My husband and I rented a car and drove to the end of every road we could find on four (4) Hawaiian Islands. We found a wonderful surprise on each path we took! On Kauai, we found the beautiful Wailua Falls. The dangers of actually climbing down the jagged rock face and getting to the falls instead of just observing them from the road were obvious and it was fenced-off and padlocked with ample posted WARNING / CAUTION / SLIPPERY / DANGEROUS / KEEP OUT = signs.
A big Samoan-built Hawaiian lady in a mumu with a tiny table and chair with something hanging off the fence behind her was ranting and raving like a lunatic. My husband thought she was crazy and went the other way. My curiousity got the best of me and I went over to see what was wrong and if she was OK – and I found…
That she was just cussed at, yelled at, laughed at and ridiculed by some young folks that are so full of themselves and “have the world by the tail” – just squeezed through the fence to go play in the waterfall. This Big Mama was ranting and raving at them – asking them to NOT go down there BECAUSE she was trying to SAVE THEIR FAMILIES the profound grief that her family has suffered from losing her very own sister who had slipped and was washed over those very waterfalls and died.
This Big Mama sat there each and every day selling prints of a picture she painted of the waterfall and a rooster that scrambled around her little piece of the world to keep her company. This is how she feeds her family and displays her devotion to her sisters memory trying to keep others from the same fate. I remember her and her devotion to her sisters memory every time I see that picture hanging in my home – 3,000 miles away… and I say a little prayer for her each time.
