, but nothing of the promised outright heartsplitting laughter I thought I would get out of it. Not even in Hawai’i, reading after dark with my camp light on.

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (D. Eggers)

Ah, a Talented New Writer™! An autobiography of one such genius! What privilege! What happenstance!

I have rarely had such a mixed impression of a book as with this particular one. Dave Eggers is an excellent writer: he has a wonderful voice, attention to the humanity that is happening around him. Still, I found myself deeply dissatisfied, and I had a hard time accepting why at first.

Reading on, things became clearer. The human material that weaves the book is staggering, indeed. The story, for the most part, tries to describe the author’s family. Ravaged by the sudden loss of both parents due to cancer, the young women and men have to find a life somewhere.

august

i am a master of contradiction
ready to jolt any time
but craving a kiss
of a man without cause.

i love those around me
as i love myself
which i learned
it took learning.

on a day like this
my soul dances
with the soul of the sun
with that of the baby that cries.

coming from italy
the reds are redder
the blues bluer
and life always a hoot.

Uploaded Images from July and August Trips

I found a set of beautiful pictures from Puna ({moszoomalbum:Puna}), shot during the vacation I took with Kirk in July. In addition, I added the latest set of pictures from my latest stint to check up on the beginning of the construction. No pictures of the construction per se, but a lot of scenery.