September-October 2011

S eptemb er- Oc tob er 2011

The Life of the People Na Maka O Ka ‘āina: Broadcasting Hawai‘i’s Reality Canine Professioinals: They Go Where Man Cannot

The Life of the Land A Breadfruit Luncheon “Lefty” the Sea Turtle A Vegan Evolution “Bonsai” Banyans

The Beamer Family Talks Story

The Life as Art Herb Kawainui Kāne: Larger Than Life Kaha i

by Herb Kawainui Kāne

C ompl i mentar y C op y Worldwide Delivery: www.KeOlaMagazine.com

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 1

The Life in Music

Gallery

WHERE PEOPLE, ART AND NATURE MEET

L O CAT E D I N H AWA I ‘ I V O L CA N O E S N AT I O N A L PA R K

2 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

V O T E D B E S T G A L L E RY I N E A S T H AWA I ‘ I

Christmas Country

WHERE PEOPLE, ART AND NATURE MEET

VOLC ANO ART CENTER

in the

_ Ka ‘Anela by Dietrich Varez

November 18

5:30 pm - 8:00 pm VAC Members Appreciation Holiday Event with special musical guest Maggie Herron

November 19, 20, 26 & 27

9:00 am - 5:00 pm Christmas in the Country, two full weekends of Artist Demostrations, Print & Book Signings

November 19 - January 2

9:00 am - 5:00 pm Annual Invitational Wreath Exhibit Phone: (808) 967-7565

2 0 0 6 - 2ANO 009, 2011 VOLC ART CENTER

WHERE PEOPLE, ART AND NATURE MEET

Upcoming Events Patina Prayers, Contemporary Paintings by Christina Skaggs 9/17-9/18 Fall Art Market at Niaulani Campus _ 9/24-11/6 Embracing ‘Ohi‘a, a Group Exhibit of Pacific Island Printmakers 10/1-10/22 Faces of Hawaii, exhibit at Niaulani Campus 10/8 Cyril Pahinui at KMC Theater 11/26 Cazimero Brothers at KMC Theater 8/6 - 9/18

www.volcanoartcenter.org

Toll Free: (866) 967-7565

Lava Rock Realty, LLC

65-1298 B Kawaihae Road, Kamuela, HI 96743

(808) 887-2500 • Info@LavaRockRealty.com

www.LavaRockRealty.com

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 3

wp@lavarockrealty.com • waimeaparkside.com

Upcountry Waimea Sweet Wind Books & Beads Unique Gifts, Jewelry, Crystals, Incense, Meditation Supplies & Much more!

A peaceful place to shop - come in and relax!

4 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Located in Parker Square, 65-1279 Kawaihae Road, Waimea 808.885.0562 • Open 7 days a week

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"The Life"

S eptemb er- Oc tob er 2 0 1 1

Ladies ˜ Be Beyond Fit ...

Be Simply Fabulous!

WELCOME TO

THE NEW

The Life in Spirit: 11 Maluhia

Peace, where is it?

by Kumu Keala Ching

The Life of the People:

16 At Home with Mary Koski

Artist, World Traveler, Lover of Fairies

25 Na Maka O Ka ‘Āina

Broadcasting Hawai‘i’s Reality

39 Canine Professionals Dogs Perform and Go Where Man Cannot

• Fitness Center • • Nutrition Counseling • • Weight Loss • • Skin/Body Care • • Personal Training • • Shower • • Changing Rooms • O N LY

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PER MONTH Less than $1/day!

The Life of the Land: 36 Bonsai Banyans Telles Tames Wild Trees

43 The Story of “Lefty” A Sea Turtle Rescue

KONA'S ONLY 24/7 ACCESS FITNESS CENTER FOR

women

46 A Breadfruit Lunch with Chef Olelo pa‘a Love for the Land Inspires Joyful Cooking

49 A Vegan Evolution 40 Years Without Meat

327-4380 FitXpressHawaii.com Located in the Kaloko Light Industrial Area Mauka of Home Depot

The Life as Art:

19 Herb Kawainui Kāne Larger Than Life

Feature Hawaiian Cultural Motifs

The Life in Music: 57 Aloha Music Camp

Beamer ‘Ohana Awakening Hawaiian Spirit

Ka Puana --- The Refrain: 74 The Courage of Chiefess Manono

By Keola and Winona Beamer

Departments: Viewpoint: The Bounty of Breadfruit.........................................10 Then & Now: Ka‘ū Landings..........................................................13 Hawai‘i Island Farmers Markets...................................................52 Treasures Grown from our Island Home..................................54 Community Calendar......................................................................63 The Life in Business..........................................................................71

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 5

30 High-Tech Textiles

Kona’s Legendary Gathering Place Enjoy shopping, dining and helpful services in a truly legendary location.

Village Merchants

6 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Heritage Center Museum KTA Market Longs Drugs Jams World Boutique Paradise Found Boutique Clint Sloan Galleries Kona Stories Bookstore Pele's Hokulele Gallery & Gifts In The Tropics - Jewelry of the Pacific Bianelli's Pizza & Pasta Kenichi Pacific Restaurant L&L Hawaiian BBQ Los Habaneros Restaurant Moo Bettah Frozen Fun Peaberry & Galette Coffee & Crepes Royal Thai Cafe Subway Regal Keauhou Stadium 7 Cinemas Nail Tech Clark Realty Corporation MacArthur & Company, Sotheby's International Realty

Oceanside 1250 Hokul'ia Shell Vacations U.S. Post Office Aloha Petroleum Bank of Hawaii Finance Factors Merrill Lynch Liberty Dialysis Keauhou Medical Clinic Keauhou Urgent Care Center Kokonutz Sports Bar & Grill Sea Paradise Charter, Sailing & Snorkel Tours Sam Choy’s - Kai Lanai (COMING SOON!)

Please visit our website for more details on Activities, Malama Discount Card, Cultural Events and Concerts

www.keauhoushoppingcenter.com

Weekly Cultural Events THURSDAYS 10am - 12pm • Kupuna Craft FRIDAYS 6-7pm •Hula Show SATURDAYS 8am - Noon Farmers Market

Last Saturday of Every Month Hui Kako'o Benefit Concert Series in aid of the Hawaii Foodbank.

Keauhou Shopping Center 78-6831 Ali'i Drive Kailua-Kona, HI 96740

"The Life" Celebrating the ar ts, culture and sustainability of Hawai‘i Island

UA MAU KE EA O KA ‘AINA I KA PONO.

The life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness. [Its sustainability depends on doing what is right.] Proclamation by Kona-born King Kamehameha III in 1843. Later adopted as the state motto.

