Boot-boot.

Today I went with Cousin K to see Uncle Lou. "Uncle" is a term of respect for older men in Hawaii, so while Cousin K is my real cousin, Uncle Lou is not my uncle. Uncle Lou is a retired fisherman, a laid-back, loquacious Portagee with a white mustache and a twinkly smile. He used to fish with Cousin K's dad, my real uncle. I first met him a week ago, when he gave me a bottle of aloe vera spray for the sunburns he predicted I would get. I have been vigilant with sunblock and hats, so my burns have been minimal, but the gesture and the ironic charm with which it was given ("There, now don't say no one in Hawaii ever gave you anything") won my heart.

Cousin K has come to look at a lure Uncle Lou is making for him, but also to talk story. They have got past the initial negotiations, and now they are talking about me.

Ask her what her favorite fish is, says Cousin K.

Uncle Lou looks at me, his smile skeptical: What's your favorite fish?

Taape! I grin.

Taape?!

You hear that? Cousin K beams.

The taape is a fish that no local fisherman respects; it is an introduced species that crowds the native fishes, and most locals think its flavor is substandard. It's a pretty fish, though, and easy to catch, and there are plenty of them, and tourists don't care. So my cousins have made the taape the primary target of their bottom fishing business. This means their overall impact on the local fish population is positive. Makes sense to me, but most locals think they're crazy.

Well, that's all I've caught so far, I shrug. That and one triggerfish.

Triggerfish? says Uncle Lou. Everyone will know you're a haole if you call it a triggerfish.

Yeah, they'd never know otherwise, I mumble. The color of my skin gets comments from every fisherman I meet; it's like having a tattoo on my forehead that says NOPE, NOT FROM AROUND HERE. But I don't tan well, and there's enough skin cancer in my family tree that it's not worth the risk just to get slightly less pale.

Not a triggerfish, Uncle Lou continues. Locals call it a humu, or duk-duk, or boot-boot.

Duk-duk I've heard, but boot-boot? says Cousin K.

You pull him up out of the water, what does he say? Uncle Lou asks me. What does he say?

I pause to picture a triggerfish freshly dragged up from the ocean floor, spitting out white goo and gasping audibly... Boot-boot! I answer.

You see? says Uncle Lou. He and Cousin K begin an anecdote-filled debate on which kinds of triggerfish are good to eat, and I inspect the latest batch of lures. They are sparkly and smooth, a variety of shapes and iridescent colors, so pretty that even I want to put them in my mouth. Uncle Lou is a master luremaker, but since he closed his shop downtown he only makes them for friends. His garage workshop is filled with the sweetly chemical smell of heated plastic.

The discussion of triggerfish ends with much skeptical head-shaking on both sides, and we walk back to the truck. Just wait, I'm gonna bring you some fillets, says Cousin K.

Bye Uncle Lou, I say, waving.

Don't catch anymore triggerfish, he calls after me. Catch boot-boot.