Leslie Wilcox Blogs

Eartha Kitt Had the Idea...

     Fellow Kalani High grads and I still laugh about the sign that teacher Harold Cole clipped to his hat as students approached the end of a school year. The sign showed a picture of a clock and the words:

    Time will pass. Will you?

    In a sense, the risk of educational failure now lasts a lifetime.  This is the informational age, a knowledge economy. What we learn in formal schooling in the first part of life isn't enough to sustain us throughout life. The best thing to learn in school is how to keep learning.

    Representing an educational organization, I sometimes visit schools to talk about lifelong learning. It's at the heart of PBS Hawaii programming. (And when young students show me they've figured out shortcuts in creating video graphics or new twists in social media, I get off the soapbox. They're already practicing what I'm preaching.)

    The late singer Eartha Kitt knew her stuff when she commented: "I am learning all the time. The tombstone will be my diploma." http://www.artistic-lemonade.com/archive/014.htm

 

Pride, Prejudice, Zombies

    Like mother, like daughter. Well, sort of.

    My youngest daughter Kai and I both love to read. We just don't like to read the same books.

    I'm a longtime ardent fan of Jane Austen's 1813 "Pride and Prejudice", for its irony and social commentary.  

    Kai is reading "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies." This book, too, is set in the countryside of 19th-century England--but in this alternative-universe countryside, zombies roam. The Bennet sisters still mind their manners--but they also head out to slay zombies.

www.gointothestory.com/2009/02/pride-prejudice-zombies.html

     The classic "Pride and Prejudice" has produced movie versions, and I watch one of the DVDs, or re-read the book, once a year.  Now "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" is spawning a movie, and I wonder if Kai will also re-visit her book or movie once a year.

      She's offering to share her book with me--and I'm waving it off and running in the other direction as if one of those zombies is after me. 

      Despite my current horror, I'm not ruling out reading it. After all, Kai has a history of opening my mind to new things. Music, films, art.

      Some things we'll never agree on. Like some boyfriends. Like some clothes. Like that ninth-grade year she thought it was cool to wear a big safety pin poked through her eyebrow.

      "What's your problem?" she would ask. Right.

       Now she's telling me,  "Try this book. You like Jon Stewart. You like parodies. You'll like 'Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.'"

     Maybe. Or I'll wait for the movie and see it with Kai. After all, we are of one mind about  popcorn with kaki mochi.  

Loretta Ables Sayre's Quick Trip Home

How many people decide as a toddler what their future profession will be...never deviate from the goal...and manage to achieve it?

If there's anything I've learned from my role as host on PBS Hawaii's Long Story Short, it's that the usual path of high achievers is to go down a career blind alley or two, then stumble upon the job in which they achieve their success.

Not Loretta Ables Sayre. She knew she was going to be a singer before she ever went to school. And shortly after graduating from high school, she was already doing that rare thing-- making her living as a singer in Hawaii. Which she continued to do for decades. (Credit Andy Bumatai for "discovering" her.)

Now at the top of her game, playing Bloody Mary in the Rodgers & Hammerstein revival of South Pacific on Broadway, Loretta took a break from her strenuous six-day-a-week schedule and made a quick trip home to Hawaii.

She was making good on a promise to speak to students at her alma mater, Radford High. And she made time to talk with me on Long Story Short.

Tune in tonight at 7:3o (Tues., July 28, 2009) to see the first of a two-part conversation with Loretta.

You'll hear her recall her childhood habit of waiting till her family went to sleep, then sneaking down to the living room to listen to music with headphones and  sing.

"When music goes into your body and gets filtered through your soul and comes out of you and it releases all of these emotions, it was so right," Loretta says. "My soul was singing when I was three years old, four years old. It's just all I ever wanted to do."

Nice to Have You Back, Ilikai Hotel

       I'm glad the Ilikai Hotel re-opened last Friday.    www.pacific.bizjournals.com/pacific/stories/2009/07/.../daily26.html

                  www.starbulletin.com/news/bulletin/50489142.html

       It's the Waikiki hotel site I've visited most, starting from my childhood,  from before the hotel opened.

        As a kid, I saw construction workers building the hotel. Floor by floor. In those days we still used the term "skyscraper."

