Tourism Talk
No shortage of trucks and accompanying odors on Lewers Street

By Michele Kayal
Advertiser columnist

With Outrigger Enterprises planning a $300 million facelift for Lewers Street, an inventory of what's there now seemed in order.

New and entirely unscientific research reveals that visitors to Lewers Street spend an average of five days enjoying ... trucks.

Following is a partial list of the sights, sounds and smells of the Lewers Street corridor encountered on a 90-minute Friday morning stroll. Proceeding makai down Lewers, they are:

• Y. Hata & Co. delivery truck, unloading Subway Sandwich store provisions

• Roberts Hawaii 50-passenger bus, idling

• Exhaust from idling bus

• Steinlager Beer truck

• Hopaco Office Supplies truck

• Coca-Cola van, red and white, appealing

• Magazine rack, splattered with ketchup(?), foil and wax paper from fast food balled up inside

• H & W Foods truck

• Budweiser rig

• Woman in leopard-print blouse, wearing plastic sandwich board, advertising timeshare resales

• Small guy in rash guard with long board, wet. Suggests water nearby

• Tall guy in baseball cap, offering resistant tourists copy of the Hindu text Baghavad Gita

• Waikiki Trolley, blaring "Every move you make," by Sting

• Atlantis trolley

• Oli Oli trolley

• E Noa Tours Trolley

• Perry's Smorgy Restaurant, dinner $9.50

• A man named Thomas, wearing snorkel and advertising Hanauma Bay trips; if nice to him, he throws in "free appetizer" coupons for Planet Hollywood

• Maui Divers mini-bus

• Ilima mini-bus

• Ala Moana Shuttle bus

• Horizon Waste Services of Hawaii truck, brimming blue dumpster hoisted behind

• Office Max truck

• Elena from Seattle suburb, thinks Lewers is "a little crowded," but likes the noise because home is too quiet.

• Red Lion, pool, darts, dancing, $1.50 mai tais

• Frito Lay truck

• Honolulu Disposal Service truck (No. 2), big, noisy, odiferous

• Carl's Jr.

• Delivery guy in blue work clothes, pushing cart with Pepsi fountain mix

• Roberts Airport Shuttle, sports ad for Magic of Polynesia show

• Open truck, pallets of Del Monte Hawaiian Pineapple on the back

• Tanya from Arizona, staying at the Ohana Waikiki Tower, about to board a Roberts Hawaii van for an excursion, "We love it. Lots of shopping, lots of restaurants. It's cool. A lot of people."

• Dollar Rent-a-Car van

• Nishimoto Trading Co. truck, unloading Asahi beer

Making a right turn onto Kalia reveals:

• Budget Rent-a-Car truck, idling

• State French Fry Co. truck

• Two men pulling handtrucks, say "Excuse me" as they inadvertently force a pedestrian off the curb

A right past the Ohaha Edgewater onto Beach Walk shows:

• Budweiser vehicle (van this time)

• Beauty salon at the Ohana Edgewater, egg-shaped stainless steel hair dryer right out of "I Love Lucy" visible through window, nostalgic

• New Tokyo restaurant, shrouded in black, soon to be Hilo Hattie

• Penske Truck Rental, unloading box springs for full-sized beds

Left onto Kalakaua:

• T-shirt shop, red tank top (2 for $12.99) says "Hawaii," but shows five Rastafarians dancing

• Long T-shirt featuring shapely body in bikini ($24.99), supposed to look like your own (ha ha)

A left down Saratoga:

• "For Lease" signs on two stories of empty storefronts

• Tattoo parlor

• Parking garage, smells: urine, rotting vegetables

So big changes coming to Lewers Street, eh?

As the mid-80s synth-pop star Howard Jones once said, "Things Can Only Get Better."