The best part of 'Iolani Palace, the basement, is ready for company. That's where the most interesting things happened. Sure, Kalakaua held state dinners upstairs in the dining room. But what the guests ate got cooked downstairs in the kitchen where delivery carts unloaded the groceries.
Most pictures show the king in full dress uniform.
The basement is where he schlepped around in his laboratory inventing torpedoes, studying medicine and reading Scientific American. If you wanted an audience with him, you certainly wouldn't go to the throne room upstairs. You'd head for the basement, where the chamberlain had his office, running the kingdom. If you looked promising, he'd crank the telephone on the wall and call the king upstairs. I hardly recognized the basement on my recent visit.