As you can see in the photo, Maui fires can scorch huge areas in a short period of time.  This one is in West Maui close to the Pali (the winding, coastal cliff road from Maalaea Harbor to Lahaina.)  Personally, I’ve spent  a long night in my car due to a similar fire a few years back.  I was driving south from Lahaina, and the roads were completely stopped.  The road closure lasted until the next morning around 8am.

If you ever find yourself stuck in traffic due to a road closing from a fire, it’d be wise considering staying on the side you’re on.  Some adventurous people decided to drive around the back side of the West Maui Mountains.  This route takes much longer, but some of them made it.  Unfortunately, annoyed locals shut the road off after sometime.  This area is pretty dangerous to drive in traffic because it is often 1 lane on cliffy roads.  If someone is coming in the opposite direction, someone is in for a long, scary reverse.

Almost every year, Maui experiences some fires.  There’s not much you can do about it.  Stay away from it and hope it doesn’t cause too much damage or danger to homes and lives.  If you need to get anywhere, and you’ve heard there’s a fire, call (808) 986-1200 for road closure updates. You can also contact your Maui car rental office.

JUST GO WITH IT with Brooklyn Decker between Jennifer Aniston & Adam Sandler

On the Set with Maui’s Own Megan Edgar:

I started off a nervous wreck. I bought dresses. I bought make-up. I bought shoes. I curled my hair. I panicked. I felt sick. I wanted to back out. I couldn’t wait to start. All of a sudden it was 5 PM on March 23rd and everything was happening whether I was ready or not. Hair styled, make-up adjusted, wardrobe checked, and then I was whisked off to the set.

What a set it was; the most beautiful luau I’ve ever seen. Smoking volcanoes, Chinese lanterns, Hawaiian gods carved into totem poles, fire dancers, hula, pulled pork and poi. Brilliant stadium lights dimmed by huge white cloths. Small, bright lights angled just so with red, blue, and yellow filters. Cameras on wheels. Cameras on cranes. Cameras on tripods. Paparazzi cameras peeking out from behind the bushes. Cameras and lights and fire dancers. I was mesmerized and we hadn’t even started.

The crew lined us up and started pulling people out of the crowd of extras. I wasn’t picked. And I wasn’t picked again.  I felt like I was in PE and no on wanted me on their team. I wasn’t going to be in the movie after all. They made a big mistake.

Then suddenly, miraculously, I was “the girl in the pink dress” and they seated me at a table with eight other people. The director introduced himself and told us to clap for the fire dancers, eat our food, and act like we were thoroughly enjoying our evening. Tough.

Words like reset, background, action, and cut became a regular part of my vocabulary and I knew exactly what to do when each one was yelled out. Make-up came by to “take off the shine.” Hair came by because I was “right in the shot.” Wardrobe took my picture so I would look exactly the same if they needed to reshoot the next day. I couldn’t believe my luck. I was “in the shot.”  I couldn’t look up from my plate without staring at Jennifer Aniston. I could have leaned over and touched Adam Sandler. I felt beautiful and important. I was being paid to have fun. How was this even possible?

Three weeks prior to my first night shooting I needed to feed some fish. My school has a fish tank and my friend Greg and I went in on a Sunday to take care of its inhabitants. When we got to school hundreds of people were lined up to get in the door. We had no idea why they were there so we just walked to the front and went inside. Before we knew it we’d filled out a form, got a number (I was lucky 999), and had our pictures taken.  3,000 people were in line that day and we scooted right by without a wait. Fate? Good thing the fish were hungry.

After our first night on set with cameras in our faces, Greg and I (we were cast as a couple) were placed in “deep background” and spent all our time walking back and forth from one set place to a second set place.  We weren’t right in the shot, but we were lucky enough to have the director use us to reset the scene.  The leads would start their dialogue based on our position, and it made us feel like we were still in the movie even though the cameras were far away.  And we could actually talk, which was a nice change from the first evening of pantomiming conversation because we were so close to the microphones.

Filming Just Go With It was amazing. I’ve never seen so many people doing so many different jobs all at the same time only to have it all come together just as the cameras start to roll.  Lighting would move huge lamps and screens at a moments notice.  Cameras would swing by on booms and roll through peoples and tables.  Make-up artists, hair stylists, wardrobe crew, and sound people would zip past one another, all on a separate mission that ended with a single goal.  Watching people work together like that was inspiring.

Then add the leads. Jennifer Aniston really is beautiful. Nicole Kidman really is elegant and lithe. Brooklyn Decker is gorgeous!  Dave Matthews can act!  Adam Sandler is very funny. (You try not to laugh when you can hear all of Adam and Nick Swardson’s dialogue as they ad-lib and improvise their way through the 20th take of a scene. Even Jenn couldn’t hold it in.)
Movie making is fun. And the paparazzi love you even if you’re not famous!

Megan Edgar

(QUICK NOTE: Furlough Fridays are days where education is taken away from children in order cut staffing expenses to help the State budget deficit.)

