The Honolulu Advertiser from Honolulu, Hawaii • 3

The Sunday Star-Bulletin Advertiser Honolulu, January 5,1975 A-3 torn horton Hawaii Report SIZ 9 'aim Advertiser photos by Charles Okamura This young Kikaider fan knows just what to do when a bunch of scaly, spiny monsters attack. You throw your arms in the air, shout CHANGE! ONE, TWO, THREE! And, zap, the evil beasts don't stand a chance. the Islands Kikaider sweeps 1 fjr The beige connection LAHAINA How I discovered, in bare feet, the beige reasoning behind the Maui philosophy while applying my own theory on overseas house guests: First off, I felt fortunate to secure even two rooms, a small car and a plane ride to Maui since the Island was full for the holidays and it was nearly impossible to get in anywhere. So one is a fool to complain about having to fly at 6:25 a.m. when one is lucky even to get on a plane at any hour.

Still, when the weekend started with my Lithuanian alarm failing to go off on time, I had the gnawing fear while racing to the airport in last-minute darkness that this might, just possibly, be turning into one of those trips where everything goes in the same direction wrong. NEVERTHELESS, Maui was mandatory because of my theory on how to handle house guests from the Mainland. First thing I always do is take them, or send them, to Maui for at least a day or two. Then, on their next visit, the odds are quite strong that the potential house guests will spend one night in Honolulu and head straight for Maui. There are two anxious moments when you travel to a Neighbor Island during crowded times: (1) When the rent-a-car girl leafs through her reservations; (2) When the hotel clerk leafs through his.

If they leaf through one stack without looking up and reach for a second, you know you're in trouble. My eyes rolled as the rent-a-car girl reached, for a second stack of papers before leafing through those and looking up to deliver those awful words that hit like a hammer, "Nothing under your name." It was starting. One of Those Kinds of Weekends. Seven a.m. at the Kahului Airport, miles away from a Kaanapali hotel room (hopefully), and no car.

Someone somewhere had left something lying on the wrong desk or failed to make the right phone call how many times a day does that happen to a tourist? and the bottom was about to fall out of a weekend before it got started. THIS IS THE point where you look at the little girl behind the desk and scream to yourself, "It's not her fault! It's not her fault!" This is easier to do on Maui than, say, in Chicago. Filling a fist with dimes and preparing for a series of telephone calls to locate a friend or a car something the average tourist can't fall back on I came up with a bit of my customary Maui luck and succeeded on the first phone call. Someone had fouled up and the girl soon received word that I was, after all, entitled to a car. "It will have to be a small one," she said.

"It will have to do," I said. Packing four long-legged people and their bags into a compact car is easier on Maui than, say in downtown Detroit. Although the ride would have been considerably more uncomfortable if my house guest had not been the weird kind who always travels with a piece of rope, permitting us to tie down the trunk lid instead of sharing the back seat with a suitcase. The bellboy at the hotel said he would bring in our bags AFTER we got our rooms. That made me nervous.

I mean, the bellboy must have had to carry too many bags back out to the street after someone's room reservation failed to materialize, so he got smart and let the bags sit outside until he saw a room key. MY SHOULDERS slumped when she started leafing through a second stack of room reservations. But I perked up when she said, "Here it is. One night. Right?" Back to slumping.

"It was supposed to be for two nights. We can't get a Sunday night flight. We have to leave early Monday morning. That's why it was supposed to be for two nights." The hotel was full, she said. No way we could stay there two nights.

I could see without looking that the bellboy was smiling at our bags sitting outside. The bags and I sat around for half an hour while phone calls were being made. Finally, a manager emerged from a back room to say everything had been straightened out and we could stay the two nights. Rather than kiss his ring, I wondered what happens to the tourists who get caught in the middle of such snafus and never see their bags reach the lobby. But I reminded myself that I was lucky even to get a room on such late notice and toddled off toward the next near-disaster.

Hardly a disaster, but I unpacked to the realization that my Lithuanian cargo handler had failed to put in zoris. Maui demands such comfort for the feet. So I headed into Lahaina in bare feet to shop for some non-shoes. I NOT ONLY found a fine pair of non-shoes, I found the secret of maintaining the right attitude on Maui. Settling on a pair of those see-through, loose-fitting, net-like, non-shoes that can be worn without socks and even pass with a pair of slacks in the evening, I had trouble deciding between the white or the beige.

"Eh, take da beige," the young girl said. "Da white ones, they just turn to one beige color before long anyways." That is superior reasoning. Why fool with pure white when more practical beige is available? Which is much like the prevailing attitude on Maui. Why worry about a little snafu here or there a car that almost wasn't there, a room that nearly disappeared when one way or the other everything on Maui eventually settles into a comfortable beige feeling. The seas and the skies are always blue, the clouds perfectly white and the hills and fields green under a golden sun.

