Drawing on Hawaiian roots brings author home

By Wanda A. Adams
Advertiser Books Editor

•	Book Signings Noon tomorrow, Native Books, Ward Centre 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Barnes & Noble, Kahala Mall Noon June 19, Borders, Waikele 2 p.m. June 19, Waldenbooks, Windward Mall

At Wailuku's St. Anthony Boys School, the teaching brothers nurtured Holokai's love of football and his intellectual curiosity, and gave him the responsibility of policing the church choir, a favorite trysting place for students from the gender-segregated boys' and girls' schools. But there was no art class; spending school time drawing or painting was considered frivolous, though Holokai did get to decorate the windows at Christmastime.

It wasn't until he accepted a football scholarship to the University of Hawai'i in 1957 that Holokai was able to move beyond wall-scribbling to learning and understanding artistic concepts.

In the mid-1960s, the offer of a job in art — as an aerospace illustrator for the McDonnell Douglas Space Systems Division — took him away from his beloved Hawai'i Nei.

"I miss Hawai'i," said Holokai, who lives in Westminster, Calif. "I missed it the day I moved here, and I still miss it."

But now his artwork is bringing him back home, at least briefly, for a book tour in honor of his first post-retirement project, "Myths and Legends of Hawai'i Coloring Book" (Bess Press, paper, $5.95).

The artwork has a distinctly vintage-comic feel, with larger-than-life musclebound men and lissome, long-haired maidens. This is purposeful, Holokai said in a phone interview.

"I was taught that when you deal in mythology, it has to look heroic. It's about gods and goddesses; it had to be powerful."

His next coloring book, about everyday people, will be very different in style, he said.

There's an irony in Holokai doing this. He admits to be being of the generation that largely spurned its Hawaiian heritage.

"My hero was not Kamehameha. My hero was Elvis Presley. 'Hawai'i Pono'i' was not our anthem. Our anthem was 'Rock around the Clock,' " he recalled. "Our whole goal was to move to the Mainland and get a good job. But once you move to the Mainland, you miss Hawai'i."

So he has passed the time between trips to visit his siblings — who mostly live on O'ahu now — studying Hawaiian history, culture and mythology.

When he retired in 1993, he wanted to do something in art, and noticed a number of cultural coloring books in a bookstore, but none showing Polynesian

culture. He began sketching, shopped his manuscript around, and Bess Press — which specializes in educational materials from and for the Pacific as well as more general-interest titles — snapped it up. He hopes to continue with a series about the whole Pacific region.

"Myths and Legends" is more than a coloring book. Each two-page spread includes a short retelling of a myth, with a Hawaian and English vocabulary to help children understand the terms, along with a full-page drawing illustrating the story.

The tales are ones he draws from his childhood. He recalls how, in Hawaiian families of that era, stories were passed on quietly, reverently, often in a very chicken-skin way.

"I tell you, it was scary. My hair stood up. They were great stories, but you didn't spread 'em around, you kept 'em to yourself," he said. "My parents were both Christian, but right next to the Bible they always kept a sacred rock, just in case."

Holokai said his challenge in retelling the story of how Maui coaxed the winds back into the calabash, or how the shark goddess cursed construction of what would become Pearl Harbor, was to think like the child he once was — to recapture the wonder and even the fear.

"I didn't want to make it cutesy. I wanted it historical. But I wanted to involve kids," he said.

Also, the stories are quite adult. "Our folks, when they told stories about the old days and legends, they never held back. There were some words I learned at 6 years old. Nowadays you have to be careful how you approach it. I don't think we should hide what the stories are about, but it has to be at a level children can understand."

Holokai and his wife, Patricia (nee Brown), have two grown children but no grandchildren yet, so he's looking forward to seeing how young people at his book-signings react.

Oh, and those drawings he made on his mother's walls? They were still there when the family sold the house in the mid-1960s.