Natural History

Blue Ginger
(Dichorisandra thyrsiflora.)

This dazzling, succulent Brazilian ornamental is neither blue nor is it a true ginger. The bright, compact conical flower heads shade towards bluish-purple, violet or even magenta, for one thing, and it lacks the colored sheath-like bracts of the real gingers. The plant is actually related to the spider-plant, a familiar hanging houseplant, and to wandering Jew and honohono grass.

Two common ornamental relatives are D. reginae, native to Peru, and grown for its colorful foliage, and D. hexandra, a flowering tropical herb that grows through much of tropical America.

Blue ginger is an old-time favorite in island landscaping and grows in well-established Maui gardens. It is particularly prevalent in long-established lush residential areas, usually growing under tall trees, in the shade and the wet. Its scientific name "thyrsifolia" means "flowers in a wand." A planting of blooming blue ginger glows like jewels under the trees. They are prized because of their blue color, a rarity in tropical plants, but they can easily take over a small yard if allowed to grow untrammeled. They don't seem to grow well in the wild.

It is becoming more readily available in the nurseries as people get interested in it again. The plants are propagated by root division or by stem cuttings and are easy to grow if they are kept well-watered and are planted under shade in cool, moist, protected areas where the soil is rich in humus. They seem to grow best in inner valleys and are generally not a good beach plant. The only major problem seems to be thrips.

The plant grows to heights of about six to eight feet and can cover large areas, just like gingers. The leaf stalks are about one or two inches thick and they emerge from the underground stems and grow vertically with leaves and flower clusters at the top. The large, narrow, pointed leaves grow to about 8 inches in length and are green, often with silvery striations. They are arranged spirally on the stalks. Nodes are spread apart at the bottom of the stalk and closer together toward the tip. The conical flower panicles appear periodically. There are many florets to each panicle and each blue floret is about a half-inch in diameter. The seed coverings are yellow to orange.

Blue ginger's close relatives, the spiderworts (Tradescantia spp.) have been found to be supersensitive to pesticide levels, automobile exhaust and ionizing radiation. They turn from blue to pink in a few days.

Blue ginger is not easily available as a cut flower on the commercial market, but given plenty of water, it will last for weeks on the bush. Some people have tried them in woven haku lei and the leaves and stems are said to make a red dye.

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Arts & Culture

Kaanapali Missionary Tales

The early Congregationalist missionaries were well-established on three other islands before they came to Maui in 1824. At that time, the native village of Lahaina stretched along a mile and a half of rocky coastline where there were about 700 grass houses with an estimated 2,300 souls.

Then as now, Lahaina was the "big city" for West Maui and Kaanapali was "country," with only a few small villages. In 1834, it was decided to start a circuit of "missionary out stations" and the first was built near Keka'a (Black Rock), a rocky promontory on which there was a sacred heiau and old burial ground. (It is interesting to note that Keka'a was also believed to be a place where the souls of the dead leaped away from this world into the hereafter.)

Within a few years an adobe school house was added, with another small home for the teacher. An extra room was built for the overnight accommodation of the missionary who came each weekend to preach.

For the first nine years while the mission station was established and took form, the pastor was the Reverend Ephraim Clark, a frail and scholarly man who looked on his "flock" at Kaanapali with a jaundiced eye. (In reports sent back to mission headquarters, he spoke of "lewdness" and indicated that it was difficult to teach his students and members of the congregation such things as modesty, hard work and punctuality).

Even so, within a few years an adobe school house was added with another small home for the teacher. An extra room was built for the overnight accommodation of the missionary who came each weekend to deliver two sermons and to teach a Bible class and Sabbath school

Reverend Clark also taught at the Lahainaluna Mission School, where he prepared classroom texts in the Hawaiian language. The texts were printed on the School's printing press. (The Mission school is still in operation today, and is often billed as "the oldest school west of the Rockies." It was established in 1831.)

Clark sailed to Hawaii as part of the Third Company of American Missionaries, which arrived in Hawaii in 1838. He was stationed at Honolulu until his reassignment to Lahainaluna and the fledgling Kaanapali outstation in 1834. He stayed there until 1843. In 1839, he took several years off as he sailed to China for his health. When he returned, from 1843 to 1846, Clark worked in Wailuku and then returned to Honolulu to become the third pastor of Kawaiahao Church.

Clark's successor was the youthful and handsome John Emerson, who arrived in Hawaii as part of the Fifth Company of American missionaries in 1832 and opened the station at Waialua on Oahu. Emerson was assigned to the Lahainaluna and to the Kaanapali station from 1842 to 1846.

Apparently he was not particularly impressed with the Kaanapali station either. In 1846, shortly before returning to the station at Waialua on Oahu, Emerson wrote, "Nothing of a peculiarly marked or very interesting character has occurred among the little church and people of Kaanapali during the past two years." It's a bit disconcerting to note that he then went on to say that there had been an epidemic 12 months earlier, "making all in the district ill and killing hundreds."

Unfortunately disease was running rampant through the native population by then, exacting a heavy toll. New diseases were constantly being introduced by visiting sailors to a vulnerable native population whose immune system could not fight off the strange assaults.

Clark and Emerson both noted that the Kaanapali region had little rainfall, so crops were "unpredictable." Because of this, during the mid-1800's, many of the natives drifted into Lahaina, which became Hawaii's most popular port.

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Hawaiiana

Valentines Words

Hau'oli Lā Ipo
Happy Valentines Day

Ipo:
Sweetheart

Aloha:
Love

Aloha wau iā 'oe:
I love you

Mele Ho'oipoipo:
Love Song

Hana Aloha:
Love Magic

Pilialoha:
To be in a bond of love

Ho'oipoipo:
Romantic

Pu'uwai:
Heart

Honi:
Kiss

Pūliki:
Hug

Loke:
Rose

Manu Aloha:
Love Bird

Kokoleka:
Chocolate

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Braddah-Nics Lexicon

STANDARD: We have to be going.
BRADDAH-NICS: Us goin' hele.

* * * * * *

STANDARD: Don't you want to participate?
BRADDAH-NICS: You no like play?

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Local Grinds

Chicken Katsu 

Ingredients: 

• 1 box of chicken thighs
• 2 cups of Panko bread crumbs
• 1 cup of flour
• 6 eggs
• Cooking oil
  
   

Procedure:

• Debone chicken.
• Place flour and Panko in two individual plates.
• Whisk eggs in a bowl, preheat frying pan on medium to high heat.
• Add half a cup of oil for each new batch entered into frying pan.
• While frying pan with oil is heating, dip each chicken piece in flour, egg and Panko. Make sure each piece is done so in this order.
• Cook in the frying pan until each side is a medium-dark golden color.
• When finished cooking cut into strips, let cool on some paper towels to drain excess oil.

Spicy Katsu Sauce

Mix and Chill:

• Half cup of ketchup
• 1 tablespoon of oyster sauce
• 3 tablespoons of sweet chili sauce
  
   

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