Publishers

Barbara Garcia Bowman • Karen Valentine

Editor & Art Director: Karen Valentine, 808.329.1711 x2 Marketing & Operations:

Barbara Garcia Bowman Barb@KeOlaMagazine.com • 808.329.1711 x1

Advertising Sales & Business Development North: Terri Amara, 808-343-3046 • terri@keolamagazine.com West: Barbara Garcia, 808-329-1711 x1 • barb@keolamagazine.com East: Adrienne Poremba, 808.935-7210 • KeOlaAds@yahoo.com South: Mars Cavers, 808.938.9760 • starmars@mac.com South: Sheryl Hyatt, 808-557-6213 • sheryl@keolamagazine.com

Distribution & Subscriptions Sharon Bowling, 808.557-8703 • subscribe@keolamagazine.com

Creative Design

Michael Mark P., Creative Director, Mana Brand Marketing ManaBrandMarketing.com • 808.345.0734

Advertising Design

Tahiti Huetter – www.tahitihuetter.com Karen Fuller – fullerdesignz@gmail.com Stephanie Schreiber – 808.315.7182

Copy Editing/Proofing

Sharon Bowling • Marya Mann • Adrienne Poremba

Production Manager: Richard Price Ambassadors

Contributing Writers

Keala Ching • Devany Vickery-Davidson • Fern Gavelek Pete Hendricks • Margaret Kearns • Denise Laitinen • Marya Mann Cynthia Sweeney • Catherine Tarleton KE OLA is printed on recycled paper with soy-based inks.

KE OLA is recognized by the Kona-Kohala Chamber of Commerce as a Kuleana Green Business.

Community Magazine Network member Editorial inquiries & calendar submissions: Submit online at www.KeOlaMagazine.com (go to Contact page) Worldwide Delivery: Call 808.329.1711 x3, order online at www.KeOlaMagazine.com or mail name, address and payment of $24 US/$42 Canada/ $48 International for one year to: P.O. Box 1494, Kailua-Kona, HI 96745. © 2011, Hawaii Island Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved

www.KeOlaMagazine.com

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 7

Eric Bowman • Keala Ching • Ursula D’Angelo WavenDean Fernandes • Fern Gavelek Dan Lappala • Deborah Ozaki • Greg Shirley

Publishers Talk Story...

Thy sea is so great...

T

wo years ago, a friend in Honolulu called and asked, “How would you like to go out on the Hokule‘a? They’re looking to recruit new crew members for a round-the-world voyage.”

“Right,” I thought. “Me?” But I jumped at the chance. Our host was Kimo Hugo, Herb Kāne’s first mate on the famous canoe’s initial shakedown voyages. I didn’t know who he was at the time, but today that experience is burned in my memory. It was an incredible honor just to step aboard that icon of the revival of Pacific voyaging and education. Participating in sail handling and examining the intricate lashings, I could sense the mana of seamen and women who’ve crossed the ocean in recent years on that very small boat, even Eddie Aikau.

“Oh God, thy sea is so great and my boat is so small…”

8 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | JULY/AUGUST 2011

– from an Irish Fisherman’s Prayer

A Herb Kāne painting graces this issue’s cover of Ke Ola magazine. This placement posed another challenge for us: how do you tell this iconic artist’s story in a way that would honor and express the impact he has had on our Hawai‘i? Our magazine is so small… like the boat… but the honor is truly ours. See “Herb Kawainui Kāne, Larger Than Life” (page 19).

Many of you have a story about Herb, who passed away earlier this year. We invite you to share your own Herb Kāne stories on our website, in the comment section following Herb’s story.

Also in this issue, you’ll find abundant praises for the humble and somewhat-lumpy breadfruit. If you tasted it once and didn’t like it, or if you’re a breadfruit novice like most of us, do give it a chance. Pacific voyagers like Kaha‘i on our cover and later on, Captain Bligh, sought to take it home and feed the world.

Ke Ola magazine, too, is sailing around the world. On a daily basis we hear how much our readers love Ke Ola and how you often mail copies to your friends and family all over the world.

We love that Ke Ola is traveling all over the world! What we would love even more is if you pick up one copy for yourself, and also order gift subscriptions for your friends and family.

(The holidays are coming.) Order on our website, call or mail (see page 7 for details). The nominal subscription fee just covers postage and handling, so the magazines are actually still complimentary. Your friends and family will thank you each time it comes in the mail.

We offer 22,000 copies for free on this island. Sending subscriptions to off-island folks helps us to gather accurate statistics so our advertisers know where their ads in Ke Ola are going!

This is your community magazine and, in the spirit of community, let’s all continue to support each other’s success. With your help, we can continue to bring more great stories about the arts, culture and sustainability of Hawai‘i Island!

Karen Valentine and Barbara Garcia

From Readers... ✿ Your Glorious Mag! Aloha! I am just writing to tell you all....and I know there’s quite a crew responsible... that I absolutely LOVE your magazine. I have read and subscibed to several mags. NONE of them come close to the high quality of everything in your monthly magazine. The level of Aloha and spirit, as well as the high level of craftsmanship is evident in each issue. Amazing.

There are mags here on O‘ahu. They just don’t come even up to # 1 on a one to ten. And you hold the #10 spot. Wow.I’ll go online and sign up for a subscription.

And if there’s that much Mana and Aloha there, I may have to move to the Big Island.

– Robert Wood, O‘ahu Home Inspector (private) ✿ Dear Editor: I am honored and grateful to have my artwork included in the article “Ocean Trash Art”

by Devany Vickery-Davidson.

My name is Aurora Robson and I am the artist who was on residency creating the piece out of plastic debris collected by the Hawai‘i Wildlife Fund on the southern shores of the Big Island. Anyway, there is a error in the article - it says that I used a heat gun to create the piece, but I didn’t. This is important because of the potential of toxins being released by the plastic if heated. One of the biggest problems with plastic in the oceans is that it acts as an aggregate (toxins accumulate in it). So, I would never melt it or heat it to create a piece -- especially with students helping, I certainly wouldn’t want to endanger their health! The piece was created using no hardware or adhesives and in a totally environmentally sensitive way.

Send us your comments, letters and photos! We take email, snail mail, submissions through our website or posts on Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter!

Editor@keolamagazine.com

The sculpture is for sale, and proceeds from the sale of the piece will go to help clean up our oceans and shorelines and raise awareness about plastic pollution. It also might be good to mention that the Sculpt the Future Foundation also helped support my creating this piece.

Thank you and Devany again for sharing this story!

Mahalo & Aloha, Aurora Robson [From the editor: Author Devany Vickery-Davidson noted the heatgun in one of the photos taken at the work site. However, she didn’t actually see it in use.

