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Daily Smile

[{"type":"text","text":"Bad to the bone..."}]

Smile 26 6 23

<title>Daily Smile: Tuesday, June 23, 2026</title>

Bad to the bone...

Daily Smile: Tuesday, June 23, 2026

Christian Shimabuku Headshot

Christian Shimabuku

Sports

All eyes were on Tua Tagovailoa prior to his ill-timed injury on Thursday. 

The Saint Louis alum and ‘Ewa Beach native was named the starting quarterback for the Atlanta Falcons prior to Sunday's Week 1 matchup against the Steelers. After six seasons with the Miami Dolphins, 

 and was eager for a fresh start with Atlanta. 

But during Thursday's practice, Tagovailoa suffered a non-contact oblique injury and was ruled out on Friday. His future with the franchise, with projected starter Michael Penix Jr. working his way from injury, remains uncertain. 

Heading into the 2026 season, NFL fans from Hawai‘i will still have dozens of players to keep track of throughout the season. The full list is below, followed by Hawai‘i affiliation:

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Active roster"}]

, defensive tackle, Indianapolis Colts (Punahou)

, safety, Indianapolis Colts (Kamehameha-Maui)

, linebacker, Pittsburgh Steelers (Saint Louis) 

, defensive lineman, Las Vegas Raiders (University of Hawai‘i)

, quarterback, Washington Commanders (Saint Louis)

, linebacker, New England Patriots (Mililani and University of Hawai‘i)

, punter, Indianapolis Colts (University of Hawai‘i)

, offensive lineman, Miami Dolphins (Saint Louis)

, offensive lineman, Arizona Cardinals (born in Hawai‘i)

, wide receiver, San Francisco 49ers (Kapolei) (Note: Stribling was carted off with an ankle injury in the team's season-opening win over the Los Angeles Rams on Thursday)

, quarterback, Atlanta Falcons (Saint Louis)

, linebacker, Jacksonville Jaguars (University of Hawai‘i)

, receiver, Pittsburgh Steelers (Saint Louis)

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Practice squad"}]

, offensive lineman, New York Jets (University of Hawai‘i) 

, kicker, Las Vegas Raiders (University of Hawai‘i)

, defensive lineman, Seattle Seawhawks (Moloka‘i)

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Injured reserve "}]

, quarterback, Cleveland Browns (Mililani) 

NFL Stock

<title>2026 NFL season kicks off for Hawai‘i's best</title>

Over 20 players with ties to the Islands are on active NFL rosters to begin the season.

2026 NFL season kicks off for Hawai‘i's best

Like the Hawai‘i prep football icons that came before him, Hunter Fujikawa is poised to become the next great quarterback to come out of Mililani High School. 

, Fujikawa, a junior with the Trojans, is hoping his name can be uttered in the same sentence by the time it's all said and done. 

 from schools such as Ohio State, Alabama and Oregon, Fujikawa, a 6-foot-2 four-star quarterback, is on pace to have been on the list of notable alumni regardless of the school that produced him. And prior to this summer, that school would have been Punahou. 

Fujikawa won the starting job on Punahou's varsity team as a freshman and in all likelihood would have held the role for all four years. 

"Just a great opportunity to play under coach 

 and (offensive coordinator) Samson Satele," Fujikawa told Aloha State Daily of his decision to transfer. "Being able to have that caliber of coaches to help me develop and get to the next level. God closes one door and opens another."

Fujikawa is far from the only former Punahou standout to join Mililani this offseason. Star 6-foot-4 receiver Zion White, who began his high school career with the Buffanblu, transferred to national powerhouse IMG Academy for his junior season. White returned to the Islands for his senior year and will suit up for the Trojans alongside Fujikawa. 

"It's been great so far," White said. "Over here, all the boys just have their heads down 24/7, just working super hard."

White and Fujikawa grew up playing against each other on the youth circuit — White for the ‘Ewa Beach Hammerheads and Fujikawa for Fiyah Squad. Fujikawa was a freshman when White was a sophomore racking up college offers before Fujikawa went on to do the same. 

"I knew he had potential," White said of Fujikawa. "We kind of just had to build that relationship. We spent multiple hours just throwing together and just spending time together. And the connection, honestly, hasn't gone anywhere. It feels like a brotherhood in a sense."

