The sun always felt warmer in Lāhaina. For the past two months, I’ve searched my mind for every memory of the town and what it looked like before the wildfires swallowed it whole. Most of them are from my summers in high school, when my family and I would drive along the winding road that connects West Maui to the island’s center—a road that terrified me when I was learning to drive because of all the twists and turns over a rocky cliff.
One of the most well-known parts of the town is Front Street. Newscasters often described it as ‘a popular tourist destination’ in the immediate aftermath of the wildfires, but many don’t know just how lively of a place it was for vacationers and locals alike before it burned. I remember the days my friends and I would spend “playing tourist” there, people-watching as crowds of actual tourists passed by. I remember the smell of salt that filled our lungs every time the waves crashed against the rock wall that separated the road from the ocean, splashing water on our skin. The wreckage that lines the strip today used to be an endless buffet of restaurants that were always open and ready to serve us whatever local dish we were craving for the day, whether it be a warm loco moco or a plate of chicken katsu. We would stand in lines that wrapped around the block for the famed Ululani’s Hawaiian Shave Ice, waiting our turn for the cold treat that would stain our tongues blue. Not far from it was Tamura’s, the grocery store where we’d get fresh poke that we’d throw in our cooler before heading to the beach.
And then there was the wise, banyan tree at the heart of town; her shade offered us refuge from the heat every time we paid her a visit. I’d always run my hand along her trunk to greet her warmly—in awe of how tall she’d stood for over a century—before we’d part ways again.
My decision to move from Maui to California two years ago for work wasn’t an easy one. Even when I was…
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