Talk:Hanauma Bay
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[edit] Note
Just a note to the author of the article on Hanauma Bay: The correct pronunciation is not "Ha-NOW-mah." That is a modern and unfortunate corruption of the original Hawaiian. The correct pronunciation is "Ha-nah-oo-mah." 'Hana' means 'bay' and 'uma' means 'shelter,' therefore: Shelter Bay, which is obviously true of the natural features. Also, Hawaiians do not call it 'Hanauma Bay' as this would be redundant because it translates to 'Shelter Bay Bay.' We simply call it 'Hanauma.'
I am writing this note because of my sorrow at the present situation and condition of the bay, what with its over use and over commercialization. When I was a kid fifty years ago I used to take the HRT bus with friends out to Hanauma on weekdays during the summer. It was so wonderful then because it was beautifully uncrowded and always clean. Weekends, though even then, saw heavier use of the bay by local families and a few tourists, which is why I usually visited only on weekdays. So delightfully uncrowded was the beautiful little bay my boy scout troop spent a whole week encamped there one summer. Words cannot express the happiness that we city kids felt to be 'roughing it' in our tents pitched on the grassy shore under the swaying palm trees, refreshed by the cool, sweet tradewinds that dropped down from the ridges above, and soothed by the soft swooshing of the waves as they caressed the sandy beach. During the day we fished with line and spear-guns then cooked the catch over the evening fire. Few things taste as good as that which we enjoyed then. What made it even more terrific for us kids was the close-by drinking faucets, showers and restrooms. Compare this memory to what is now there and it becomes apparent why I do not appreciate the corruption of the name of the place.
Over-hyped, over-used, and over-taken by the hoards of tourists who flood the place everyday, polluting the water with their suntan lotions and other fluids, and who crowd the beach leaving no place for the crabs which once populated the sandy shore. 3,000 bodies every day stomping on the coral reef and thereby destroying it and with it the food supply that attracted the colorful reef fish there in the first place. All this to satisfy a tourist industry that that only knows one law: More is better. Local families don't go there much these days because of the crowds of tourists. Local kids don't have the same opportunity to enjoy that special place as I did long ago. It is too sad for words.
--unsigned essay by 12.44.115.43, 07:29, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