Though we agree that Hawaii education has MAJOR problems, Lingle’s statement, “We need to get more worked up about what happens when they are in school rather than when … they are not in school,” is like saying, “When you have cancer, don’t worry about the fact that your doctor will be around even less to cure you, worry about the cancer!” How exactly does one fix a problem when those closest to it are given less time to fix it?

With a culture that obviously struggles to develop its children to be competitive in our world, wouldn’t you think that keeping teachers employed full-time should remain a priority?  Yes, our deficit is a big problem, but cutting education is the shortest sighted solution one can propose.  In her speech on Friday, Lingle reiterated her proposals to fix our economic woes.  She discussed:

• Programs putting unemployed welfare recipients to work. This sounds great, but in our personal experience, a sizable portion of people on welfare in Hawaii aren’t interested in working.  The idea of compensating employers for hiring welfare recipients is also a good idea in theory, but if an employer NEEDS an employee wouldn’t they have to hire them anyway?  This also seems short-sighted considering that when the program stops, many will go back on welfare because their employer won’t be able to afford keeping them on.

• Tax Credits for construction and Renovation. Island growth is really not a long-term solution either.  We have enormously high occupancy rates and big problems with distribution of scarce resources like water, as well as devastating environmental issues to try and fix before we encourage more construction.

So what is the solution to our economic problems in Hawaii? We feel high-tech industrial growth, long term educational growth, and preparation of  economic down turns will do us better than any other solutions.  Lingle did mention a proposal to set aside 5% of funds when tax revenues are growing.  This is a good idea, but government track records in this area have shown that money set aside often becomes reallocated with time.

The implementation of Furlough Fridays is indicative of Hawaii’s prioritizing education below most other things.  Lingle insinuates that the problem lies IN the classroom and that the problem is quality.  We disagree.  The blame falls everywhere between the parents all the way to the top administrators in the school system, as well as on the heads of legislators.  If administration would let teachers spend more time teaching than testing, if parents took more of an interest in their children’s education and genuinely wanted their kids to be brighter than they are, if government could find better ways to cut from the budget and possibly take federal aid we might see a brighter future in Hawaii.

Are teachers to blame? Surely some teachers in Hawaii shouldn’t be teaching, but for the most part teachers are NOT the reason for our lagging behind most of the country (and the world) in educating our children properly.  The problem is that education is not a priority in Hawaii when it should be #1.  Our spiraling cycle of education continues to build on an already poorly educated culture.  Much of this is due to our citizens already being poorly educated and not seeing the value in it.

Not only would an emphasis in education be helpful to us economically in the long term, but socially we believe the islands would become healthier.  In that, we mean with more understanding of other cultures, higher levels of confidence and income, and a broader more developed economic share of the world’s production and innovation could alleviate some of the ignorance and racial tension that is so prevalent in Hawaii today.

This editorial is just one view point from one of our writers.  Quotation and information was found through the Maui News.  Mahalo for your reporting!

100’s of employees will be laid off as a century old business is shut down. Many are worried about what will happen with the 2,000 acres used in the ceased pineapple operations. Though ML&P has expressed that it will be used for other agricultural products, only time will tell whether it’s really sold for commercial and residential property.

This marks the end of an iconic industry that runs deep in many local families’ roots. With sugarcane also suffering, it’s not difficult to imagine what might happen to all of Maui eventually. Let’s hope we can keep the central valley green a little longer.

Advanced Maui Optical & Space Surveillance Technologies Conference

The AMOS conference was held at the Wailea Beach Marriott Resort on September 1st through 4th, the only conference bringing together international astronomers and space surveillance experts.

Hosted by the Maui Economic Development Board (MEDB), the conference had prominent speakers such as Senator Daniel K. Inouye (appropriately via satellite), Air Force Lt. General larry James, Keawala’i Congregational Church’s Kealahou Alika, MEDB President Jeanne Skog, and Wes Friewald (the President of Pacific Defense Solutions) among others.

One of the major topics was the satellite collision in Early February of this year.  Discussion over the concern about large amounts of debris in Earth’s orbit from the Russian and American Satellites was deliberated.

Senate passes measure for additional MSSS funding

MSSS (Maui Space Surveillance System) is home to the largest optical telescope in the United States, designed for tracking satellites.  10,000 feet above sea level, Haleakala Crater’s summit has multiple telescopes that are crucial for space research.

On October 6th, the US Senate passed a measure to increase funding by 207.5 million dollars for projects involving Hawaii.  $20 million of this will go to the research projects at the MSSS.

Maui Observes Spacecraft Crash into the MOON!

We know. It sounds untrue, but it’s a fact! Because Maui and Hawaii have such incredible observing facilities and excellent proximity for viewing, we have been asked to observe a spacecraft being intentionally crashed in to the surface of the moon on October 9th.

The plume of debris will rise up to 3 miles from the surface of the moon.  NASA and the university of Hawaii are hoping this event will determine whether water exists under the surface at the Moon’s poles.  If there is enough water on the moon, we could very possibly colonize it.  With water, agriculture, oxygen, and protective radiation shields would be possible.

We’ll keep you updated!