Ke Ola regrets the mistake and we are happy to pass on this information to our readers.] ✿ Dear Editor: As an animal lover I couldn’t help but immerse myself in the recent article, “Saving the Kona Nightingale.” This article inspired me! As a small business owner who creates handbags from Hawaiian coffee sacks, I appreciate the Hawaiian donkey and its significance in the history of Kona coffee. One of the coffee sacks used in my handbag collection is from Kona Pacific Farmers Co-op and it features a Kona Nightingale. I created the ’Save the Kona Nightingale’ tote to help raise money and awareness regarding efforts being made to protect and preserve these donkeys. A portion of the proceeds benefits the “Humane Society of the U.S. Waikoloa Donkey Project.” Mahalo Ke Ola magazine for spreading the word about our island issues and allowing us as a community to offer a helping hand!

– Tanya Mariano Kearns Owner/Designer, Manila Extract www.ManilaExtract.etsy.com

Follow us:

September/October 2011 S eptemb er- Oc tob er 2011 KE OLA

The Life of the People Na Maka O Ka ‘āina: Broadcasting Hawai‘i’s Reality Canine Professioinals: They Go Where Man Cannot

The Life of the Land A Breadfruit Luncheon “Lefty” the Sea Turtle A Vegan Evolution “Bonsai” Banyans

The Life in Music The Beamer Family Talks Story

The Life as Art www.KeOlaMagazine.com

Herb Kawainui Kāne: Larger Than Life Kahai

by Herb Kawainui Kāne

C O M P L I M E N TA R Y C O P Y Worldwide Delivery: www.KeOlaMagazine.com

On the Cover:

Kaha‘i, painting by Herb Kawainui Kāne.

More paintings at www.HerbKaneStudio.com

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SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 9

A Hawaiian legend tells of the chief Kaha’i who brought breadfruit saplings from Tahiti long ago, sailing not less than 2,800 miles each way.

Known as ‘ulu, or uru in Polynesia, the breadfruit tree (Moraceae) originated in Asia and was brought to the Pacific islands of Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia by the early sailing canoes.

It was said that Kaha’i planted his breadtruit at Pu’uloa on the southern coast of O‘ahu in the ‘ Ewa district.

There is another myth that explains the origin of breadfruit as the gift of the Hawaiian god Kū, who, to save his children from starvation in a time of famine, buried himself alive in the earth near his house. From his head sprang the tree bearing as fruit the “staff of life,” shaped like a man’s head. In further imagery, Kū is said to have told his wife: “My body will be the trunk and branches.

My hands will be the leaves ... the heart inside the fruit will be my tongue. Roast the fruit, soak it, beat off the skin, and eat some and feed our children.” A version of this myth is localized at Ka’awaloa in Kona, on the South Kona coast of the island of Hawai‘i.

WE MAKE MOVING

The Bounty of Breadfruit

By Andrea Dean, Craig Elevitch, and Dr. Diane Ragone

10 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

B

readfruit—‘ulu—was one of the “canoe plants” brought to fruit is high in carbohydrates and Hawai‘i in Polynesian voyaging canoes. This beautiful tree once a good source of dietary fiber, calplayed a major role in the spiritual and cultural life of Hawaiians cium, copper, iron, magnesium, potassium, thiamine, and niacin. and was a key food staple and source of wood, craft materials and Some breadfruit varieties are also good sources of anti-oxidants medicine. ‘Ulu is easily grown in many of our environments. and carotenoids. Prepared and eaten at all stages of development, Hawaiians had large field systems that integrated ‘ulu with crops it can be roasted, baked, boiled, fried, pickled, fermented, frozen, such as kalo (taro), ‘uala (sweet potato), mai‘a (banana), kō (sugarand dried and ground into flour or starch. cane) and others.

Hawaiian mythology around ‘ulu teaches us many lessons about For hundreds of years before Western contact, traditional love, life and survival. One of the more commonly known stoHawaiian breadfruit groves were capable of providing the food ries that informs the Hawaiian world view is about how the god value to sustain tens of thousands of people. As an example of Kū transformed himself into the ‘ulu tree to save his family (and the extent of the plantings, a “breadfruit belt” in ultimately the islands) from starvation. How would mauka Kona called kalu ‘ulu was one-half-mile our modern experience of life in Hawai‘i be wide and 18 miles long and is estimated to have changed if the landscape once again was filled I ke alo no ka ‘ulu a hala: produced as much as 36,000 tons of ‘ulu fruit by the beauty and bounty of breadfruit?

“The breadfruit was just in per year. Other important ‘ulu groves on Hawai‘i front, and it was missed.”

Island were located in North Kohala, Hilo, Ka‘ū, On Saturday, September 24, from 9 a.m.–3 (That which you are seeking and Puna. p.m., the Ho‘oulu ka ‘Ulu project is presenting may be found right Today, Hawai‘i imports 85 percent of its food the Breadfruit Festival at the Amy B.H. Greenbefore you.) from outside the state. Can breadfruit once well Ethnobotanical Garden in South Kona. The From ‘Ōlelo No‘eau: Hawaiian again become a major source of delicious and Breadfruit Festival will feature Hawaiian and Proverbs and Poetical Sayings nutritious staple food in Hawai‘i and replace a Pacific Islander cultural activities including talks – by Mary Kawena Pukui substantial portion of the food that we import? on the culture and history of breadfruit, ‘Ōlelo The Breadfruit Institute of the National TropiNo‘eau, woodworking, quilting demonstrations, cal Botanical Garden has assembled the world’s tapa making, ‘ulu poi making, ‘Ulumaika, and largest collection of breadfruit—more than 120 much more. varieties—located at Kahanu Garden in Hana, Maui, and carries The festival also offers numerous ways to prepare and enjoy a large knowledge base on their website. The Breadfruit Instibreadfruit. The public can enter a cooking contest and two guest tute proposes that breadfruit could be a major solution to world chefs will be demonstrating how to make various delicious breadhunger for the more than 80 percent of the world’s under-nourfruit dishes—Chef Olelo pa‘a Ogawa of Glow Hawai‘i and Scott ished who live in tropical and subtropical regions. The Breadfruit Lutey, executive chef of the Eddie Aikau Restaurant and Museum.

Institute’s Hunger Initiative is currently working on pilot projects Chef Betty Saiki and the students from the West Hawai‘i Culinary in Honduras, Jamaica, Haiti, and Africa.

Arts School will be preparing breadfruit delicacies and other loLast year the Hawai‘i Homegrown Food Network partnered cally grown food for sale. with the Breadfruit Institute to create the Ho‘oulu ka ‘Ulu (Sprout Recipes will be made available to the public. ‘Ulu trees will be the Breadfruit) project to revitalize breadfruit for food security in available for purchase. The event is free and open to the public.

Hawai‘i. Despite Hawai‘i’s long history with ‘ulu, most people think Find more information about the Breadfruit Festival and the that it is of little importance. Lack of knowledge about when and Ho‘oulu ka ‘Ulu project at www.breadfruit.info and learn about the how to harvest, and delicious ways to prepare breadfruit, hinders Breadfruit Institute (and find lots of recipes) at www.breadfruit.org the widespread use of this highly nutritious, abundant, affordable and, culturally appropriate food source. Breadfruit has progres–Photos by Craig Elevitch sively diminished as a food and material resource over the past Andrea Dean and Craig Elevitch of Hawai‘i Homegrown Food 200 years, and the time is right to revitalize the abundant ‘ulu as Network and Dr. Diane Ragone of the Breadfruit Institute are the we consider solutions to our dependence on imported food.

