Paukukalo River

(Lessons in Reaching Out)

Growing up on the Reinhardt estate at Paukukalo, we endured our fair share of hardships. Fortunately, not the kind that our parents nor their parents before them endured, thank goodness!  Our generation at least had toothpaste, electric iron and washing machines!  Mom tells stories of brushing their teeth with charcoal sooth, yikes!  Of boiling water in a tarai (big washtub) to do their laundry, using lye soap! Then ironing their clothes and linens with a charcoal iron!  Pua ting!

We all heard, at one time or another, stories being told of the olden days, where one's parents walked for miles and miles to get to their schools...we all heard that proverbial, "You know, you fellahs don't know how hard it was growing up during our time!"  Of course, here in tropical Hawaii.....at least we get good weather year round.  The stories being told on the mainland, are of snow and ice.....brrrrrr!

Most of us Reinhardt kids have our "watered-down-hardship-version" to tell.  Like our parents, we too endured some of what they experienced.  Not only "walking" to school, but also, "walking" to the store", or "walking" up the road to buy kerosene by the gallons and hauling it back home for our stoves.  We did our fair share of "walking", let me tell you! 

During our, "small-kid-time" the lower Waiehu Beach Road, had no bridge suspending over the river bed.  The bridge wasn't built until the 1960s', so, we kids walked from our homestead down at Paukukalo's Kaae Road, all the way to the old Kahului School!  Not far, if measured by today's time...but try being a little kid, with no paved road and no shoes, barefoot most of the time, anyway....and see how far you would last! 

Mililani Almeida, being the oldest and responsible for all of us little ones...took the lead and we all clasped each others hands to form a human chain, linking from one end of the river across to the other side.  When the river trickled, we had no problem crossing over.  On most days, it just ran "normal", meaning  you could easily wade into it, as it was only ankle deep...on most days that is.  Sometimes though, it reached waist-deep!

Of course, on those "normal" days, we took advantage of the river!  We played and swam and picked up wild plums that grew alongside the river bank (we would mash these juicy plums with Hawaiian Salt, sugar and shoyu......yummmmm, but it would leave tell-tale purple stains on your tongue, busted!). We would frolic and just linger in the river...killing time before we high-tailed it on home, way before our parents got home from work!

But, there were days when that same river, was boiling and raging!  River rock and boulders would roll-down the river with a mighty force!  That river, took many a lives in its time.  We are amazed that us cousins are still alive today and not one of us drowned while crossing that river!  Mind you, a few of us cousins, did land in the drink now and again....but somehow, over the years, the lessons we learned about looking out for each other came naturally.  Hands were always reaching out, mindful of the little ones or magically appear to "rescue" one another just in the brink of time before you could be washed over the edge and be carried all the way down to the river mouth, then out to sea!  Pictured here, is Gabe Vista reaching out to his nephew Aukai at the bottom of the river mouth down at Paukukalo.

In the olden days, when the sugar mill was in production, the river would run muddy....a chocolatey brown color and the stench was hauna (stink!).  But, us kids were forced to cross over....afterall, we had to go to school and crossing that river was the only way to get there!  Neva mind...all the sugar cane opala!

Tons of sugar cane flotsam, (opala, refuse, floating on water) would run its course down the river, meandering toward the river mouth and then, out to sea.  It was kinda eerie....watching these huge, nestled, entanglement of processed sugar cane debris float by in clusters.  Some the size of knolls, small hills (well, to us, anyway, 'cause we were only small kids!).

But, that was years and years ago.  Over time, with stricter enviornmental laws and regulations enforced---sugar cane dumping came to an end.  However, the river still flows, but not much.  With the heavy rains....one can still hear the boulders come tumbling down the river bed...and sometimes, if you close your eyes, you can see Mililani taking the lead and little hands, automatically "reaching out" for one another.