Real Love?

[Menehune Man]

What does "Real" love mean to you. How about real life examples that you know of. Change names if you feel it's appropriate. Romantic? Friendship? Samaritan? Neighbor? Foe? Kids kine? Here's a time that worked out well... About 4 years ago my wife and I met a guy here in Honolulu, but he was from Las Vegas. he was homeless and we let him stay with us for awhile. We really wanted to help him. Eventually had to ask him to leave because of the drugs being brought into our home. He asked us to please hold on to his two duffle bags till he could retrieve them. We agreed. 3 years went by and we heard nothing then my wife suggested that he may be in jail. I checked and sure enough also that he'd be released in two months. We made contact and he came to our place for three days till he returned to his family in Las Vegas. It touched me so deeply how happy he was to still have his photos, etc. A Samaritan type of love.

[Pedro]

Re: Real Love?

I am a Mililani Boy and I know a story of love and growth if ya want to hear about it. I live in an apartment complex and where I live in Mililani is on a platue and down below the hill is a valley we call Waipio Valley. There is sort of like a river that runs thru the valley further downward we called "Devils Swamp" or the creak for short, because the water was mirky, there was a shear drop into the water where rappids could swallow someone whole if you didn't know how to swim. Me and my friends weren't good swimmers but we swam in packs. It was a government owned property and we didn't care. Some one had clipped the fence blocking us from going inside. Sometime's people who live in the Valley would go there to catch Talapia with their bamboo fishing poles. I don't know if I would eat it, and I never tried it. Eventually as I got older I stopped going down there basicaly I lost interest in it, but where I lost interest my little brother picked it up. This was about five years ago in 1999 I just graduated and I got a job washing windows, everyday my little brother and his band of friends went down to the Devils Swamp and he would tell me about his adventures. One day one of my friends his little brother and this other kid I knew begged my little brother to take them down with him to the creak. I little brother eventually did and they loved it, but they couldn't swim for beans. My little brother told them both (one was a punky samoan kid I think about eleven or ten and the other my friends little brother a scrawny Filipino kid about nine) not to go down to the creak unless they told some one or told my brother. One day they took it upon themselves to go down the valley for a dip without letting anyone know, the thing was like I said they didn't know how to swim. I just came home from work tired and I was with my friend by the park by my apartment complex overlooking the valley. He was tired like me and he told me he was looking for his little brother and for over an hour we sat and gazed at this chopper flying down bellow the valley. We didn't know what to think we thought it was another brush fire, but it was to early in the day to tell, and there weren't no smoke. I went into the house latter that day and turned on the T.V. and on the T.V. I watched the news intently they showed my little brothers friend and the samoan boy. They both drowned in the valley creak, but they weren't dead they were evacked to the hospital having been under the dirty water for more than five minutes. I was filled with tears. At my apartment complex we formed a prayer group everynight the boys were in the hospital. It was the childrens idea and my little brothers idea. Every day I our prayer circle got bigger and bigger with new faces who we didn't know. They just came everynight at seven and prayed with us. My little brother felt torn apart and I remember he had a squeeky voice and it started to mature. I saw him grow into a different man aside from the brat I knew. On the seventh night of the prayer group the both boys had passed away, but where they had passed we had found each other in the apartment complex and grew together as a people. I still wonder what would have happened if those boys had survived. A lot of time has passed since than and often I think about it.