Alone

Rick continued with his reports.  “It is about seven in the morning here in Hawaii, we are keeping you up to date with the situation as it unfolds.  Our studios are very close to the riot that is now being dealt with near the South Kalihi or it might even be as close as the A’ala Park areas of…well…right here in this part of town.  OK, our field reporters are all in the areas of this activity.  Lets go to Ross right now.”  The AM station had grown to be the number one source of local and national news in Hawaii.  They now had field reporters and made direct links by satellite to other world news sites.  The quickly thrown together radio stations by the now defunct television news agencies were all gone.  Again, not enough advertisers.  Listeners had chipped in and now the AM talk radio station was one of two on the air.  The other being the government funded and maintained Public Broadcasting Radio.

The field reporter chimed in.  “Rick, this is Ross in Waipahu.  There does appear to be an affray happening between authorities and the public here.  Citizens are throwing fire, well basically hand made bombs at the police vehicles and military humvee vehicles.  Others are throwing rocks and debris at the police officers.  It is not safe, at this time for anyone to enter the Waipahu or Ewa Beach areas.  This is being told to us by the Honolulu Police Department.”

Rick was back on. “Ok…Ross.  Tell us about…wait, John is in place now in Kalihi not far from our studios.  John what is happening there?”

 “Rick, there has apparently been a shooting incident here between the police and a drug selling gang that got so out of control it has encompassed the Dillingham area of Kalihi all the way to A’ala Park and perhaps…no definitely it has reached the Chinatown district now.  Military and police S.W.A.T. team members are moving to get closer to homes being used as fortresses by this gang.  We did speak to an officer that was walking out of this firefight after he had been shot in the stomach region.”

 “Shot?  The officers are getting shot now?”  Rick asked with disbelief and shock.

 “There have been officers and military shot here already.  This particular officer walked out of the fight himself and was heading to an ambulance.  He told us what we mostly know right now about what is happening here.”

Rick broke back in.  “OK.. You have heard all of this now.  There is a fight going on, quite a dangerous situation, in not only Waipahu but in the Kalihi areas.”  Rick stated.  “ We will try to get more information and keep in touch with Ross and John on the front lines of this small war happening on our island today.”

With that Pete and I set out to check the wooden  ‘bars’ on the windows.  We had cut them by hand out of scrap and nailed them to the home windows all around the house. The idea was to eliminate entry ways for potential burglars and make them try to come in right through the main doors and sliders.  Now they might be needed for protection from this fight going on.

The ham radio set began to beep, it was Mike.  Mike and I exchanged some brief conversation on the ham radio sets and he agreed to come over and stay with us.  Mike and Amanda were on the other side of Mililani town. They had a nice home.  Unfortunately it was one of the first homes on the South part of Mililani and therefore a prime target for burglars coming North from Waipahu.  Mike and Amanda made several calls to us on their hand held transceivers as they came towards our home to tell their progress. 

Mike relayed that there were pick up trucks full of people riding up the H2 towards Mililani from the Honolulu or the Western side of the island.  They had guns and torches.  It all sounded crazy but Pete understood it all clear.  He explained it to us.

 “This is like a revolt.  Much of the island has been out of work and living on soup and bread lines for about  six months now.  They see everyone riding their bikes into town and having fun around them and they have had enough.  They reached a breaking point and something set it off like a bomb today.”

He was probably right.  Regardless of what triggered it, there was a war started this morning and they were coming to get… I guess, revenge or something.  They wanted more than the government paycheck and the three hot meals they received each day.  The fact wa