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Sunday, May 25, 2008

Because I can!

I went to the "Open Market" this morning for the second time. My daughter couldn't make it so she asked me to pick up some of the Tuba Rose stems that she had picked up last week for $1.00 dollar a stem.

That was the first place I stopped at, as they go out quickly. They were sitting in a bucket without water in the morning sun and they were not as nice as last weeks. But I knew Chris would want them so I picked the best I could find.

The lady next to me asked the guy, "How Much?" I was ready to say to her $1.00 a stem when he said, "they are $1.25 a stem." I looked the guy in the eyes and asked him did it cost him more gas to get them here then last week? he just laughed and said, "No Auntie (there's that Auntie again) it's Memorial Day" as though paying a higher price for the flowers honored the Vets!

Needless to say I was upset. I continued to meander through the stalls to buy the fruits and vegetables. As I got to the sellers that I had patronized the week before I had notice that everything had gone up. I checked other stalls and all of the prices had gone up. I am not sure what the reason was. The holiday? Maybe you had to cook more food? The cost of gas to get to the market? Or was it "hey everyone else is doing it so why not?"

There is not a person I have talked to that is not upset with the price of Gas nor are they happy with the conglomerate's that are responsible for it. They complain about how we are being taken advantage of and that they are only getting rich off of the little people because they have us over a barrel.

But after my trip through the market I began to wonder. Do we do it to ourselves? These are little farmers and sellers, they are not a monopoly, and yet they are taking advantage like the big guys. If these people who bring there products to be sold who maybe traveled 10 miles to get it there as there are lots of farms around Kunia or maybe they did come further away so they may have to make a 50 mile round trip at the most and that would not be very many of them, are they passing the price of gas off on us? The prices ranged from 19¢ on the dollar to doubling the price of the week before.

Or is it in all man to be selfish and stick it to his fellow man because he can? What is going on with people? We complain and complain about the big guys but can't see what we ourselves do to our neighbors.

We see it happen time and again. The holidays are a very good example. Christmas being the biggest one. Thanks to commercialism Christmas has lost that specialness to me. I can't be excited about a holiday that starts in July and by the time Christmas arrives I am so sick of all of the advertisements, plastic globe blown snow on a fat, red cheeked, non personal Santa and "buy this buy that," being shoved in my face that I am ready to take the tree down before the day even arrives.

But the cost of flowers going up because the retailer knows that you will want to lay the flowers on the grave of someone who has sacrificed their life so that this retailer can do just such a thing turns my stomach. And to say it with such glee?

The ancient Hawaiians did not like peddlers. They looked down on them with such disdain as they felt if you had extra of anything you gave it to others who did not have. I can't imagine what they would feel if they could see what "peddlers" do today.

I worry, times are bad and in the back of my mind I think we need to all pull together during these days but now I am worried because I don't think it will be possible.

And yet, I bought the bedraggled flowers for the asking price, paid the extra 19¢ a pound on the papaya, the extra dollar on the Okinawan Potatoes. What choice did I have. It's the market or the stores who charge even more.

But I will put my feelings about gouge thy neighbor out there and try to tell as many people as will listen. Even if my daughter, (who thankfully was not with me this morning when I questioned the flower seller), gets upset when I speak out. It may get me in trouble one day but just as the flower seller can gouge prices in the memory of a fallen solder I can speak out due to their sacrifices, and this I will do because, I Can!

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Do you want to know about Hawaii from a locals point of view? Where do we like to go? What things do we like to see. This blog is about seeing Hawaii without being trapped. This is a journal about Good eats, Hawaiian events, and looking at the islands through the eyes of someone who has lived here for more then forty years.

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