(Photo: AP/Chris Stewart)
The standard driver's license in Hawaii has space for 35 characters for the driver's last name. It's not enough:
Janice "Lokelani" Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele is in the midst of a fight with state and local officials to ensure that her full name gets listed on a license or ID card. Her name is pronounced: KAY'-ee-hah-nah-EE'-coo-COW'-ah-KAH'-hee-HOO'-lee-heh-eh-KAH'-how-NAH-eh-leh.
The documents only have room for 35 characters. Her name has 35 letters plus a mark used in the Hawaiian alphabet, called an okina.
So Hawaii County instead issued her driver's license and her state ID with the last letter of her name chopped off. And it omitted her first name.
Ms. Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele is offended that her full name does not appear. But the Hawaiian government is working on a solution: by the end of the year, driver's license cards will have space for 40 characters.
That's not to say the state shouldn't find some solution, as she gives an example as-to why. But to be "offended"? Meh.
But this is a Hawaiian person in Hawaii, so I'm inclined to be supportive of her desire to use a name from the Hawaiian language.