Wilton Manors, Summer 2004"I read an interesting article in the Gay News," my ex-boyfriend's hookup tells us. "It was about the gay traditions of kanaka maoli, traditional Hawaiian society. "
With three housemates dating and hooking up regularly, you never know who will be sitting at the breakfast table, especially on weekends. This morning there's seven, including my housemate Yuri, my ex-boyfriend Wade, and Ricardo, the Cuban-American dance instructor who Yuri and Wade "shared" last night.
"The aikane, or male bedmate, was a standard part of the culture," Ricardo continues. "Every guy had a wife and an aikane."
"I always thought of Hawaii as a 'good place,'" I say, "Where same-sex desire is open.
"Me, too!" Wade exclaims. "I applied to the University of Hawaii for my undergrad degree, but my parents talked me into staying home in Canada. I should have gone! Hawaiian men are so hot!"
"And I'd love to hear the Hawaiian language spoken," I add.
"You could get your chance," Ricardo says. "According to the article, there are 400,000 native Hawaiians on the mainland, most of them right here in Florida."
"That's 200,000 men," Yuri calculates, "100,000 adult men, 10,000 adult gays.""Nice odds!" Ricardo says. "You could get an aikane easily, if you plan your strategy right."
"And when you do, bring him around," I add. "I want to talk to him."
"Or use your mouth, anyway," Wade says. Everyone laughs.
Where do you find gay native Hawaiians in Florida?
The Polynesian restaurants in Fort Lauderdale, the Big Kahuna and the Mai-Kai, are tacky, touristy, and very heterosexual, with "shows" featuring gyrating women in grass skirts.
There is a Hawaiian Civic Association in Melbourne, but its brochure lists "family friendly," that is, heterosexual-only events.
But: Florida International University in Miami. 10% of the 50,000 students are Pacific Islanders, mostly native Hawaiians.
5,000 of them, 2,500 male, 250 gay male.
Ok, where to find them?
Wade checks the schedule of classes for something on Pacific Island anthropology, languages, cultures...and finds Hawaiian Language 101, offered through the Asian Studies Department!
Surely lots of native Hawaiians would enroll in such a class!
It's a long drive on terrible Florida highways, but at least his job at the hotel will pay the tuition, if he tells them that language study will come in handy in speaking to tourists.
Week 1
Hawaiian 101 was held on Tuesdays and Thursdays in the Deuxieme Maison, "The Second House," actually a long, low concrete building.
Wade loved the language. Only 8 consonants, including a glottal stop: H, K, L, M, N, P, W. And no dipthongs. So Merry Christmas becomes Mele Kalikimaka.
The professor was a woman of Irish, Japanese, and Hawaiian ancestry, not a native speaker; she said that there were only about 2,000 native speakers left, but 200,000 people have learned some Hawaiian to get in touch with their roots.
What about your classmates?
11 women, 8 other men. Of the men, one was haole, one black, the rest native Hawaiians trying to fill the "foreign language" requirement and get in touch with their roots at the same time.
Are any of the six native Hawaiian men gay?
It was hard to tell. They all came and left in a group, and didn't interact much with the haole boys.
Week 2Class is cancelled due to the hurricane.
Week 3
The Hawaiian for "I have a big stick" is i loaa he nui lāʻau
Week 4
"I finally managed to get a cruisy conversation with one of my classmates," Wade tells us. "David. He's majoring in Mass Communications. He was excited to find out that I'm from Canada."
Week 5
"Made it!" Wade exclaims. "David is gay, but closeted. We went out for coffee, and then back to his dorm room."
"How big is he?" Yuri asks.
"You know I'm usually into older guys, but David is super-hot. Very handsome face, smooth chest, xylophone abs, thick Smooth chest, tight pec muscles, very affectionate. We kissed, cuddled, he went down on me, I went down on him."
"How big?" Yuri repeats.
Wade smiles. "I kept choking."
"Ok, you've been out with David three times," I say. "Time to introduce him."
"And share him," Yuri adds.
"He hasn't been out very long," Wade says, "And he's a little on the shy side. I'm not sure he'd be up for sharing with both of you. Maybe Yuri could share, and I could talk him into letting Boomer watch."
"Fine with me."
"Bring him on Thursday night," Yuri says. "For dinner."
Week 7
Yuri is not really interested in sharing Wade's boyfriend -- he's into bodybuilder types, not twinks. He'll do it, of course, just to be polite.
But I'm thrilled. I spend the week remembering the Pacific hunks of my childhood: Call It Courage, Robinson Crusoe on Mars, the tales of Robert Louis Stevenson. Dusky, muscular Hawaiian guys fill my fantasies.
Finally Thursday night comes. Barney is out, so it will be just the four of us. Yuri makes moussaka, with a green salad and dolmas, stuffed grape leaves. I rent a new porn movie to set the mood for later.
A curly-haired haole.
Actually of English, Portuguese, and Japanese ancestry.
Well, Wade never actually said the guy was native Hawaiian.
At least he was not as shy as Wade thought, open to "sharing" with both of us, and very well hung.
There's a story about searching for native Hawaiian men in Hawaii on The Gay Guide to Small Town Beefcake. See "The Haole Hunks of Kauai, Hawaii"
There's also mahu or transexual bottom.
ReplyDeleteFunny how my own same-sex experiences were similar, but with women? Not so much.