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| National Cemetery of the Pacific |
A visit to Pearl Harbor is a must for all visitors to Hawaii, but along with that one must visit the National Cemetery of the Pacific and Fort DeRussy to round out a way to experience beauty mixed with honor and the appreciation of America's history during critical times and the sacrifices great men made.
The older folks of Hawaii still talk about what they were doing when Pearl Harbor was hit unexpectedly by Japanese planes carrying bombs that destroyed virtually the entire U.S. fleet at the time. One of these folks is Constance Yeung who carried her baby in her arms, screaming as she saw the sky light up in the distance, as if the mountains had caught fire. She was standing near the edge of the ocean, between Waikiki and the downtown area, waiting for her friend to pick her up to arrange their trip back to California, as they had just traveled to Hawaii so Yeung could show off her new baby. But the friend never came, and Yeung was to spend many months in the islands in the chaos yet to come.
I learned Yeung's story as one learns from passers by over 28 years I lived in Hawaii. The story of Pearl Harbor has those many personal sides, but so do the other historic sites associated with World War II. One of these sites is Fort DeRussy, part of the Waikiki area tourists wander through but often don't understand how significant a place it has become.
This grand expanse of lawn, monuments, flowers and foliage extends from Kalakaua to the edge of the ocean, hotels looming on all sides. The visitor strolls down walkways in the sunshine, almost always present as Waikiki is the sunny part of the islands. But one must linger for those special moments, because here are memorialized those men who made the ultimate sacrifice.
I knew some of those men of the units still living, members of the 442nd and 100th Japanese military units, as a sub-contractor counselor for the Veterans Administration in Hawaii. These were men of Japanese ancestry who volunteered to fight the Japanese. They were often second generation people, some with families placed in internment camps by a nation fearful that the island Japanese were spies. Some were, but many were loyal American citizens. These sons of America with skin the butter color distinguishing them as different, stood up bravely and said, "I will go" to what for them could often mean terrible cruelty and death. For if caught by a member of the Axis powers, that included Germany, Italy and Japan, they would be tortured badly, having turned against one of their own kind during war. They became the most decorated of all military units during World War II.
Bronze plaques now placed near the Kalakaua side of Fort DeRussy speak a few words about these brave men, but words are never enough for men whose deeds were as great as these men did six decades ago. Men are dead or dying, old men, a few still walking among the citizens of Hawaii, modestly never revealing their sacrifices. The visitor thinks of those sacrifices as a walk is taken from the busy Kalakaua down the pathways, winding their way to the beach side hotels, like the Outrigger Reef. One wonders what those survivors among those men memorialized here think too when they walk these winding paths.
The National Cemetery of the Pacific stands like a citadel upon the mountain, Punchbowl and Tantalus there where lovers park and runners climb the hills. It poses on that mountain, majestically surveying everything, like a grandfather looking over a family dutifully. It is here men and women of the Pacific are buried. These people also include those who have sacrificed in war and other ways, like Ellison Onizuka Azuna, one of the astronauts of the Challenger that exploded killing everyone more than 25 years ago.
A visit to Hawaii is not complete for anyone who wants to understand the meaning of what these islands bring to all Americans, mainlander and local alike. The islands are a paradise for sure, but they also represent that far-off place where the history of America was changed and like happened with the bombing of the World Trade Towers will never be the same again. The beauty, history, majesty and memory of Hawaii mingle together at a cemetery high upon a hill, in ships that lay buried by the sea, and the shining walkways of a park that allows one to consider the sacrifices made by those who gave it all.
