Poetry by Lee Tonouchi & Meg Withers
When I turn left on Kahekili Highway near my house on the windward
side of O`ahu, I turn toward my son’s baseball practice and many of his
games in Kahalu`u. I also turn toward a community of coaches and
parents who, for the most part, speak Pidgin English. (The language is
actually Hawaiian Creole English or HCE, but people in Hawai`i call it
Pidgin.) Many dads come from work in the bright green shirts of
construction and road-workers; the moms, who speak less Pidgin, still
live in its surround. If I turn right on Kahekili Highway, in the
direction of Kāne`ohe Town and highways to Honolulu, toward my
daughter’s soccer practices, I drive into a world of local people who,
for the most part, do not speak Pidgin to each other. Kāne`ohe is the
suburbs; Kahalu`u is still country. Baseball has a working class
history in Hawai`i, especially among AJA, or Americans of Japanese
ancestry; soccer is played in a suburban middle class present untethered
to plantation or war histories. While the local bumpersticker that
reads “Keep the Country Country” is in standard English, its sentiment
is Pidgin. The response, or “Keep Town Town,” might be read with a
local accent, but it’s hardly da kine.
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