Mauka : Toward the mountains.
Makai : Toward the sea.
(What?? There’s somebody who doesn’t know this? I would have thought everybody would know that! //old-rolleyes//)
Note that these terms only work in the coastal areas around the perimeters of the islands. Once you get into the interior uplands, they don’t make any sense.
In Honolulu specifically, there are the additional terms “Eva” (towards the community of Eva, which is east from Honolulu along the coast), and “Diamond Head” (towards Diamond Head; but this only works in the older part of Honolulu, where Diamond Head is to the west; the city now extends well beyond that).
Did you know that Honolulu has some Interstate Highways? :smack: There were built, starting in the 1960’s (I was there then), with Interstate Highway funds, so Interstates they are. They are labeled, of course, according to the rules of the Interstate highways, that is, the directions are signed North, South, East, or West, and not Mauka, Makai, Eva, or Diamond Head.
When they were new, I think it took the local people a while to get accustomed to that. Nobody in Honolulu ever used the directions North, South, East, or West before that.
I knew he was a Communist. I was still amazed that, as a member of the Almanac Singers, recorded an album of anti-WWII songs after the Hitler-Stalin pact was signed. After Hitler broke the pact and invaded Russia, the Communist line executed a 180, so the album was withdrawn, and people who bought the album were asked to return it!
That’s not strictly true. There are other edible bromeliads, but you won’t find them in stores in this country. For instance, the species Karatas plumieri (common name piñuela) produces an edible fruit. Young shoots and inflorescences are also sometimes eaten. It’s native to Central America.
Back to the main topic: I was surprised when someone I know asked me when the next U.S. presidential election will be. This is a person with a college degree who works for a city government and who pays attention to politics. And it wasn’t that she didn’t know the exact date - she didn’t know it would be in November, 2016.
There were a lot of American Communists before WWII. It’s not anti-American to be a communist per se, but you are right that they were hypocrites. These were the useful idiots Stalin spoke of. Pete lived among a group of communists (interspersed with the occasional anarchist) in the outskirts of Croton-on-Hudson in New York, an area that was called Red Row. But aside from their Stalinist sympathies (which they later dropped like so many others disillusioned when they learned the reality) they believed in freedom, equality, and justice. You can rightly call them fools, they were as hypocritical as virtually everyone else, but anti-American is an unfair assessment.
When I was a kid, me and other piano-playing kids would be hauled around in minivans and station wagons to various piano recitals and competitions. To pass the time on these trips the kids and I would play some variation of 20 questions, often science based (like “think of an animal”, and with yes-no questions figure out which animal).
Some of these kids were home-schooled, and I was shocked by the total lack of understanding of basic zoology. In a group of about 10-14 year olds, the home-schooled kids didn’t know the difference between vertebrates and invertebrates, mammals and reptiles, even insects vs non-insects. My 13 year old self felt great shock and pity.
And this^. If I were talking to the investigating detective I would say “My house was burgled”, because it means something different than “robbed”. In casual conversation I would say “My house was robbed” because “burgled” sounds pretentious.
To expand, in case anyone doesn’t understand: If I am talking to a friend, “How are y’all doing” = tell me how each family member is, currently. “How are you doing?” = tell me about your own self. Or, in a professional context, “How are y’all doing?” = how is business? what’s morale like?
I’d argue it can also just be used as an intensifier. “All y’all get your butts in here, now” is semantically identical to “Y’all get your butts in here, now”, but much more emphatic.
Wow, I thought I was the only one. When I was in high school many many decades ago the rooms were designated as being in the north, south, east, or west wing. I had no notion at all, if standing in an office in the center of the school, which way any of those wings were. I clearly recall my brother reassuring me “Don’t worry, you’ll figure out this directional thing.” Still waiting on that.
Also, for people talking about calling electricity “hydro”, what sort of context would that be in? Would you say “turn on the hydro?” or “there was a blackout, so we had no hydro?”?
