About Town 4-8-13

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Hawaii Island’s Ken Love, executive director of the Hawaii Tropical Fruit Growers, appears in a documentary film, “The Fruit Hunters.” The film will be screened at 6 p.m. Wednesday in the 2013 spring showcase of the Hawaii International Film Festival on Oahu. HTFG members will display fresh fruit and sell HTFG videos and posters featuring local produce at the premiere.

Love appears in
‘The Fruit Hunters’

Hawaii Island’s Ken Love, executive director of the Hawaii Tropical Fruit Growers, appears in a documentary film, “The Fruit Hunters.” The film will be screened at 6 p.m. Wednesday in the 2013 spring showcase of the Hawaii International Film Festival on Oahu. HTFG members will display fresh fruit and sell HTFG videos and posters featuring local produce at the premiere.

“In ‘The Fruit Hunters,’ the characters travel across culture, history and geography to illustrate how people are intertwined with the fruits they grow and eat,” Love said.

Inspired by Adam Gollner’s 2008 book of the same name, the film is a documentary about exotic fruit cultivators and preservationists. It uses performers and fruit enthusiasts to stage real and imagined moments in the history of fruit.

The story follows Bill Pullman’s crusade to create a community orchard near his Hollywood Hills home. Noris Ledesma and Richard Campbell of Florida’s Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden “scour the jungle for rare mangos, hoping to intervene before the plants are steamrolled by industrialization,” according to the film synopsis. Other plots include a scientist racing to breed bananas resistant to a fungus that threatens the worldwide crop and fruit detective Isabella Ragione investigating paintings for clues to rediscover lost fruits.

Love appears in the film introducing Pullman to some of Hawaii’s finest fruits and later appears in Pullman’s dream sequence. Filming on Hawaii Island took place at the Keauhou Farmers Market, Manago Hotel and a number of private farms in South Kona.

The film will be released in 15 U.S. cities in May and later in Japan.

Soil, water group meeting Wednesday

Mauna Kea Soil and Water Conservation District meets from 4 to 6 p.m. Wednesday at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service Waimea office, 67-1185 Mamalahoa Highway, Suite 148.

Anyone requiring an accommodation or auxiliary aid to attend the meeting should call Margaret Fowler at 885-6602, ext. 100.

Road, picnic area closure at Kaloko-Honokohau park

As part of ongoing efforts to remove invasive, non-native plants from the Kaloko-Honokohau National Historical Park, the gravel access road to Kaloko Fishpond Picnic Area — Ala Nui Kaloko — off Highway 19 at mile marker 96.5, will be closed from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesday. To ensure visitor’s safety during chipping activities, this area of the park will be closed until work is complete.

For more information, call the Kaloko-Honokohau National Historical Park visitor contact station at 326-9057.

Sasaki to speak
at Rotary meeting

Lori Sasaki, manager of the Workforce Development Division of the state Department of Labor, will speak at the Kona Sunrise Rotary meeting from 6:45 to 7:45 a.m. Wednesday at Hale Halawai in Kailua-Kona. She will provide information on programs and services including the Volunteer Internship Program, the Employment Training Fund and the Work Opportunity Tax Credit program, as well as the online job search engine HireNet Hawaii. Labor market statistics and career information will also be provided.

Breakfast is $10 per person. Rotarians and interested individuals are welcome to attend. For more information, contact Bev Fraser at 936-9965.

Seniors to learn
yoga techniques

The Kailua-Kona Seniors meets at 10 a.m. Wednesday at Hale Halawai in Kailua-Kona. Qatsina will be the guest speaker. She will share yoga and breathing exercises and demonstrate chair aerobics.

For more information, call Claire at 756-5352 or Elsa at 315-8732.