In addition to Fujikawa and White, the Trojans will also feature a trio of Satele brothers in linebacker Toa, and defensive linemen Trison and Tayden. Toa and Trison have already committed to Oregon, while Tayden is entering his freshman year. Their father and offensive coordinator, Samson Satele, is a former University of Hawai‘i standout offensive lineman and eight-year NFL veteran. 

"It's been great so far," Fujikawa said of the transition to Mililani. "I love the boys. This team, we should have a great year ahead of us."

White, who is entering his senior year, has already committed to California, choosing the Golden Bears over a 

. Fujikawa, meanwhile, says he's putting his recruitment "on pause" in order to focus on his junior season. 

"Recruiting is going to keep going, but I just want to continue to build relationships with coaches and focus on the season, and then see what happens after," Fujikawa said. 

Mililani's season officially begins on Aug. 14 with a home game against Liberty High School of Henderson, Nev. As a program, the Trojans have two state titles to their name: one in 2014 as the HHSAA Division I champions, their lone top-tiered state crown. Mililani won the 2016 Division I HHSAA state title, but it was the same year the state introduced a new top tier in the Open Division. 

"What everybody wants to do and everyone's vision is winning the state championship," Fujikawa said. 

Added White, when asked about his individual goals for the 2026 season: "I have personal goals, but honestly, I'm a team-first kind of guy and I just want to win states above all." 

Mililani football 080328

<title>Mililani's new dynamic duo looks to take Trojans back to HHSAA mountaintop</title>

Former Punahou teammates Zion White and Hunter Fujikawa are reunited at Mililani and have the Trojans thinking big ahead of the 2026 high school football season.

Mililani's new dynamic duo looks to take Trojans back to HHSAA mountaintop

Lopaka and Tanya Kapanui

Lopaka Kapanui and Tanya Kapanui

Hawai‘i History

Columnists

In its original conception in the 1960s, the H3 highway was to pass through Moanalua Valley, with another tunnel to be bored through Maunakapu and the Ko‘olau Range. Plans for the six-lane highway, meant to ease traffic buildup on the Pali and Likelike Highways, became entangled in a decade-long dispute leading all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The State Department of Transportation promised a scenic highway that would open up the privately held lands and, at the same time, would coordinate with the landowners to develop a historic and botanical park in the valley. While many people who claimed to be authorities on the subject said that Moanalua Valley held little archaeological or historical importance, one woman spent her lifetime recording extensive oral histories of the valley.

As early as 1902, Gertrude MacKinnon Damon kept a diary of interviews with the people whose families had been stewards of the valley, including Nāmakahelu Makaena, a kumu hula who passed on the mo‘olelo of Moanalua. The Damon family, who have lived in the valley since 1890, created the Moanalua Gardens Foundation and, by using extensive oral histories and enlisting help from conservationists, residents, cultural practitioners, and the general public, kept the plans for H3 tied up in court for nearly a decade. Finally, in a 1976 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld an appeals court injunction. The Court effectively stopped the original H3 construction through Moanalua Valley when it ruled that the Department of Transportation had failed to adequately prove there were no feasible alternative routes to Windward O‘ahu.

Despite testimony that Moanalua was of little importance to Hawai‘i and her people, this sacred valley is rich in history and legend. The Moanalua ahupua‘a extends from the ridges of the Ko‘olau Mountain Range down to Āliamanu and Āliapa‘akai, through Māpunapuna to the Honolulu Airport and industrial center to Māmala Bay. One of the most sacred wahi pana within this area is Leilono.

Located on the northern side of the famous hill of Kapūkakī, now known as Red Hill, this entrance to the afterworld was in line with the burial hill of Āliamanu, where O‘ahu’s ali‘i were buried. There at the portal to the underworld stood he ‘ulu o Leiwalo, a breadfruit tree of Leiwalo. A soul would climb the tree and, from one of its two branches, would leap into pō pau ʻole, the everlasting night. However, these branches were deceiving. If a spirit was lacking an ‘aumakua and climbed onto a branch on the western side of the tree, the branch withered at once and broke off, and the spirit would plunge down into a pit of darkness. But if he climbed the other, it would bring help from ‘aumakua, and the soul would see his ancestors in the afterworld from time immemorial.

