8 Years Of A Hundred Ghost Stories. 2024.

 Eight years ago, my wife challenged me to write a hundred stories toward Halloween on this blog.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #100. Solution.

In 1887, King David Kalākaua was forced to sign the bayonet constitution under threat of violence from a private militia called the Honolulu Rifles.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #99. Clara.

Throughout my life, I could never shake the unsettling feeling that my mother simply did not like me.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #98. Love WIll Keep Us Together. Pt. 2.

We had to put locks on our doors because Blossom and her kids used butter knives to pry open our door knobs and let themselves in our rooms.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #97. Love Will Keep Us Together. Pt. 1.

 Living on Aniani Street was the ideal part of my teenage life.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #96. The One.

 Jealousy lived in our household because of old family grudges we inherited from our parents and their parents, and so forth.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #95. Terry Higa.

  Every high school has its secrets; Terry Higa was ours. He wasn't a strange kid, like how other weird kids were back in the day. Terry wasn't aloof or self-absorbed; he didn't talk to himself or chew on his fingernails.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #94. Senses.

I'm losing my cognitive senses.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #93. Jerry,

 I stood back and watched my daughter kneel at her mother's grave at the Hawaiian Memorial Cemetery.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #92. Double.

  Our kids were driving my wife crazy.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #91. HEAD.

  You know this story not because it's an urban legend but because it's real and happened to someone who could be our friend, brother, cousin, uncle, or father.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #90. Cadillac.

 CADILLAC COMES BACK

Because of the adrenalin born out of my fear, I climbed the wrong telephone pole. I'd meant to climb the newer concrete pole, which was more massive, dug deep, and practically unmovable. But no, the 1966 Cadillac Hearse Fleetwood was hot on my heels, and the wooden telephone pole was the closest, so I climbed up on it because my mortality was at stake.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #89. Lei.

She hated her English name and refused to be acknowledged by it or to answer it.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #88. Hina.

 HINA 

The missionary family built their home at the edge of old Ko'olina near a stretch of sand that fell under the watchful shade of Waimanalo and Pili 'O Kahe. The heathens of the Wai'anae ahupua'a needed to hear the word of God and repent their lives of savagery and wanton lust among one another.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #87. The Four Game.

 In a group, there are those committed to the game.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To 2024. #86. Lei Makana.

My hands no longer have the dexterity they once did when weaving a lei of different flowers and ferns, which was as effortless as breathing.

The process was and still is therapeutic. One cannot create a lei entirely if one is upset, out of sorts, or even heartbroken. Those adverse emotions will become the lei that you wili, and alas, for the one who wears it. It is difficult to hold the wili taut while placing the alternating flower and fern in their fixed patterns, but today, the discomfort is worth the effort. The ferns are palapalai, and the flowers are Chinese jasmine, or as we call it here, pikake. For me, it holds a bittersweet fragrance that elicits love and heartbreak. Not the romantic kind, but the type attributed to a life that should have been long and fruitful but was cut short by an unfair destiny, which seems senseless in the overall picture. One fern to the left and wili, one in the middle and wili. One fern to the right and wili. Place the pikake in the middle and wili. Repeat until pau, your hands and fingers cramp up, and you must sit back and take a deep breath. You breathe in pain and exhale it out of the pores of your skin.

My fingernails are stained green from the palai, but its heady fragrance, joined with the pikake, is worth it. When I was younger, she appeared almost at will without invocation or chant on my part. It may have been how I wove my words together. They were truthful, not missing a fact, but added that bit of paʻakai to give the words a morsel of flavor that would leave a taste of her story on the tongues of those who came to listen. This continued for a few years until COVID-19 befell us, and Waikīkī became closed off. When all opened once more, and I was free to return to her home, she did not manifest. Of course, she was not obligated to, but the frequency of her absence over time moved me to discontinue my visits. However, it did not stop me from offering a lei of palai and pikake each year on her birthday. At ninety-eight years of age, the walk to the corner of Kānekapolei and Kuhiō has proven difficult, and the knees and hips are not what they once were.

Of course, wheelchairs and walkers are made available to me, but I must travel on my own, using the mana I have to move my body, for it is with all I have that I must make the offering of this lei of mine. I chose to do this late at night because of the quiet and less populated area. I am finally here. I croak forth an oli aloha and hold the lei above my lowered head. Step by slow step, I inch forward and place the garland of flowers at her feet. The sigh that leaves my body takes tears with it, which fall freely, not being wiped away. The tears are her hoʻokupu from me as well.

~

The following year, on October 16, 2060, the throng of people waited patiently for the ghost of the old Hawaiian man to manifest and leave his lei of palai and pikake. They waited with nano-cameras and recorders to put to posterity the chant that the ghost of the old Hawaiian man offered every year. The hour of four was nigh, and all in attendance held their breath. A soothing breeze swept through the crowd, raising the hackles on each person's neck. The ghost appeared as it did each year, hobbling forward, holding the lei above his head, and laying it at the feet of the princess. To everyone's shock and surprise, the princess's ghost also manifested. A gasp arose from the crowd, and time seemed to set everything and everyone to pause. Her beautiful, slender hands reached down and received the lei, which she placed around her neck. She reached down, grasped the old Hawaiian man by his hands, and lifted him to where she stood. He fell into her arms like an infant needing to slumber in its mother's embrace.. A glowing warmth emanated from the two as the tableau slowly dissolved with the gentle wind that swept through the crowd. The ghost of the old Hawaiian man never appeared again, and to this day, no one knows who he was or where he may have come.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #85. Two Hermans.

 The accident was horrible, and I was dumbstruck as it unfolded in front of me. An errant driver in his Cadillac SUV with no care for his safety or anyone else's came at an alarming rate of speed from behind me.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #84

 KA MEA

WAHI: KE ALA NUI 'O PUNCHBOWL


People like me have a healthy life or try to, even though we have the thing. Other people who have the thing make millions of dollars off of it, or at least they claim they do.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #83. Torch.

 Marie Peters met me in her Waipahu home garage, dressed in an 80s-style one-piece jumpsuit. She led me to a round table. "Sit," she pointed to the fold-out chair opposite, where she took a seat. "I wanted to show you something first before we talked."

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #82. Mākou.

 They donʻt hide in the shadows as we expected them to, as we see in investigative videos on social media.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #81. Uncle Thomas.

 1

Because of my Uncle Thomas, my parents could buy the family station wagon at a reasonable price.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #80. Aupuni Street. 3.

 It was the last evening of the final lesson.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #79. Aupuni Street 2.

The third year was here before I knew it. Mom became more reflective for some reason.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #78. Aupuni Street.

The time of my life was spent in Orlando, Florida, where I had a great job and an incredible nightlife.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #77. Reese.

The Martins, the Corderos', and the Medeiros were our neighbors on that small plot second to the corner house at the end of Kaukamana Street, crossing Kula'aupuni Road.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. # 76. Pohina.

 Pōhina was worried that his acceptance letter to the school he applied to would never arrive.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #75. Mahkthaaahmpsen.

 My brother Kainoa had autism, but growing up, my folks told me that he was in his own space and that he'd be fine.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #74. Laumeki 5.

 The existence of these people flew on the tongues of those who spread the rumors, but it wasn't a rumor because here they were in front of him.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #73. Laumeki 4.

 Lisa was finally found by another couple who lived nearby.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #72. Laumeki 3.

 Raymond knew he had something he couldn't hold on to.

100 Ghost Stories Counting Down To Halloween 2024. #71. Laumeki 2.

 Somewhere in the pitch black, Raymond heard drums and then chanting.