I heard back from Auntie Anuhea.

“u” sounds like “oo”, “e” sounds like “bet”. I was wrong, don’t say “lay-lay” that would be like “lei-lei”. Instead use that short “e”. oo-koo-le-le.

She agrees that it is hard to write the ‘okina on the computer. The ‘okina should flow towards the following letter. When you can’t do that with different fonts, just use the apostrophe key. She says that a straight up and down or slightly leaning ‘okina is better than none at all. This is interesting about using XP with the Hawaiian language: http://www.olelo.hawaii.edu/pub/WordXP.pdf

She adds: “Incidentally, Denny, thanks for bringing up the word Hawai’ian. It is often confused as a word within the Hawaiian language vocabulary. It is not. It is, in fact, an English word and hence doesn’t include the ‘okina between the two “i’s”. Confusing? Hope not. Check ulukau.org for clarification. ”

I hope that clears all of your questions up. Thank you for having interest in this matter, I think it is taken lightly by too many,

~Hippie Guy

You are right on both accounts. How ‘ukulele is pronounced: oo-koo-ley-ley, with the first syllable (oo) said like you were punched in the stomach. It’s not really obnoxious, but enough to make a difference. I’ll see if I can post an mp3 of me and/or one of my contacts saying it.

Which way the ‘okina points: due to the restrictions of a formal keyboard it’s hard to determine which way it points. It could ether be: ‘ukulele or `ukulele. I’ll see if I can get in touch with Auntie Anuhea and see what her feelings are towards this.

Thanks for the heads up,

~Hippie Guy

Aloha,

Denny