Co-Directors of the Ho‘oulu ka ‘Ulu project. Ho‘oulu ka ‘Ulu is a project Breadfruit can easily be prepared in a variety of ways compatto revitalize ‘ulu as an attractive, delicious, nutritious, abundant, ible with both traditional and modern tastes. Nutritionally, breadaffordable, and culturally appropriate food that addresses Hawai‘i’s food security issues.

Photo by Eric Bowman

The Life IN SPIRIT

M

An arched rainbow A pathway of the Higher Spirit Peace resonates within In the face of the Heavens Beauty upon my eyes A reflection of a mountain Indeed a majestic mountain Appearing before me Here I am Peaceful one An unconditional relationship Found deep within the forest I am here In the face of the Higher Spirit Here I am Peaceful one

aluhia, ma hea ia? Ua ho’oulu ‘ia ka pi’o o ke ānuenue, he ala o ke Akua. Nānā wale maila ka u’i o ke Akua a kau a’ela ka maluhia o loko nei. Aia ka maluhia i laila! Noho ihola ka nani o ku’u ‘ike i mua ho’i o ka mauna kū kilakila o ka lani. Aia ka maluhia i laila! I ka nahelehele ia, pili maila ke ola o ka waolani i ka noho pili wale ‘ana me ke Akua. Aia ka maluhia i laila! Eia maila ē, ka Maluhia ē. Huli ‘ole ka maluhia i waho o ke ola, aia ka maluhia i loko laila. E ho’oulu ia!

Aia e ka uka mauna o Wakea Wakea o ka lani, kau mai i luna I luna o ke ao, wahi maluhia ‘Ilihia ke aloha, kau i ka poli Lipolipo ka ‘i’ini e ku’u ola E ola mau loa no nā kau a kau E ola mau loa no nā kau a kau

High above the temple of Wakea Majestically is Wakea on high Peaceful indeed above the clouds A reverent unity within the heart My life is my deep wishes Longevity forever Longevity forever

aluhia, aia i uka o Mauna Kea! I ka nani o ka maluhia, pili maila me ke Akua i luna o ke ao. ‘Ilihia a’ela ke aloha mai loko mai o ka ‘i’ini o ke ola o’u a e ola mau loa no nā kau a kau!

E ho’oulu ia!

Peace, where is it? Inspired indeed by the arched rainbow, the path of the Higher Spirit. The splendor of the Higher Spirit is seen as the peace resonates from within. Peace is there! Indeed beauty to my eyes presented upon the majestic mountain radiantly within the heavens. Peace is there! Upon the depths of the forest an unconditional relationship is endured with the Higher Spirit.

Peace is there! Rejoice, the peaceful one! Seek never the peace outside of your life, peace is found within. Inspire!

M

Peace is found upon Mauna Kea! A peaceful beauty is indeed the unconditional love of the Higher Spirit high above the clouds.

A reverent unity found deep within one’s life, longevity forever.

Inspire!

The inspiration of Maluhia and He Aloha o Mauna Kea speaks to the turmoil of our daily lives, as we seek a genuine peaceful moment to inspire the longevity of our lives. Longevity comes with the removal of barriers, the ability to unite a common perspective, the forgiveness of one’s faults and failure, the inspiration of an unconditional unity, the recognition of peace found within and the acknowledgement of one’s gift and living it. Recognize that the Higher Spirit is within every image—you! Inspire a generation, we must!

Contact Kumu Keala Ching at kumukeala@nawaiiwiola.org

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 11

Pi’o mai ke ānuenue I ke ala o ke Akua Noho maila ka maluhia I ke alo o ka lani Nani ku’u ‘ike I ka malu o ka mauna Manua kū kilakila I mua o ke alo Eia maila ē Ka Maluhia ē Pili maila ke aloha I ka nāhelehele Noho iho au I ke alo o ke Akua Eia maila ē Ka Maluhia ē

12 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

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View looking northeast along the Ka‘u coastline, overlooking Honuapo Landing, both today and in earlier days –Color photo by Karen Valentine; Historic photo courtesy Lyman Museum

auna Loa Volcano had almost taken its present form when the first Polynesians began to fish, live, and farm in the Ka’ū District. The Ninole Volcanic Hills, seen above Punalu‘u, date from eruptions long before Mauna Loa and may be some of the oldest blocks in the ancient fault system.

The two primeval volcanoes began forming the island of Hawai‘i as it rose from the deep sea floor about a million years ago, breaking the ocean surface 500,000 years ago. The first recorded people came to the flanks of the slightly older volcanic mass, Ninole, and by the time Polynesian voyagers arrived, Hawai‘i Island was composed of five volcanoes. The next island, Lō‘ihi, was already growing in the deep ocean over a hotspot a few miles to the southeast, and will some day be the youngest island in the Hawaiian chain.

The new residents found a wild, primal land along the seacoast stretching toward Ka Lae (South Point), with almost constant, robust wind sweeping across the southernmost tip of all the islands.

The prevailing northeast winds still blow there and continue up the leeward coast as far as Kauna Point, over 15 miles toward Kailua-Kona.

The district of Ka’ū is physically larger than the island of O‘ahu.

The present Hawai‘i County Council District stretches from Kupapau Point at Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park all the way around to Kealakekua Bay. But the heart of Ka‘ū fronts the southeast coast.

Long before Hawaiians organized into ahupua’a and other island divisions, before a united Hawaiian Kingdom, the first Polynesians arrived. Bringing their culture, knowledge and basic materials for survival, the voyagers immediately began fishing and farming.

Only after the mid-1900s has technology allowed us to recreate

Meeting the steamship at Honuapo, 1912 – Photo courtesy of Hawai‘i State Archives a chronology for the earliest settlers. Until the 1950s, Hawaiian archeology was composed of surveys of stone structures and localized collections found on the surface. The discovery of radioactive carbon dating of charcoal was a new key to early sites. Analysis of early Hawaiian camps, homes, and fireplaces, including Pu‘u Ali’i, at Ka Lae, indicated Polynesians had arrived and lived there for many generations, perhaps back as early as 300 AD. In the 1780s, Keoua Ku’ahu’ula, ruler of the district of Ka‘ū, was the chief rival of Kamehameha I for control of the island of Hawai‘i.

That rivalry, which ended with Keoua’s death, could have gone either way, but history knows Kamehameha as the eventual ruler of all the islands.

