Since we moved back to Kahala and have been walking to the beach before dawn, there’s something been nagging at me. I finally figured out that it’s banyan tree that you see in this photo.

Actually, it’s the sound of the mynah birds in the banyan, located next to the parking lot at Waialae Beach Park, where Kahala Avenue runs in past the Waialae Country Club, the Kahala apartments, and on to the hotel.

There’s a period before dawn, which I recall being repeated during evening twilight, when the mynah birds gather by the hundreds or thousands in a raucous wave of bird sounds. It’s loud, but I realize that I don’t find it objectionable in the least because similar sounds are embedded in my small-kid-time memories.

I was probably somewhere between five and ten years old when my father would walk my sister and I down the street to the Waialae Beach Park after dinner several times a week, then either walk for a while across the golf course as it got dark, or go over to the beach and walk past the dairy where the cows were milked.

And along the way, there were several trees where the rowdy birds would be gathering before settling down for the night. It’s the same sound we now hear in the mornings.

Today I walked over beneath the tree and recorded a bit of the experience with my iPhone.

Click here to listen to the mynahs as the sounded on Sunday morning. I’ll eventually have to try this again with a proper microphone, but this will do for now.

I hope you enjoy it.