I am a recent transplant to the hawaiian islands from the east coast of the U.S. our little family unit — my partner and I and our four-legged companions — were fortunate enough to have the opportunity and the means to pack up our world and follow the dream of living, for a little while at least, on this island paradise.
There is a lot to absorb, like the fact that we are living on a relative grain of volcanic sand compared to the place we called home, so small you have to zoom way into the middle of the pacific ocean on google maps just to find it. like the knowledge that my presence here is possible because the country that is a large part of my identity took over these islands and its people in an illegal power move designed to serve only itself. In hawaii, I find myself once again reckoning with what it means to be Chinese American. But I’m more surprised to find that this place makes me face what it means to be human. Because my paradise is simultaneously another’s living hell, and suffering lies in stark contrast against the multimillion-dollar beachfront properties hawaii is famous for.
Don’t get me wrong. We came for the same reasons everyone else did — the temperate climate, the mauka and the makai, to pluck and enjoy the far-flung fruits of the wild earth. But I want it to be more.
Through this blog, I hope to understand this land, its histories, their contemporary meanings to native and indigenous folks, and if I’m lucky, where I might fit into this story.
Tidepool Haikus 