HAPA HAOLE

Hapa Haole 1979

Hapa Haole 1978

See, I  talk Hawai'ian  too!  I also talk Ilokano well enough to have the great and loving Voice from the Kitchen, Isabel, to smother both these Hapa-Haole's with her motherly love and attention.

Some twenty and some years ago, in Disneyland, Anaheim, California something happened that I remembered early this morning and it got me to thinking about the racial mix running through the veins of the two handsome male creatures pictured above.  It was not a pretty picture and I had one of those "French Canadian Hockey Player" moments.  We were taking a break from the usual attractions and just lolly-gagging on the lawn near the "Haunted House" with our then small boys.  Along came strolling musicians, a Mexican Mariachi.  To my surprise, one of the two sweet children above said, "These people should go back home."  I whirled about, stabbed him in the heart and throat with my eyes (The right for the heart, the left for the throat) and ground out "You should too, Half-Breed" from between my teeth.  That put an end to happy-happy for a few minutes.  Of course Mama took care of smoothing things out.  All I did for a few minutes was shake my head in disbelief.  The boy had been in the local parochial school for less than two years and he had already been able to make such vicious judgments and express them.  

Time has a way of changing things.  It is sure that the Disneyland episode had an effect on our beloved sons.  They went on with their lives living in the miscegenetic (I made this word up) world of Southern California.  They had close friends of several races, even some Hapa-Haoles like themselves.  Just to show you how indiscriminate they were, and still are, they even have a white, Anglo-Saxon or two in their close circle.  One of them is married to a Native American lady.  Both of them know and respect their origins.  They both know and understand the language of their mother and of their father (the English speaking half of their father, who himself, is a Hapa-Haole of sorts).  They both eat from the cultural menu of all their friends, ranging from Japanese, touching all the Pacific Islands, landing in Mexico, reaching out for some European, especially Italian, and grabbing a hot dog and a hamburger on the way.  They do have one strong culinary predilection, though.  They are rice eaters.  Potatoes are a distant second on the staples list.  

It is very interesting to see the cultural development of offspring.  They grow up not giving too much shrift to their cultural heritage.  Then one day it hits them.  This is especially true when growing up in Southern California, one of the thickest "gumbo stew pots" in the nation.  It is not necessarily true in other sections of this great nation.  Some 40 plus years ago when I was working for a General Mills plant on and across the Mexican Border, we hired a young African American woman from Alabama.  She and I became fast friends.  She had never experienced such culture shock.  She told me several times that she was glad that her family could not see her "cavorting" with white people and all these "other natives from God knows where."  She said that in her Alabama environment, she would hardly see two or three white people a month, never mind work every day with them, eat with them and even sit down at a bar and have a drink together with them.  I haven't seen her in all this time.  Somehow I hope she reads this.  Say "Hi", Tommie!  

I leave you therefore with my reflections about this "Hapa Thought."  I hope that we all appreciate the treasure of the cultural stew that we live in.  I know I do.  To paraphrase St. Peter, Friend, of gold and silver I have none.  What I do have, I willingly give you.  Get up and enjoy the aura of my way of life as I know you will allow me to share in yours. (Heart-warming story as told in the book of  Acts in the Christian Bible, chapter 3, verses 1 through 10)