II the human workings go astray, think beige. It helps keep your feet on the ground, even when it looks like everything is about to blow 'kyhigh. another way. "In Japan, they saw these shows so much they were sick of them," he said. "That's why they brought them here." Miyakawa sat through a rehearsal this week of the live Kikaider-Ol stage show that is packing Hawaii children in for three and four shows a day at the Honolulu International Center.

It was ideally timed with the Kikaider-Ol television debut last week. MIYAKAWA expounded on why the shows are popular. He hinted that his network is considering sending the shows to California for consumption, but not immediately. "For the children, I think it is the fighting," he said. "The half good, the half evil.

Similar to ourselves as human beings." Miyakawa maintained that the Oriental characters have been vital to the By KAREN HORTON Advertiser Staff Writer They leap off sofas, arms crossing, flailing and rotating as startled parents go bananas. They go through a routine of 43 elaborate gestures before jumping into backyard swimming pools to take on the Red Okoze Fish. They scream, "Change!" and become, in their minds, mechanical superheroes who can look at the mailman or teacher and envision The Spiteful Green Sponge. They are those wild, unabashed fans of a batch of Japanese television programs that have taken over the State with the oldtime impact of a Flash Gordon, Lone Ranger or Superman of media days gone by. KIKAIDER was the first.

Then Rainbowman (changing into seven dif- v'v ill ysmmmmfrnm "Editing technique," Miyakawa said of the flashy spins and leaps. "Japanese film has highly developed technique." SNOWBALLING merchandise sales leave men like Yoshimi Endo, Shiro-kiya advertising manager, stunned. His store and several others locally, like Dai'ei, have been clearing the shelves of posters, masks, T-shirts, tank tops, helmets, racing cars, transformation belts, gloves, air chairs, hand buzzers, shopping bags, belts, necklaces and dolls of the various characters at anywhere from 49 cents and up, mostly up. "We first carried Kikaider items in 1970 when the character was popular in Japan," he said. "We didn't get much response.

Then the show went on television here last year and He marked the sidewalk sale in July 1974 as the kickoff in sales that have never slowed. He still reels from the recent sale of 4,000 Kikaider LPs off the rack at $6.95 each. SINCE THE new hero Kikaider-Ol dolls went on sale after Christmas at Shirokiya, 500 dozen have been sold. In all, 6,000 dozen television show dolls have been sold. Since last July, 48,000 T-shirts have been put on the backs of children.

Endo's 4-year-old daughter, Eureka, is another Kikaider fan. "She knows the songs Continued on A-6. A newsroom debate has been waged over the correct spelling of the Japanese television wonder man. His name has appeared in print as both "Kikaida" and "Kikaider." When the spelling discrepancy first was noticed, the assumption prevailed that "Kikaida" probably was the more correct transliteration. That theory, however, was torpedoed by Yasushi Miyakawa of the Tokyo television network which produces the show.

"Kikaida," it seems, was a Hawaii attempt at cross-cultural precision that just isn't valid. His name is Kikaider and he's a pretty rough character, so you'd better not forget it. Jiro serenades a young admirer with the "Kikaider" theme song. success here because of the Oriental population. However, he wouldn't let that discourage potential California popularity.

He said, "They might find the shows unusual." THE SHOWS have essentially similar themes. Pleasant-looking clear-skinned young persons, when pitted against overwhelming evil, are transformed into computerized, flashily Pressed, robot-looking characters who perform miraculous feats. They save men, women, children and whole villages threatened by evil organizations, evil monsters, androids and things with television sets on their heads. The programs are colorful, action-packed, have catchy theme songs and every chapter is prime time Halloween. The choreography of the kung fu and samurai-like fighting is, at times, majestic.

Kikaider will do a double back flip off a boulder, land on bis feet and spin around, leap into his motorcycle, go miles in seconds, then complete a forward double triple spin out and still be clearheaded enough fight. ferent versions). Next was Kamen Rider Now Kikaider's brother, Kikaider-Ol has debuted and is scoring high. "We're still amazed and overwhelmed at the programs' success here," said Joanne Ninomiya, general manager of KIKU-TV, the station airing the Japanese language shows several nights weekly. They are subtitled in English.

"They were so differ-ent," I knew they would make it here. But I can't get over the impact." Neither can Yasushi Miyakawa, international relations manager of the Nippon Educational Television KIKU's network affiliate in Tokyo. IT WAS NET which first flashed these same shows on Japanese screens three years ago. Such science fiction-monster programs have been popular for more than a decade there. "This is the first time to the outside for these NET Japanese television shows," Miyakawa said.

"In the United States, these kinds of films are not so often telecast." Avowed Kikaider-Ol fan, PauiySoto, 12, put it These beautiful antique car models are more than coin banks, they're highly decorative pieces for any home. You pay just $3.50 for each coin bank, buy as many as you want during Pioneer Savings Days. Handsome aittiipe car coin banks now for savers at Pioneer federal I g5o Downtown: 926 Fort St. Mall 1539 Kapiolani Blvd. 2211 Kalakaua Ave.

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