Laie: 'spirit of aloha'

MR says: This story has a beautiful photo gallery.

On a quiet street in Laie, Hawaii, Flora Kapualahaole Soren demonstrates the true spirit of aloha. Following the example of the generations before her, she extends an open-door, open-refrigerator invitation to a reporter from Salt Lake City.

Sister Soren shares her stories, her photographs, her history, her time and her food.

Her generosity, she explains, is something she learned in her youth. Laie is — and always has been — a place where visitors are welcome, she explains.

Sister Soren would know. Her roots in the island community run deep.

In 1865, the Church purchased 6,000 acres of barren land — with no known source of fresh water — on the North Shore of the Hawaiian island of Oahu.

The land had been an ancient sanctuary for defeated warriors or fugitives in Hawaii who sought protection and cleansing in the puuhonua or city of refuge. Now it would be "a gathering place" for pioneer members of the Church in the Pacific.

Read the rest of this story at ldschurchnews.com