All You White People

      More Letters From Paradise
        All You White People

Some time ago my friend Paul returned to the mainland for a visit. He said that he wanted to have some Indiana home-grown sweetcorn and tomatoes. He was surprised to see all those white people.

I told the story to my Chinese, American-born dentist. He had a similar experience while visiting China. "They all looked the same," he said.

The point I am trying to make is that here in Hawaii, there is such an ethnic mix it is sometime called chop suey, and we all take it for granted. One such example is that the driver license tests are written in eight different languages! Our Governor is Korean, while the State Superintendent of Schools is Japanese. Our dentist mentioned above is assisted by a Samoan woman. The hygienist is Vietnamese. Our family doctor who recently retired, is Japanese. His replacement is an Indian woman.

Our condo security guards are Hawaiian, Chinese, Samoan, and Haole. The word "haole" (how-lee) is a Hawaiian term meaning white or foreigner.

If you call Sears for the repair of your dishwasher, your repairmen could be a Chinese and a Filipino. And it doesn't matter what your ethnicity is. We have come to accept it for what it is. The ethnic diversity adds much richness to our lives.

Recently, Teena received a call from a woman on the mainland, wanting to ask about a particular hotel. Teena told her that the hotel is excellent and managed and staffed by Japanese. Hearing that, she chose another hotel and found to her dismay, the same situation she was trying so hard to avoid.

There are a lot of problems here in paradise, but race and ethnicity is not one of them. In fact, there is a very funny Hawaiian song in which several ethnic groups are made fun of. Nobody gets mad. As they say here "Ain't no big 'ting."

           Aloha
           Grant