        One reason I've been to the Ilikai so often is an accident of location. The Ilikai's next-door neighbor used to be Kaiser Hospital and medical clinics. Imagine that! A hospital sitting on Waikiki property values, overlooking the Ala Wai Yacht Harbor and Kaiser's surf break...

         No wonder that the kids in my family never complained about having to tag along to other family members' doctor visits or other health business.  We were off to a place where we could fill our eyes with sailing and surfing. And often, as time allowed, we'd take swimsuits. Those were the days in which parents would let you loose with only a stern reminder to be back on time and not to cause any trouble. No water bottles, no cellphones.

        We'd walk by the boats, my older brother rubber-necking to see if one of the live-aboard ladies was sunbathing topless again;  talk with the beachboy at the Duke Kahanamoku Lagoon; check the surf; swim.  And we'd always return to the hospital with a detour through the Ilikai Hotel. After all, it was the building where Hawaii Five-O star Jack Lord stood to survey the city for crime!  The lobby was open and welcoming, even to bedraggled kids. The storefronts displayed jade and coral jewelry and splashy aloha prints. The women's restroom had a sleek side room of mirrors and vanity tables. We tried to figure out why there were always people at the pool when there was an interesting ocean a short walk away.

       Inevitably,  the Kaiser Hospital Waikiki would give way to a hotel (now the Hawaii Prince). The  old hospital relocated to Moanalua. Its demise became a Big Event in Honolulu--there was an implosion which became part of a Magnum PI show. Tom Selleck shot a scene in the vacant building  just before the blasts. A TV news reporter at the time for KGMB (CBS), I went live with the implosion from an Ilikai rooftop near the tennis courts. The fall-out of drifting ashes was heavier than I expected, and I blinked my way uncomfortably through most of my report.

       With Kaiser gone, I kept going to the Ilikai.  Weddings, the Press Club Gridiron shows, a laser-tag game business that didn't last long, baby parties, business luncheons.

       Another accident of location caused me to stay there one night a year for years. The hotel is close to Ala Moana Center. I used to be one of the organizers and emcees of the annual Lokahi Holiday Giving Drive held at the shopping center. It was always a glorious  jumble of volunteer set-up, boxes, balloons, top musical performers, donors, receipts, TV cut-ins, wrap-up reports, thank-yous and clean-up.  A long day--fun and sweaty and exhausting. My husband, who often managed the drive-through donation lane, and I didn't feel like making the trip home. North Shore--40 miles. Ilikai Hotel--2 blocks. We'd check into the Ilikai.

      Of course, the accident of location was no accident. Hawaii's Chinn Ho knew when he laboriously put together the financing  that it was a strategic site on the edge of Waikiki--near other Waikiki businesses, the shoreline, the harbor, and Ala Moana Center and Ala Moana Park.

      So nice to know that the Ilikai's epitaph has been shelved; I much prefer this happier ending and new beginning.

Rundown of New Shows on PBS Hawaii

      In Hawaii, many favorite aunties favor tanktops and rubber slippers and they may sport a tattoo or two. By contrast, Englishwoman Miss Marple wears proper dresses and carries an ironed cloth handkerchief. But she'd be welcomed and embraced here as a favorite auntie, for her interest in people, her willingness to talk with anyone and to listen with respect.

       Unfortunately, Miss Marple doesn't visit Hawaii much--week after week, she ferrets out killers in Britain. Beneath the sweet hat and white hair is a steel-trap mind.

     Tonight (Sun., July 26, 2009), at 8 pm, on MASTERPIECE MYSTERY! Miss Marple is busy unraveling the riddle of a dying man's words.

     Here are program highlights for the coming week on Hawaii's only public television station, PBS Hawaii.

--Hawaii’s gift to Broadway, Loretta Ables-Sayre, tells us about her childhood and formative musical influences on LONG STORY SHORT (Tues., July 28, 7:30 pm). Loretta won a Tony nomination as Bloody Mary in the current Rodgers & Hammerstein revival of “South Pacific” at Lincoln Center. This is the first of a lively two-part conversation with Loretta, who made a quick trip back to Hawaii to speak at her alma mater, Radford High.

