When
I ran out of things to say, I found myself exhorting the crowd to scream
out their pain, their angst, their rage. Five hundred people, making
a lei around the park by holding hands, stood staring at me. I waited
a second and began to scream from the deep pit of my belly. It was a
wail that expressed the darkness of my own soul and it pulled all the
breath out of me. In the stunned silence that followed, my lungs were
desperately trying to fill themselves with another scream. But before
I could recover, a man I had never seen before - judging by his crewcut
and stature, I pegged him as military - jumped into the circle and started
screaming. There was no mistaking his angst and frustration. A woman
beside him started crying. Then more and more people began wailing,
screaming and yelling. Regular everyday kind of people - local and tourist
- out of their own confusion and horror, were screaming. The cameramen
from the TV stations put down their cameras and started screaming. The
chief of police, a legislator, even the cops who were there to watch
over the crowd, all joined in the screaming.
After
that I invited people to speak out in an open mike session. When the
energy shifted, a march ensued down Kalakaua Avenue. After the first
marchers returned to the park, it began to rain. In Hawai'i, there is
a belief that when nature shows itself, like through rain, at the end
of or during an event, it is a sign - ho'ailona - of spiritual blessing.
Mamo
Kim, 2003
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