Last week, I began this two-part review of things I learned in 2021 with a look at the interesting, unusual and just plain wacky proposals Hawaii had for locating its City Hall, state Capitol, Neal Blaisdell Center, Convention Center and university.

I also looked at some things I never knew about Ala Moana Center; as well as firsthand stories from paper boys and girls.

Here’s part two.

Gov. Judd pitched to Babe Ruth

I knew Babe Ruth had come to Hawaii in 1933, near the end of his career, to play baseball games in Honolulu and Hilo. I didn’t know that he talked Gov. Lawrence Judd into pitching to him before the game.

Judd had played ball at Punahou as a catcher. His first pitch was outside, but Ruth swung and missed. Strike one. The second pitch was also outside, but Ruth again swung and missed. Strike two.

Judd’s third pitch was right over the plate. Ruth swung and connected. It was a home run.

Cully Judd, the grandson of Judd, told me he still has a signed baseball from that day.

Sinatra made Maui onions famous

Everyone knows Maui onions are sweet, but until last month, I had no idea Frank Sinatra made them popular on the mainland.

He asked journalist Eddie Sherman to send him two dozen in 1966. Sherman misunderstood and sent him two huge bags full — 99 pounds.

The story ran in the local papers but then was picked up all around the country. It elevated the lowly Maui onion to near celebrity status.

Paul McCartney

Another thing I learned is that Paul and Linda McCartney were in Hawaii in 1975. They rented a house at 15 Hanapepe Place in Portlock.

Paul and Linda co-wrote “Silly Love Songs” at the home on a piano that looked out over the ocean. McCartney said John Lennon and other critics had said he tended to write soapy, silly love songs, and Paul thought, what’s wrong with that?

“Silly Love Songs” was the No. 1 Billboard song of 1976 and is McCartney’s bestselling single ever. It was on the album “Wings at the Speed of Sound.”

I’ll write more about that in 2022.

East doesn’t meet West

Perhaps the funniest stories I wrote about in 2021 were about some of the ways East didn’t quite meet West. By that I mean, ways the mainland misunderstands Hawaii and vice versa.

For instance, many mainlanders took decades to get it through their skulls that Hawaii was a state, and no, we don’t live in grass shacks, wear grass skirts, coconut bras, and own monkeys.

And no, you can’t drive from the mainland to Hawaii. No, pineapples don’t grow on trees. No, we don’t all put pineapple on our pizzas, own hula hoops, surf, or dance hula.

But yes, you can drink the water here; yes, we have indoor plumbing; yes, we speak English; and yes, we use American currency.

When I flipped the script, I found that we in the islands misunderstand the mainland in even quirkier ways, particularly when it comes to food.

Ken Fujii told me he went to Northwestern University, and his dormmate invited him to his Chicago home for dinner. The first course in this sit-down dinner looked like a boiled pineapple crown.

The hostess suggested Fujii start, as their guest.

“It was a monster task, too tough for me to slice, as it slipped around on the plate. And after I finally got one ‘leaf’ separated from the crown, I put it in my mouth and started to chew and chew and chew on the impossibly tough tasteless fibrous leaf. Everyone was still, watching me, in amazement, waiting for me to swallow.

“My friend’s mother finally politely interrupted me and said, ‘Ken, that’s an interesting way that you Hawaiians have for eating an ARTICHOKE! Let me show you how we do it here.’

“And she simply pulled off one of the outermost artichoke petals, dipped it in melted lemon butter, and dragged it across her teeth to get at the fleshy part. And then she put the fibrous petal down on an empty plate.”

Manapua?

Others have told me they went to Chinese restaurants and ordered manapua, only to have the waiter look flabbergasted. They call it char siu bao. Same thing with saimin.

Bryant Ching said he ordered saimin at the Chinese Tea Room in Corvallis, Ore., in 1963.