Along the entire shoreline of Ka‘ū, there are settlements which go far back in time, especially Punalu’u, with its abundant water

❁Continued on page 14

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M

❁Continued from page 13

Ka‘u Landings

flowing seaward from Ninole Gulch. The Ka‘ū district is isolated from other districts by lava flows, prevailing winds, and the Mauna Loa massif. It is a “downhill” sail by sea (with the wind at your back) westward along the coast from Cape Kumukahi to La Lae, but usually a struggle under sail or power into the northeast “tradewind” back toward Hilo. Hawaiian coastal mariners paddled and sailed regularly along the coast for centuries, traveling and fishing in Ka‘ū communities that were somewhat isolated by distance and climate from the outside into the mid-1800s.

Reverend William Ellis, in his circuit around the island in 1823, estimated Ka‘ū’s population at 5-6,000. A government survey in 1853 put the population at 2,210, a 50 percent drop in 30 years, with diseases taking their toll as they did elsewhere in Hawai‘i.

After the Great Mahele land division of 1843, more foreigners acquired land and began western agricultural businesses. In 1860, ranching gained momentum in Ka‘ū, with the start of Kapapala Ranch, and in 1866 with Kahuku Ranch, managed by a former whaling captain named Robert Brown. The vast grazing lands of Ka‘ū district seemed ideal for the cattle business.

Then, all of a sudden, all of Ka‘ū and the entire island began to shake in March of 1868 with a swarm of massive earthquakes that also caused a tsunami. At the same time, both Mauna Loa and Kīlauea were erupting!

At about 4 p.m. on April 2, Mrs. Sara Joiner Lyman noted in her diary, written in Hilo, 40 miles away from the worst shaking, “There was such an awful rocking and heaving of the earth as we never felt before…. At one moment the surface of the earth seemed to move like the surface of the ocean and the large trees to sway hither and thither like ships’ masts in a storm…. The shocks were considerably more severe here than they were at the crater of Kīlauea 30 miles from here, but less severe than they were in Ka‘ū from Kapapala to Kahuku.”

After the huge earthquake, Captain Brown’s Kahuku Ranch home was covered with lava from a southwest rift outbreak of Mauna Loa. About 250 head of cattle were consumed by the lava.

Holualoa Village 14 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

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Ka’alu’alu Bay –John Coney Photo

Contact writer Pete Hendricks at oldsaltp@yahoo.com.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 15

To Ka‘ū residents, those days of continuous strong tremors must have been unnerving.

The 1868 earthquake damage was severe, but the related, locally generated tsunami rose up to 50 feet along the shoreline, drowning many and destroying numerous Ka‘ū shoreline villages and residences.

Many Hawaiian coastal settlements in Ka‘ū just disappeared.

Perhaps even greater change came with the pressure to move people and goods in the new market economy. People regrouped and rebuilt. Along the Ka‘ū coast, four bays were the shipping points for the vast district: Keauhou, Punalu’u, Honuapo and Ka’alu’alu [see map]. All of the bays had been used by earlier Hawaiians, but now more schooners and steamships began to call.

Keauhou Bay (not the one in Kona) to windward, being the nearest to Kīlauea volcano, began to host a few hardy tourists willing to make the arduous trek up the mountain to Kīlauea.

The first loss of a western ship in Ka‘ū occurred at Keauhou in 1846, when the schooner Clarion went ashore. Captain Pali and crew were saved, but the cargo was lost. Clarion was likely engaged in the pulu trade—pulu being the soft wool at the base of the hapu’u (tree fern) frond stalk. For a time, pulu was the preferred mattress and pillow stuffing. Up to 50 people were later employed in the pulu operation, harvesting in the volcano forest, and bringing the bales of stuffing by mule down the long trail to Keauhou landing.

Tourist numbers increased with the expansion of Volcano House in 1877. The first Volcano House, now the Volcano Art Center, was hauled piece by piece up the old pulu trail by wagon from Keauhou landing. Later, tourists would take the railroad from Honuapo to Pahala, and complete the Volcano journey by stagecoach.

The southernmost of the four Ka‘ū landings, Ka’alu’alu Bay was used for a time for goods and cattle shipments, and was closest to Wai’ohinu, seven miles upland, formerly the main village of Ka‘ū.

As sugar production grew in Ka‘ū, Ka’alu’alu was little used commercially except for cattle shipments.

Punalu’u, and later Honuapo, became the principal landings with the growth of the Ka‘ū sugar industry. The first sugar plantation, Na’alehu Sugar Company, was established by Alexander Hutchinson and John Costa in 1878. By the 1880s, there were four plantations with mills in Ka‘ū, and a number of other sugar growers.

No place in the entire district of Ka‘ū has had a wharf to accommodate vessels larger than lighters or large whaleboats. Even at Punalu’u and Honuapo, both improved by wharfs, ships had to anchor or tie up to moorings, while cargo and passengers made the often dangerous transition from ship to shore in rowed whaleboats, later motorized.

In early sugar days, workers had three- or five-year contracts, and were under bondage to the plantations. The local sheriff would track down “deserters” for return to the plantations. The return of two workers to Honuapo resulted in a local tragedy.

Alexander Hutchinson, a pioneer in Ka‘ū sugar, met a steamer off Honuapo landing in 1879 to take custody of two field workers who had deserted. On the way back to shore, the large rowboat carrying everyone capsized and Hutchinson hit his head on the reef, dying a few days later.

The schooner Fanny also met her end on March 2, 1878, at Punalu’u. Fanny, 49 tons, had spent years as a pilot boat at the port of San Francisco, and had been in the Hawaiian coasting trade a short time. Again the sea took its toll, as the little schooner, under an acting captain, apparently anchored too far to leeward in the bay, she was not able to claw away to windward from the reef upon departure.

The precarious business of sending sugar and cattle from Honuapo continued until 1942, when the port was shut down permanently due to World War II concerns. Better roads allowed cargo to be trucked to Hilo for outward shipment. Ka‘ū Agribusiness Company, the last sugar operation on Hawai‘i Island, continued operations until 1996.

The Ka‘ū coast and ocean today continues to be a wild, beautiful, primal place—the longest stretch of undeveloped coastline in the state of Hawai‘i. Fishermen still harvest the rich, nearshore waters and offshore ocean, but going to sea in Ka‘ū—site of the first Hawaiians’ landings—is only for the experienced mariner. ❖

OF THE PEOPLE

The Life 16 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Mary Koski in her living room –Photo by Catherine Tarleton

I

n the Waimea home of artist Mary Koski live flowers in windowsills, in bottles and pots on cupboards and table tops. There are two overstuffed puffy cats in the chairs, and smiling children framed on every wall. And fairies, flickering just outside the corner of your eye. We have tea on a tray—cups and saucers, tinkling spoons, little cookies. How better to call the fairies? They twitter around my head with memories of my grandmother, and that first cup of tea long ago, rich with milk and sugar. Certainly Mimi’s house had fairies too. But that’s not this story.