--Later that night (Tues., July 28), at 10 pm, P.O.V. presents a compelling British documentary - "Hold Me Tight, Let Me Go"-- about Oxford’s Mulberry Bush School for emotionally disturbed children. Variety calls it a film "mixing ferocity with tenderness, delicacy with tenacity."

--HISTORY DETECTIVES (Mon., July 27, 9 pm) has a Hawaii connection, with a claim by a man named John Ott that he has a piece of Amelia Earhart’s missing Lockheed L-10E Electra in which she made her last flight. He says his grandfather worked as a flight mechanic at a Honolulu airfield and - well, the story unfolds Monday night.

Other all-new episodes on PBS Hawaii: NOVA ScienceNOW (Tues., July 28, 9pm) which includes the story behind the discovery of the oldest known organic molecules on earth; TIME TEAM AMERICA (Wed., July 29, 8 pm) visits the historic underground homes of the Fremont Indians in southern Utah’s remote canyons; ASCENT OF MONEY (Wed., July 29, 9 pm) asks whether and when China will cut off its huge line of credit to struggling America; WIDE ANGLE (Wed., July 29, 10 pm) focuses on an Arab-Israeli teenager’s struggle with religious values conflicting with her dream of stardom; INSIGHTS ON PBS HAWAII (Thurs., July 30, 7:30 pm) explores the Hawaii impact of healthcare reform within the context of the economic crisis; and GLOBE TREKKER (Thurs., July 30, 10 pm) experiences Morocco, getting caught in a sandstorm on a camel trek and visiting the walled city of Fez, the most complete medieval metropolis in the Arab world.

Something different on "Playing for Change" (Sat., Aug. 1, 10 pm) filmmakers racked up a lot of frequent flier miles, recording top musicians performing the same classics ("Stand By Me," "One World") in different parts of the world. The creative new mix was made to advance peace through music.

If you miss a show, please check our website. You may be able to see it for free on demand:  www.pbshawaii.org

 

A Shark's Welcome on Computer Wallpaper

  Do you want to be greeted by a large lurking shark every time you go to your computer?

   That's what's on my screen, after a quick download of PBS Hawaii's August computer wallpaper.

    Other choices for the month:  the late great entertainer Nat King Cole and the enduring kids' character, Curious George.  Help yourself at: www.pbshawaii.org/ourproductions/wallpaper.php

Sharks are on my mind after seeing a six-footer (no exaggeration), probably a reef shark,  come awfully close to shore in knee-deep water on the North Shore. It was a fearsome sight in an otherwise placid beach environment. No idea what brought it in--except that it must've been chasing a fish or otherwise foraging for food. It turned and left quickly.

The next day, in the same spot, my husband Jeff saw a little kid splashing around in waterwings.

The area, known as Silva Channel, is where a surfer sitting on his board waiting for a wave back in the 1970s got his foot nipped by a shark.  He paddled in without further incident.

Undoubtedly there are many sharks in the area. Divers like my youngest daughter see them routinely.  Fortunately, people aren't preferred shark food.

A Very Fine Mess on King Street

     I'm sure that streetsweepers and groundskeepers don't share my glee at this time of year that the shower trees are in full bloom, lush blossoms swirling in summer breezes and scattering gold and pink on the ground.

     Walking along South King Street today, I saw piles of shower flowers curb-high and colorful along this main thoroughfare.

      Beautiful, as long as you spot the blossoms before they turn another texture and color--shriveled brown.

    

Hawaii Education on the Chopping Block

     Tonight (July 23, 2009), for the second Thursday in a row, our weekly live public affairs TV show "Insights on PBS Hawaii" looks at how budget cuts will impact Hawaii schools.

     Last week, the subject was higher education. See the program online at: http://www.kmeb.org/insights02.htm

    This time, starting at 7:30 pm, we're concentrating on public schools, K-12.  Guests are public schools chief Pat Hamamoto, State Senate Education Chair Norman Sakamoto, Gail Awakuni, principal of Campbell High and former National Principal of the Year, and Alvin Parker of the Charter School Review Panel and principal of Ka Waihona Charter School.

    We welcome your questions and comments by phone, email, Twitter or live blogging on this website, http://www.pbshawaii.org

    Dan Boylan moderates and contributing editor Howard Dicus explains how education and the economy interact.

