Hawaiian for Travelers: It’s About the Vowels

Aloha and mahalo. Those will get you out of the gate in Hawaii, though it’s also handy to get a good grasp on mauka —inland—and makai —towards the sea, just in case you find yourself getting directions from locals.

A few more words might make their way into your vocabulary, especially when it comes to food—there’s poke and poi and ahi and ono. I learned how to say no problem or thanks—a’ole pilikia—from a park ranger and I can read Hawaiian out loud with a halting conviction, but there’s no way I understand it. I still stumble over directions and streets signs—Hi’ilawe and Ali’i and Ala Wai and Kapiolani and Kalakaua—they all start to run together in this haole’s mind. We were going where, now?

To complicate things, pidgin is still widely used in the islands—it’s a Hawaiian slang that uses lots of English with Hawaiian words mixed in. My ears don’t know what to do with this stuff—it can take me five minutes to respond to a simple “Howzit!”—“Hi, how are you?”—because I’m running it through the poorly built universal translator in my brain. I try to keep a simple aloha handy, just in case.

I recently had the great pleasure of meeting a kupuna —elder—who sings traditional Hawaiian falsetto music. “You have to listen,” she said, “you don’t need to know the meaning of the words to hear the music. Hawaiian, it’s all about the vowels.” I laughed, but I knew what she meant. I can sing a few simple Hawaiian songs but don’t ask me to translate them for you. I’ll settle for trying to go the right direction, saying please and thank you, and finding my way without the usual consonants to guide me.

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