Fluid Shades of Poetry in Bloom

Bougainvillea

Summertime in Chinatown

Smiling Wahine

 

 

The wide variety of bougainvillea colors that exist always amazes me. Whenever I come upon a hedge or bush overflowing with bright  hues, my camera practically jumps out of my tote bag. In Queen Kapiolani Park, at the far end of Waikiki, I took photographs of a beautiful array of bushes The display represented a complete blend of an after-shower rainbow, another act of nature that always makes me smile.

 

Even with all those choices though, my favorite is still the brilliant purple contained in a proliferation of bushes found all over the island, from Hawai'i Kai to Hale'iwa and Kapolei to Turtle Bay.

 

The above picture was taken in the early 1990's. This was before a clean-up crew chopped away the branches of flowering bushes that hung over the Nu’uanu Stream canal. The stream flows down from the Ko'olau Mountains, runs parallel to River Street in Chinatown, and all the way to the ocean. With so many extended stretches of concrete and brick buildings, erected after the plague and fire of 1900, I miss the vibrancy and sense of comfort that those blossoms once offered to the area.