The nights are cooling, and it is time to bring out the quilts after months of sleeping only under a thin, rayon pareau (sarong). . .

Young Barry (Barack) Obama, whose childhood apartment is adjacent to Young street, must have walked the lane many times to collect his thoughts while growing up. . .

Schools of small fry continue to animate the harbor. Swarms of tiny arrows - bigger everyday - are still learning the stately hula of adult fish. Watching them play & learn, the mind asks: "What breed are those?" The imagination murmurs that it doesn't really matter as attention shifts, now enraptured by the golden points of sparkle swaying scattered across the unified field of the ocean's surface. . .

"Honolulu Winter Calendar" Tired and skinny Kolea (golden plover) have returned to our misty-morning Waikiki lawns after their latest epic flight from Alaska. Anticipation and a fresh autumn coolness thrill the O`ahu air. . .

Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever run out of things to write about. After all, Waikiki is little more than two miles long and just a few blocks deep. Then two guys show up in a junk boat. Not a Chinese junk, but a "boat" made out of junk. . .

Major attractions have advertising budgets, big signs, and locations you can't miss. But oftentimes it's too easy to overlook some real gems, so come stroll along as we visit two or three of them on little Beach Walk Street here in Waikiki. . .

Sitting on the frayed tatami mats of our little coffee shack in the uplands of Kona many years ago, I fell in love with the indescribably sweet and humane sounds of Hawaiian music. Radio stations from far off Hilo and Honolulu made house-calls that healed my immigrant heart. . .

All my friends and family have heard it over and over again: I love Chinatown! For a city kid like me, Honolulu's Chinatown is familiar "mother street." The grit, the small streets full of vehicles, a multiplicity of languages, old buildings and a million little family shops, all make me feel very much at home. . .

Summer means blooming shower trees all over town. Their branches of swaying, brightly colored, mini-Japanese lanterns turn even a walk to the corner into a sort of a mini-festival. The world's best weather (look, another rainbow!) certainly doesn't hurt either, as clean, cool Trade Winds cruise briskly thanks to the customary North Pacific High. . .

Old Waikiki was quiet and marshy, a place of rice paddies, duck ponds, and small farmers. The voices of the surf, Nalu, and the wind, Makani, spoke more clearly in those days. After western contact, the ingenious Hawaiian fishponds, aquaculture pantry to the chiefs and fresh food for generations, crumbled neglected. Their wisdom of sustainability would slumber unappreciated for a hundred years. . .