Karleen C. Chinen
Commentary
By the end of this year — which is only a few months away — Maui will be a very different place. Hawaiian Commercial & Sugar Company will be no more. What will become of those lands once devoted to sugar? Diversified agriculture? Homes? Malls?
It has been a while since I visited Maui, but if I remember correctly, there were always red lights blinking on and off at the HC&S mill in Pu‘unënë against the dark evening sky. Come the end of December, the mill that never seemed to sleep will go silent . . . forever.
One of the things I’ve always loved about being on the Valley Isle is that, unlike O‘ahu, where you have to battle traffic and drive for what seems like forever, “country” on Maui always seemed just minutes away. Take a right on Dairy Road and you were on Häna Highway with the sight of beautiful Haleakalä filling your windshield. When I did interviews on Maui, I would always try to schedule my interviews back-to-back in the morning so that the afternoon would be all mine to enjoy. I would soak up the beauty of that open space, breathing in the cool, fresh air.
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