Bette Midler On Hawaii’s Influence On Her Environmentalism: “Yes, no question. Although, it was a hard childhood. We lived in a very poor neighborhood called the Halawa, which was very rough. We were the only white family for miles around. And we were reminded of it every day. People avoided us because the tradition there was antiwhite. Only the weakest children would play with white children. But there was a great deal of solace from nature: the beautiful skies, the sea, the smell of the flowers, all those bugs and birds. There was so much to look at. And I thought the whole world was like that. So when I came to what they call the mainland, I couldn’t understand. It was a complete shock to my system.” (Good Housekeeping, 1996)
