Mauians picturing peace

Hundreds gather in Kahului to send a postcard of aloha

The Maui News
Monday, February 17, 2003

By MELISSA TANJI
Staff Writer

At least a thousand Mauians of all races and ages rallied Sunday afternoon on the Maui Community College campus to show their opposition to a U.S. war against Iraq.

The main event was the Maui Peace Portrait — a photograph of the gathered crowd that will be turned into postcards to be sent by the participants to the White House, to members of Congress and to friends and family.

"No war, no war, no war," chanted state Sen. J. Kalani English, the 6th District Democrat who represents East Maui, Molokai and Lanai, in leading the throng of peace advocates.

Adorned with aloha shirts and lei, and carrying anti-war signs, the participants stated their feelings, enjoyed the music and applauded the speakers before posing for the portrait.

"We think this war is stupid," said Kathryn Hall of Waikapu. "There has been no proof."

The mother of three said she finds it "strange" that President George W. Bush has shifted his focus from Osama bin Laden, head of the al-Qaida terrorist organization held responsible for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, to Saddam Hussein.

"I think it's all propaganda," she said. "He hasn't said anything about Osama bin Laden."

The Maui rally came one day after anti-war rallies, marches and demonstrations were held around the world. It brought together Maui families, people who had protested the Vietnam Peace portrait

War, elected officials, business owners and ministers.

The primary draw was the portrait, modeled after a peace portrait photographed in Port Townsend, Wash., last year. Cindy Wolpin, a visitor from Port Townsend, suggested a portrait for Maui to Maui Peace Action, a group that had been holding periodic peace demonstrations over the past several months.

State Rep. Sol Kaho'ohalahala, whose 13th District includes part of East Maui with Molokai and Lanai, said that Hawaii serves as an example to the world.

"We are the people of aloha. Perhaps now more than even we have to practice aloha," he said.

Kaho'ohalahala noted that his name Solomon means "the peacemaker" in Hebrew.

English said he introduced a Senate concurrent resolution last Friday urging Bush to not start a war with Iraq preemptively, "but to pursue a peaceful, diplomatic resolution built upon international support." The resolution has received support from most Democrat senators, he said.

"These are my people," English said of the gathering at MCC. "I have to reflect their view in the Legislature."

English said he fears the decisions being made by the Bush administration "without the consent of the people."

Korean War veteran Cecil Bailey said he is "against any war, if it can be helped."

The 71-year-old retired heating and air conditioning contractor said he wants Bush to wait for U.N. approval before any action is taken.

Bailey, a former Californian who now lives in Lahaina, said he was a medic in the Korean War and took care of prisoners of war.

"I had it made, I was lucky," he said. But he added, "We wasted our time in Korea . . . 'cause look at it."

Bailey said war helped South Korea remain free, but North Korea is still a communist dictatorship.

A former Vietnam War protester, photographer Terry Rowe of Kihei, said she was out to show her support for peace.

"I believe in trying to come to a peaceful end, instead of coming to a war," she said. "I was there (protesting) in the Vietnam War" as a teen-ager who took part in demonstrations in Berkeley and San Francisco.

The difference she sees between theen and now is that the movement for peace now is more global.

"The world has gotten a lot smaller because of our technology," she said.

She said she also is involved in the Peace Poem, an effort of the Maui Live Poets Society to have individuals contribute lines to create the world's longest poem.

The Rev. Ron Kobata of Makawao Hongwanji Mission said he was participating in the "finite gesture to express infinite concern that there be peace in the world."

"May we all attain perfect peace," Kobata said, reciting a line of the "Golden Chain of Love" that is part of the Buddhist church's traditional group recitation.

An Ulupalakua woman, Diane Lewis, said she participated to advocate peace, although she said, "I don't think any of these things will affect what Bush does."

"It's not the masses that want it, it's the president," she said.

A 46-year-old doctor from Kula said he is concerned about the welfare of innocent people in Iraq.

"When we go there and bomb, we are going to destroy their infrastructure," said Dr. Madhup Joshi.

As happened on 9-11, there will be victims who will not get medical and emergency attention when they are injured, while a war will leave live ammunition and misfiring bombs that will kill innocent people in Iraq, he said.

Chuck Uyeda, an author and business owner, said he has been keeping up with what the government has been saying and comparing facts. All of it has him wondering.

"It makes me question the legalization of the government's position," he said.

The 59-year-old Kahului resident said he is finishing a novel, "Warriors of Peace: The Ghandi Legacy." Ghandi was the advocate of independence for India who proved the possibilities of peaceful protest. Uyeda said he started writing the book after a small group of peace activists began holding anti-war signs in front of the Kahului Shopping Center.

Darrel Hall, Kathryn's husband, was part of the group demonstrating in front of the Kahului Shopping Center.

He said he thought there were only "15 liberals on Maui." But he marveled at the crowd on Sunday. Now that a call for blood is imminent, he said, people are becoming more aware that the threat of war is real.

Kathryn Hall and her 16-year-old son Shane were also concerned about the draft.

Shane said he will be turning 17 soon and in another year he will be required to register with the Selective Service System.

The draft is inactive now, but he feared that it will be revived as more people are needed in the military. He suspects that those who are not affluent will get drafted sooner than others.

"We're not that extremely wealthy," the Baldwin High School student said.

Sally Raisbeck, an organizer with Maui Peace Action, said she took offense to Bush saying the U.N. was "irrelevant" for resisting the U.S. call for military action in Iraq.

"I think Bush is irrelevant," she said.

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