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Tomayto, tomahto. Yeah, I threw that through there. Their. They're. English is one of the easiest languages to learn to speak, but one of the hardest to learn how to write, right? Now try to inflict English onto something like Hawaiian and you'll get all kinds of results.
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our own Halemaumau or Halema`uma`u
Thank you Carey, I never realized there was a disparity in the spelling and pronunciation of Halemaumau between even close neighbors from Puna and Ka'u. Perhaps it was a matter of significance in the experience of people from each area?
Downwind, Ka'u residents encountered Halemaumau's vog, and had the memory of the eruption which resulted in the Ka'u Desert footprints left behind in the hardened ash, while upwind in Puna, visitors to the crater from our area may have been impressed by the ferns they walked through to reach the summit. It's just a thought, no more than an unstudied guess as to what may have created the difference, but clearly it's a complex transition from the spoken Hawaiian language, to the written word.
“Generalized intelligence and mental alertness are the most powerful enemies of dictatorship and at the same time the basic conditions of effective democracy.” - Aldous Huxley
"I'm at that stage in life where I stay out of discussions. Even if you say 1+1=5, you're right - have fun." - Keanu Reeves
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HOTPE - that is pretty much my take...
It is often hard to realize also the extent of lost knowledge... unification of a formally more feudal system normally causes some traditions & stories, olelo, to not be popular, then add the massive loss of native population, and the islands lost much of their culturally diverse heritage in a very short period.
Luckily, the push for literacy on island did help preserve some of the diversity, and researchers today are looking at the older written works esp. in collections like the Nupepa project, with its ongoing work to translate the many Hawaiian Language newspapers that were in print throughout much of the 1800`s:
http://libweb.hawaii.edu/digicoll/newspapers.htm
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My old Mom used to say they were coming to Ka-wowie. Whatever. We know where we are.
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Everyone ,including Magno,was saying "Pohiki" at the last meeting in Pahoa:
https://youtu.be/2QP5npnypRc