The Shaka and Hawaii Time

Now that I have taught the girls how to "hang loose" I thought I'd do a little research to find out what I had taught them....

There seems to be a lot of questions surrounding the Shaka, but it appears to be accepted as part of the culture now....

How to Make a Shaka and to send a shaka: make a fist with either hand. Extend the thumb and pinky while keeping the middle fingers curled under. Face your thumb and pinky away from your body and draw an invisible “j” in the air. Give your shaka a shake and you’re communicating Hawaiian-style!

Some of the dispute is over the name...as we know from reading the blog there is no "sh"
in the Hawaiian language...

There are a couple of stories as to the origin...one of my favorites is the fella who was involved in an industrial accident and lost all but his thumb and pinky on one hand...he then was hired to keep kids off the sugar cane train....the kids would use the train to ride into town...the kids would signal each other when the security guy was near by flashing the "shaka"....

There is another story that links it to a TV pitchman and yet another that has it being popularized by a politician in campaigns beginning in 1976.

If you would like to read about it here are some links...
http://www.to-hawaii.com/shaka.php
http://starbulletin.com/2002/03/31/news/kokualine.html

I've heard a lot about "Hawaiian time" lately and I guess it is something we should all consider as we make our plans. According to my information, the people of Hawaii are much more laid back than those of us here on the mainland, it has even been suggested in some of my reading that we may become infected by this feeling (although some of us that are a bit more tense than others it may take longer). We should remember that the two reasons for our trip to Hawai'i are Granny's Birthday and to experience beauty and a sense of peace. Speaking of Hawaiian time, here is a little, "Did You Know?"...Hawaii has its own time zone. It’s called Hawaiian Standard Time. There is no daylight savings time in Hawaii, which means that in summer, Hawaii is two hours behind the U.S. West Coast, while in winter, Hawaii is three hours behind the U.S. West Coast.

The word for today is Haole (how-leh) originally meant foreigner now means Caucasian.