Moanalua was also the site of intense battles. In the 1780s, Kahekili, the ali‘i of Maui, attacked O‘ahu. Kahahana was the ali‘i of O‘ahu at the time, and after evading Kahekili’s warriors for two years, he was finally caught and killed. After his death, a plot was laid to kill all the ali‘i from Maui, but someone warned them, and the attack was unsuccessful. In retaliation, Kahekili and his warriors massacred all opposition and their families.

Kalaikoa, an ali‘i from Maui, built a long house and named it Kauwalua. He stripped the bones of his enemies, bound them together, and set them up inside and all around the outside of the house. The gruesome sight of this hale iwi, house of bones, stood at Lapakea on the slope into Moanalua and was visible from the shore. A housing development was built over this site, just below Tripler Army Hospital.

In a 1972 interview, Hawaii’s Living Treasure, Dr. Rubellite Johnson, shared a tale of night marchers who came down from the top of Moanalua.

Rudolph Tai, a patriarch of the Mormon Church in Hawai‘i, used to live in the old Damon Tract housing, which is now the airport industrial park. One night, he heard the ghost army approaching from the uppermost part of Moanalua. He could hear their chants, and as they grew closer, he could even hear the hiss of their burning torches as the night marchers made their way toward the sea. For two long hours, Rudolph Tai held his hands over his ears, trying to keep the sound of the ghostly procession out, until the chants and the marching slowly faded away.

But at the same time, Dr. Johnson said, the late watch on a small ship that was anchored in Pearl Harbor recorded in his log a curious event. From midnight until 2 a.m., the man saw a string of torches moving slowly from the top of Moanalua Valley, winding toward the sea where they disappeared.

There are dozens of haunting stories throughout Moanalua, including the high school, stores in Mapunapuna, and businesses in the airport industrial center. My own story took place at Moanalua Gardens.

As we were preparing for a hula festival, our kumu held practice at the gardens a few days before the event. On the way to practice one afternoon, I came across a Hawaiian woman in the parking lot wrapping cords of olonā on a spool. She sat on a chair propped up against the hedges while people walked past her without any acknowledgment.

As I started to pass her, we made eye contact, and she asked me, “Pahi? You get pahi?”

[{"type":"text","text":"She was asking if I had a knife."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"“ʻAe,” I replied, “Loaʻa ka pahi.” Yes, I have a knife."}]

I removed a small knife from my pocket and showed it to her. She pulled a cord taught in front of her and nodded. I opened my knife and cut the olonā cord in the place she wanted.

She seemed relieved when she thanked me and went back to wrapping the olonā on her spool.

When I met with my kumu, I explained what happened, and he immediately pulled out his own pocketknife.

“When you go back out to the parking lot after hula, she’s going to ask you to cut the olonā again. Instead of using your own knife,” my kumu instructed, “Use mine.”

He took my knife and placed his own in my hand. Nothing more was said, and we proceeded with our hula instructions for the day. After three hours, the lessons were done, and I made my way back to the parking lot. Just as my kumu said, the Hawaiian woman was still there, winding her olonā on a spool. And just as my kumu said, the woman again asked me to cut a cord of her plant fiber.

Using the knife he gave me, I cut the olonā without incident, but instead of being thankful, the woman scoffed and spat on the ground.

She gathered her olonā fibers and her spool and walked off into the park. I watched her walk right past the security guard who was telling people that the park was closed. He didn’t even glance in her direction, and I wondered if he even saw her.

As soon as I got home, my kumu called and asked about the woman. I told him exactly what happened and asked why he gave me his knife to use.

My kumu explained that the woman was a mo‘o wahine, a very kolohe one. He said that once I used my knife to cut the woman’s cord, it became dull. If I tried to use it again to cut her olonā, it would not have worked. Then, she would have asked me to do something else.

“Whatever that something else was,” he said, “It would lead to another task, then another, until finally, it would cost you your life. Especially now, since you’re under hula kapu.”

The lesson learned that day was that even while in the process of spiritual education on the middle path, there will always be someone or something that will try to lead you astray.

Moanalua Gardens

<title>Moanalua’s Haunting History</title>

If an old Hawaiian woman asks you to cut a cord for her in Moanalua Valley, be very, very careful what you do next. That's just once of the eerie tales of this part of O‘ahu where many battles have raged, from the invasion of Kahekili from Maui to the dispute over the route of H3.

Daily Smile: Tuesday, June 23, 2026

ASD Staff

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Daily Smile: Tuesday, June 23, 2026

Authors

ASD Staff

Reporter

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