Mary and her next-door neighbor, who also happens to be her famous artist daughter Kathy Long, sit with me just off the bright kitchen, where light twinkles in and plays among the flowers, tea and spoons. These two women have obviously spent their lives as each other’s biggest fan; they finish each other’s sentences; they stir and sip and smile together.

“I never wanted to be a nurse, a teacher, or any of the other things other little girls wanted to be,” said Mary. “I just knew I was going to be an artist.” Born in San Diego, she demonstrated exceptional talents in music, dance and art from a very young age.

“Mom started out in dance,” said Kathy. “She was a ballerina; she danced on point at 7 years old. And she played violin with Santa Barbara Orchestra.” Art was the bliss Mary chose to follow.

She began as an art major at the University of California at Santa Barbara, but only attended two years. “I was going with a boy that my parents didn’t want me to marry,” said Mary. “So I said, ‘Well, if I have to move, I want to go to Mexico City.’ I just knew that they wouldn’t let me do that.”

The Dream Tree

Her parents surprised her, however, and it wasn’t long after she arrived at Mexico City College that she met Oiva Koski, who was working at the Finnish Embassy. He had been with the Finnish Embassy in Berlin during World War II, when he got the idea to buy a boat and sail from Norway to Mexico. Someone sank it, and he lost everything, but without it, and a spirit of adventure, he would not have met Mary.

“We were at the bus stop,” said Mary, “And it was Christmas time so the busses were very crowded and there were only two seats available. We talked. He spoke a sort of ‘Finnglish,’ but he was a sweet young man with extraordinary IQ.” For Mary and the tall, blonde, blue-eyed Finn, it was love at first sight, and for the next 60 years, theirs was a romantic adventure played out around the world. “We had a lovely marriage,” said Mary. “We had more fun than anybody… he just had itchy feet.”

After a couple of years in Mexico, and the birth of their first child, Oiva decided to move the family to Brownsville, Texas, where his parents lived. From there, his itchy feet took them to California, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and across the Atlantic Ocean. In Europe, Mary enjoyed painting in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Scandinavia. “I loved living in Liechtenstein,” said Mary. “We were on a mountainside… just above the cloud level. And some mornings, it was like somebody poured a bucket of gold down the mountains.”

Mary would work, painting portraits, miniatures, still life and landscapes, wherever they were in the world, now as a mom of two boys and a girl. “I would be dispensing juice with one hand

“Sweet Aloha” – cover illustration for Koski’s book, “Tiny Treasures,” focusing on the islands’ tiny treasures—its children—in enchanting portraits accompanied by lyrical poetry and paint with the other,” she said. “I met the nicest people doing portraits. You spend a little time with people, you’re with them several days or several weeks and you form a relationship.”

“We moved 36 times before we bought this house in Waimea,” said daughter Kathy, “And we always went to fascinating places...

As kids, we were used to it. I loved my childhood. We had a good time; we were a good family together, a very creative household.”

In 1983, Mary and Oiva, Mary’s mother Bertha Irby (a distant relative of Lady Godiva, according to Kathy’s research), Kathy and

her husband Bertil Long and their daughter Megan, moved to the Big Island. At the age of 78, Oiva created a comfortable family compound with a shared garden yard that is inviting to all, including fairies.

Perhaps as a result, Mary is the author of four books about fairies, including three volumes of the popular “Stowaway Fairy” series, and “Fairies in My Hat.” For over a decade, Island Heritage published her “Children of Hawai‘i” calendars, which have become collector’s items. She also created a little book of paintings and poetry called “Tiny Treasures” and illustrated the “Little Princess Kai‘ulani and Her Garden by the Sea” by Ellie Crowe.

Many of her paintings grace the corridors of Kapi‘olani Hospital for Women and Children.

Amazon.com describes her work as “a celebration of Hawai‘i’s children, set against their tropical island home and depicted in luminous paintings…Koski EnchantedBaby reveals a delight and

❁Continued on page 18

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 17

Her work is also available at Gallery of Great Things in Waimea, Lavender Moon in Kainaliu, Dreams of Paradise in Hilo and other galleries.

Children’s books by Mary Koski include: The Stowaway Fairy in Hawai‘i, The Stowaway Fairy’s Volcano Adventure, The Stowaway Fairy Goes to Japan, and Fairies in My Hat. All are available at local booksellers and Amazon.com.

Contact writer Catherine Tarleton at catherinetarleton@gmail.com.

Dear Diary

❁Continued from page 17 fascination with the subtleties of the human face and the challenging interplay of light and shadow. Working in the classical style of Flemish masters like Vermeer and Rembrandt, Koski creates light and life that seem to glow from within the painting.”

Of herself, Mary says, “For years I painted still-life, beautiful objects, and portraits of dignified business men and lovely ladies. I didn’t really mean to become a painter of fairies and children, but they captured me with their innocence and charm, their delight in life and, of course, their incredible beauty.

“Ultimately, I really didn’t have much choice.” ❖

18 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Mary’s art is available for purchase at www.MaryKoskiArt.com.

Please inquire using the contact form.

“I am in love with light.

Sunlight, starlight, moonlight and that pearly silver light that comes from rain and mist.

Lamplight, candlelight and firelight.

The reflected light from glowing skin, the bright spot of light reflected from a flashing eye.

I am in love with shadows.

Warm shadows, cool shadows, luminous speaking shadows, shadows that hold mysteries and secrets, shadows that are merely a soft whisper.

I only paint light and shadows, the forms they hold within come by themselves.”

– Mary Koski

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paintbrush and founder of a society of ocean navigators.

Herb set his own course, beginning with the single choice to become an artist, sometimes contrary to the advice of others, including his father and art-world trends, which he defied with characteristic determination. In so doing he became a peerless and popular success. But that’s not the end of the story.

Born in 1928 and raised in Hilo and Waipi‘o Valley, Herb moved to Chicago to study art, to Honolulu when his spirit called him back to Hawai‘i, and back home to Hawai‘i Island’s Kealakekua before he made his final passage on March 8, 2011.

❁Continued on page 20

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S

etting sail in the weather and sea conditions of home port, we begin our journeys in life. As we stretch out across the vast seas of experience, our course is adjusted with input from sources that reveal themselves along the way: changing winds, inspirations, desires and even messages from the spirit world, voices of the ancestors.

Such was the course of Herb Kawainui Kāne, a Hawaiian hapa haole, mainland-educated, larger-than-life icon—cultural interpreter, reflector of beauty, visual storyteller, re-creator of ancient life scenes, initiator of a cultural renaissance, wielder of a magic

AS ART

A canoe navigator of ancient Hawai’i, aboard a sailing canoe at sunset, the stars of the northern constellation of the Big Dipper in the darkening sky. He wears a pendant of polished pearl shell, a metaphor for “star” because of its luster.