“There was deafening silence as the cooks looked at each other. I saw the bewilderment and I immediately asked for ‘won ton mein.’

“A few minutes later, I was given a plate of a few fried wontons on some fried noodles.

“Later, my aunt told me to order ‘wontons IN noodle soup.’ Needless to say, I didn’t order saimin or won ton mein until I got back to Hawaii again.”

JoAnne Yamamoto enjoyed the soup with lemon at a Nashville steakhouse until her friends told her it was a finger bowl.

BBQ meat

“This is my story on being a naive local boy,” James Nakasone wrote. “Back in 1959 when I was attending UC Berkeley, I was ono for BBQ meat (thin-sliced teriyaki beef).

“I walked into the market and asked the butcher for BBQ meat. The butcher looked at me and asked ‘what do you want to barbeque?’

“I said, ‘you know, BBQ meat.’ This went on for a couple more exchanges and in exasperation, he shook his head and walked away and left me dumbfounded.

“Little did I know at that time that barbeque was just a style of cooking and that any type of meat (beef, pork, lamb, chicken, etc.) could be barbequed. Later on, I realized how stupid I was then.”

Rice

George Butterfield said, “In 1961, I traveled to the mainland for the first time going to Lincoln, Neb., to start my freshman year at the University of Nebraska.

“Later in the fall, my dorm room neighbor took me home with him to a small town in northeast Nebraska, for a couple of days. Because I was from Hawaii, they had rice. It was my first encounter with Uncle Ben’s Rice and it looked a little strange.

“Everyone took a serving and then we all looked at each other: me at them, because they poured some milk and sprinkled sugar on the rice, and them at me because I didn’t.”

Kaukau

Willson Moore told me his wife Sally was invited to her roommate’s home in Chicago to visit her family. After enjoying a home-cooked meal, Sally complimented the hostess by saying it was wonderful “kaukau” (food).

“No, Sally” said the mother, “it is not ‘cow cow’ but ‘baa baa’ (lamb)!”

River?

“Once in Waikiki, many decades ago,” Ray Tabata wrote, “a tourist stopped me and asked — looking out from the beach — ‘What’s the name of this river?’

“I guess the person may have been from one of the states bordering the Mississippi River, which could look like an ocean.

“On another occasion, when flying from Hilo to Kona, a passenger next to me asked, ‘How long does it to take to fly to the island of Kona?’

“I told him we’re just flying to the other side of the SAME island. I guess he hadn’t looked at the map of the Big Island in the Aloha Airlines in-flight magazine.”

Igloos too?

“On a business trip to Fargo, N.D., a friend and I went to a cowboy saloon. We are both Japanese.

“We decided to sit at the bar. There was a guy next to me — a ‘townie’ or Fargo local. He sized the two of us up and finally asked, ‘What are you dudes, anyway?’

“To avoid the confusing entanglement of ‘Japanese … but from Hawaii … U.S. citizens, etc.,’ I just responded with, ‘We’re eskimos.’

“His response? ‘Uh huh. That’s what I figured. I KNEW you was eskimos.’”

Mahalo

Melvin Lang told me that, “I had arranged for a visiting Australian professor to stay for a few days at Hale Manoa dormitory at the UH East-West Center.

“When we met for lunch after his first night’s stay, he told me that he hadn’t yet met someone who apparently everyone was angry at.

“There was one sign in the bathroom, ‘Please shut the lights and water off after you’re finished, Mahalo.’

“There was another sign in the hallway, ‘Please keep this door closed to preserve the air-conditioning, Mahalo.’

“I noticed several other signs not only in the dorm and in the cafeteria also chastising this guy Mahalo.

“Who is this troublemaker, Mahalo, he asked?”

I knew the mainland misunderstood us, but in 2021 I learned it was a two-way street, and our side was more heavily traveled!

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Bob Sigall is the author of the five “Companies We Keep” books. Send him your comments and suggestions to Sigall@Yahoo.com.