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'Aloha Friday' to go worldwide

The Hawaii Visitors and Convention Bureau is taking the concept "Aloha Friday" around the world to promote the islands. The bureau will share Aloha Friday with 18 cities on five continents on Oct. 5.

Among the cities will be New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Seattle, Tokyo, Osaka, Seoul, Taipei, Beijing, London, Frankfurt and Buenos Aires.

"In those cities, we'll have one big retail shop where we will have our representatives there in aloha attire," said HVCB President Tony Vericella. "We'll ask the people in the store to be wearing aloha attire."

The bureau plans to spend $100,000 on the annual promotion, which will be on the first Friday in October of every year. This year's event includes a CD of contemporary Hawaiian music produced by Mountain Apple Co.

Earlier this year, HVCB launched a similar promotion with Lei Day on May 1, in which more than 30,000 fresh flower lei were sent to people in 17 cities worldwide.

Chevron buyout of Texaco OK'd

Chevron Corp.'s $46.6 billion purchase of Texaco Inc. to form the world's fourth-largest investor-owned oil company was unanimously approved by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission yesterday.

Hawai'i, along with 10 other states and the trade commission, reached an agreement with Texaco and Chevron that would address potential anti-competitive effects of the merger on gasoline prices, Hawai'i Attorney General Earl Anzai said in a statement.

Texaco agreed to sell U.S. refining and marketing assets that in 1998 from joint ventures with Royal Dutch/Shell Group and Saudi Arabian Oil Co. Shell will pay for the Texaco stakes before the merger takes place next month. The assets will be placed in a trust if Texaco and Shell can't agree on a price.