Suspended by a necklace of finely braided hair of ancestors, it is treasured for its mana. Over an underwrap of tapa he wears a fine mat, fastened around his waist with braided sennit (coconut fiber). As protection against the chill of the coming night he may need the waterproofed wrap, the dyed tapa now slung over his shoulder. His tattoos— waves, birds, and star—symbolize his wisdom in using the way-finding keys of the navigator—tools for reading dominant wave patterns, the flight paths of migrating birds, and positions of the stars.

The secondary element in the design is a voyaging canoe under sail. A third element is a ki’i aumakua (ancestral spirit image) holding another pearl shell, symbolizing the navigator holding fast to his guiding star. The images of aumakua were not portraits, but physical resting places for benevolent ancestral spirits whose invisible presence and helpful power could be invoked by chants and solicited by acts of respect.

The Life

The Navigator

“Plaiter of Mats” demonstrates the art of lauhala weaving in native Hawaiian life. Each step is shown in this painting.

20 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

❁Continued from page 19 Along the way, Herb Kāne amassed a prolific life’s body of work including paintings, murals, U.S. Postal stamps and published illustrations that blend realism, romanticism and mythology to tell a visual story. When Kāne attended Chicago’s School of the Art Institute, after serving in the U.S. Navy, artistic trends were turning away from photographic realism reminiscent of painters such as Thomas Hart Benton and Grant Wood, two painters admired

by Kāne. Abstract expressionism was all the rage, but the young student worked to hone his skills in rendering the human figure, settings and landscapes realistically, although enhanced by a romanticized ideal. These skills suited him to jobs illustrating commercial art, which he practiced for a short time, with little satisfaction. “The end came when I won a Jolly Green Giant campaign, and for a year, did drawings and paintings of that big green fairy until I could no longer suffer it,” Kāne said.

Change of Course

Kāne had been nurturing a passion for sailing his catamaran on Lake Michigan, and had begun researching Hawaiian canoes in the library of the University of Chicago and the Field Museum of Natural History, where an extensive collection of Pacific island cultural artifacts had been installed.

Herb started drawing sailing canoes and created a series of paintings of Polynesian canoes, which were purchased in 1969 by the Hawai’i State Foundation of Culture and the Arts. This purchase made it possible for him to move back to Hawai’i, where he lived in Honolulu and continued his passion and study of Polynesian voyaging canoes. As he said, the canoe brought him back home.

Being in Hawai‘i once again brought back images from his childhood. Herb’s father had come from a family of taro farmers in Waipi‘o Valley, where the Kāne family sometimes stayed. Legends and ghost stories abounded by the lantern light as his father shared tales of the ancestors with his son. Images started forming

in the young boy’s mind, images that would one day appear on gigantic murals and paintings for all to see—Hawaiians, malihini, kama‘aina and visitors to Hawai‘i some decades into the future.

Kāne brought the history and culture alive for the public and the Hawaiian people who had at one time been stripped of their cultural identity. He not only recalled legends, but extensively researched historical accounts and 18th century illustrations to create historically accurate art that is characterized by an emphasis on realistic and precise draftsmanship when depicting historical scenes. His series of voyaging canoe paintings and many other paintings of battles, everyday domestic life, and ceremonial occasions contain exquisite detail and color harmonies that bring each scene to life.

U.S. Sen. Daniel Akaka said of Kāne: “Herb Kāne was a Titan and a giant amongst Hawaiian historians who has left his legacy in his artwork and his words of wisdom as a gift of Aloha to Hawai’i nei and to the rest of the world.”

Over the years, the public embraced the artist and, as if starved for life and breath, breathed in and lapped up every new painting as it was unveiled. Herb Kāne paintings are on display at Bishop Museum, major resorts, Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park and in the Hawai’i State Capitol. His paintings of Polynesian sailing, in particular, have been widely reproduced, appearing as illustrations in books and articles. A major commission was a series of seven paintings for National Geographic magazine and published in the December 1974 issue. A good writer himself, Herb published several books of Hawaiian history and personal accounts, illustrated with his paintings. They include Voyage, the Discovery of Hawai‘i (1976), Pele, Goddess of Volcanoes (1967), Voyagers (1991) and Ancient Hawai‘i (1997).

Kāne’s dedication to accuracy and lifelike detail was important to depicting historical accounts, but when he turned his imagination to the legends of old Hawai’i and the spiritual and mythological side of the Hawaiian culture, his work is more expressionistic. In his painting Pele, Goddess of the Volcano for the Jaggar Museum at Kīlauea, the supernatural figure is depicted with literal fire in her eyes and flowing lava as her hair.

In an intriguing blend of realism and supernatural, Kāne himself reported several instances of “chicken-skin” accounts of people seeing figures stepping out of his paintings, and voices coming from scenes in the paintings.

He created several oversized canvasses and murals for hotel lobbies, public and commercial spaces. His 1973 mural, made of wool, titled “Opening of the Pacific to Man,” was designed for the entrance to the Pacific Trade Center in Honolulu. It measures 43 feet long and11 feet high and offers views of several voyaging canoes and a central monumental male figure holding a paddle. In the corner of the mural is a representation of the wayfarer’s chart, traditionally made of shells and sticks, in which islands and ocean swell patterns are encoded to assist the training of a navigator.

Kāne was commissioned by the National Park Service in 1976 to paint “Keoua’s Arrival,” which is on permanent display in the Visitor Center at Pu’ukoholā Heiau National Historic Site. One 1973, site-specific mural, painted on a custom-designed wall as part of a history center under construction (and never completed) at Punalu‘u Black Sand Beach, became an object of crime and mystery. The 24-foot-wide historical mural, titled “Ancient Punalu‘u, Hawai’i Island,” depicting a scene at Punalu‘u, survived the 1975 tsunami that destroyed the interior of the building. According to

❁Continued on page 22

The newly-renovated lobby of Kailua-Kona’s King Kamehameha Kona Beach Hotel features a site-specific mural of the grounds of the hotel at the time of King Kamehameha (shown above, left). The painting depicts the king wearing a simple kapa garment while in conversation with his son Liholiho. Beside him stands his prime minister, Kalanimoku. The prince’s attendant, wearing a short yellow cape, is John Papa I’i, who later became an important historian. The fish in the foreground represent the gifts of food brought

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daily to the court. Two ladies of the court are seated at left. Kamehameha’s residence was a complex of thatched structures around a tranquil cove at Kailua Bay. Across the cove stand his private temple, ‘Ahu‘ena, a replica of which is there today.

Throughout the hotel lobby in display cases is an exhibit of 40 signed and numbered, limited-edition giclees—the largest collection of its kind in any Hawai’i hotel.

The Herb Kawainui Kāne-designed Polynesian voyaging canoe Hokule‘a, sailing near Papahānaumokuākea National Marine Monument, Northwest Hawaiian Islands –Photo by Na’alehu Anthony, courtesy of NOAA

❁Continued from page 20

22 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

eyewitnesses, the wave pushed all the displays out the far side of the room and left a mud line three or four feet high on the wall—except on the mural, which was dry and undamaged.