"The Check's in the Mail"

         The Corporation for Public Broadcasting told us it liked our idea and was satisfied with our detailed answers to its follow-up questions--and it was putting the check in the mail.  Really.

          Indeed, we received the check this week. $100,000! Believe me, we wasted no time in depositing  the beautiful six-digit baby in the bank for use on our exciting new project. (The check will be followed next year by another check for $100,000. It's very important seed money from the nonprofit Corp. for Public Broadcasting.)

          PBS Hawaii is one of two PBS stations in the country that beat out stiff competition to be awarded $200,000 for an educational program using tech to bridge distances and share skills and diversity. 

         Our staff  intends to work with public, charter and private schools across Hawaii to develop the nation's first statewide student news network.

         Students from different schools, different islands, will work together on a PBS Hawaii  intranet web portal to frame  half-hour newscasts. They'll propose story ideas, craft scripts, and produce video stories for broadcast on statewide television and for showing on the worldwide web.

         This project will be a new source of fresh information and perspectives. It'll  be a rare addition to education in these days of take-aways. And it'll address the fundamental disconnect between the skills that potential employers need in entry-level employees and what many schools currently provide.

         We want to see students picking up universally transferable real-world skills in critical thinking, effective communication and results-oriented collaboration. (Not to mention that they'll  gain experience in meeting deadlines and using digital media.)

        The heads of the three school systems, including DOE chief Pat Hamamoto, are supportive of this project.  A number of rural schools on Neighbor Islands have contacted us, thrilled they'll have the same access to a broad audience as well-known and larger Honolulu schools.

       A steering committee for this student news network is being formed at this time. I'll be sharing more with you here as we go along.  Meantime, if you have questions or if you know local funders who'd like to get involved in this worthy project, please let me know...at leslie@pbshawaii.org

           

Remembering Alice Ihori

    Alice Ihori was one of those people who met people in grocery stores and planes and became lifelong friends with them. She worked as a bookkeeper, but you could have sworn she was the social director--always arranging events and food and fun.

    She loved to sew. She'd only wear pants she made herself, because "the others don't fit right in the crotch." And she sewed for others, without asking what they wanted or what size they wore. They reacted with surprised thanks, and to their further surprise, they found the clothing item was just right for them.

      I attended a "celebration of life" today  for this irrepressible Kaimuki woman who passed away in her late 80s. Alice Ihori worked a long time ago with my father at KUMU Radio. Her daughter Joan Ihori Rich is my classmate from Kalani High School. 

      When I was in middle school, Alice gave my father a beautiful old Singer sewing machine, set in wood, with drawers for thread and bobbins and cutting shears. She told him it had a lot of life yet--and admonished him to make sure it was put to good use. It was. My family hit tough times and I  learned to sew, making and mending clothes for years. Today the gifted vintage sewing machine  has a place of honor in my living room.

      Family and friends gathered in a large room at Kapiolani Community College to honor the  memory of a woman who never stopped getting to know people,  trying new things, and extending herself for others.

     In her senior years, she became spokesperson for a big annual seniors fair, promoting it on radio and TV.  She picked up roles in commercials and TV shows shooting in Hawaii. 

      The  oldest person to enter the Honolulu Advertiser's Project Runway Honolulu fashion design contest, she also served as her own model. She made denim shorts and turned a pink blanket, a present from her hematologist, into a jacket.  She figured, why go out and buy fabric when there was so much of it around the house?

       At today's memorial, stories flowed about Alice-isms. There were so many.

       For example, a woman who spoke English as a second language told me that when she was a newcomer to Honolulu, Alice adopted her. Learning the young woman feared being alone when her husband was out of town on business, Alice graciously made sure the woman was always welcome in her home  for a home-cooked meal and and a sleep-over.

      Most of the stories had to do with getting a call from Alice at the end of the day. She'd made someone dinner or a pie and wanted them to stop by and pick it up.

      Alice's family sent their guests away today with perfect keepsakes. Alice had left a great many hand-made items behind. I had a choice of crocheted clothes hangers or kitchen towels crocheted to hang on knobs.

      I chose the towels. Not only do I delight in seeing Alice's neat crochet loops. I like the idea that at some level, her towels will do something useful every day, in the heart of the home, just like she did.