Then in 2005 the mural was stolen from the vacant site. Thieves are believed to have cut out the wall in five sections removing the painting in sections. To this day, it has never been recovered.

Kāne responded by recreating a version of the mural in oil paint on canvas, saying, “Now all the thieves have is a preliminary sketch. Vengeance is mine.”

Artist Turned Naval Architect

Perhaps the artist’s greatest work of art, and the one that has the farthest reaching impact isn’t a painting at all, but one that looks like it emerged directly from a Herb Kāne painting—the Hōkūle‘a. In fact, it did.

His detailed drawings of Polynesian canoes, completed during his research for paintings, became a foundation for building a real canoe.

While living in Honolulu, Kāne attracted a group of sailing enthusiasts, including University of Hawai’i anthropologist Ben Finney and Tommy Holmes, author of The Hawaiian Canoe.

Together they founded the Polynesian Voyaging Society and began building the Hōkūle‘a, a wa’a kaulua, a Polynesian double-hulled voyaging canoe, based on historical Polynesian design and capable of sailing between Hawai’i and Tahiti. Their purpose was to prove that ancestral Polynesian voyagers could have purposely navigated in vessels of similar type to colonize Hawai’i.

“Even more intriguing to me was the thought that recreating the central object of the ancient culture and taking it to sea might stimulate the growing interest in a cultural revival,” Kāne said. He drew sketches for the canoe and made a painting for inspiration and to raise money.

Kāne designed this accurate, full-scale replica of a Polynesian voyaging canoe and named it Hōkūle‘a after the name came to him in a dream. Hōkūle‘a is the Hawaiian name for the star Arcturus, which was the guiding star in celestial navigation for

Pacific voyages to the Hawaiian Islands. It is the zenith star that sits above Hawai‘i. The canoe was launched on March 8, 1973, and Kāne served as the skipper for two years as the canoe and novice crew sailed among the Hawaiian Islands to attract crew and support for its maiden international voyage.

Kāne’s role in the creation and promotion of the Hōkūle‘a helped restore pride of heritage to the peoples of the Pacific.

Kāne’s colleague, Nainoa Thompson, navigator of the Hōkūle‘a, says Kāne was “the visionary, the dreamer, and he was the architect and the engineer. He’s the one that carried the burden of building, and constructing, and sailing Hōkūle‘a.” Elsewhere, Thompson told an interviewer, “When you look at Herb’s legacy, it is transforming Hawai’i’s society because he brought pride and culture and inspiration back, through the canoe….He is the father of the Hawaiian Renaissance.”

To see more Herb Kāne paintings and prints for sale, visit www.HerbKaneStudio.com Images courtesy of the Herb Kāne estate.

Contact writer Karen Valentine at Karen@keolamagazine.com.

Herb Kawainui Kāne – June 21, 1928 - March 8, 2011

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In 1984, Kāne was named a Living Treasure of Hawai‘i In his book, Voyagers, Kāne refers to himself as an art historian, a breed of which there are only a handful in the U.S. Rather than writing about history, these artists illustrate history. He was particularly rewarded when, after viewing the mural depicting the war temple at Pu‘ukoholā, the huge heiau near Kawaihae, “a young Hawaiian admitted that he had always regarded the present remains of the old temple platforms as ‘just piles of rock.’ But you show me not only the rock platform that remains today, but the buildings, the altar, the fire—all gone now. And you even show the people. Even if they restored the place, they could not bring back the people. After what this painting said to me, I can never again look at any heiau as just a pile of rock.”

Herb didn’t avoid some of the dark side of history. He painted vast and vicious battle scenes, such as “The Battle at Nu‘uanu Pali.” The proud beauty of the native Hawaiian human figure stands out in all of Kāne’s exquisite and colorful renderings. The land positively glows under Kona sunsets and volcanic eruptions. The sea and surf are realistically powerful as the ships, canoes and their navigators sail forward to glory or doom.

For millions of people, Herb Kāne’s paintings are Hawai‘i. ❖

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The Life

Documentarians Joan Lander and Puhipau – Photo by Carl Viti, courtesy of Honolulu Advertiser

OF THE PEOPLE

T

The experience led him to study “the true history of Hawai‘i,” which included the fact that Sand Island was actually ceded government lands belonging to the Hawaiian Kingdom. He became involved with the production of “The Sand Island Story,“ a documentary produced by Victoria Keith and Jeremy Rochford of Windward Video, and edited by Joan Lander.

Born in 1947 in Cumberland, Maryland, Joan was working at the time with a Honolulu video company called Videololo. Helping to edit the Sand Island documentary, she met Puhipau, and after “The Sand Island Story” aired in 1982 on PBS stations throughout the U.S., they joined forces to form the independent documentary team Nā Maka o ka ‘Āina. Together, they are realizing the power of video to educate and spread awareness of the plight of Hawai‘i’s first people, the kānaka maoli.

After requesting an interview, I wrote to Joan and Puhipau with a few questions to begin our conversation. Their provocative responses were so clear, concise and personal that we at Ke Ola magazine chose to print their responses verbatim, to preserve the edge and clarity of the filmmakers’ perspectives.

Marya: What one incident led each of you respectively to focus so purely on being the filmic eyes of Hawai’i Island?

Joan and Puhipau: Actually, we do not focus just on Hawai‘i Island.

Oftentimes our subject will be something broad like “native birds” or “ahupua‘a” or “Hawaiian language” or “Hawaiian sovereignty,” and we will explore those subjects on several of the islands. We have also done production in Australia, Vanuatu and Rapa Nui (Easter Island).

However, we have a special aloha for Hawai‘i island. Puhipau’s ‘ohana is from Keālia, Kona. He was born in Hilo and spent his younger years in Keaukaha. When Joan first moved to Hawai‘i in 1970, it was to this island. We met in 1982 while both of us were living in Honolulu and, after having a home base there for many years, we moved back to Hawai‘i Island in 1995.

❁Continued on page 26

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 25

o carry on traditions, some people sharpen their tongues or sharpen their pens. Others sharpen their spears. Joan Lander and Puhipau of Nā Maka o ka ‘Āina — “The Eyes of the Land” — sharpen their focus, creating no ordinary picture show.

With unflinching devotion since 1982, the couple’s award-winning Na‘alehu video production company has produced more than 90 documentaries that focus on the land and people of Hawai`i and the Pacific.

Ranging from “Contemporary Hawaiian Artists and Islands at Risk: Genetic Engineering in Hawai’i” to “E Ola Ka ‘Olelo Hawai’i (May the Hawaiian Language Live)”, their films have screened at festivals from Berlin to Japan, Canada to New Zealand and won recognition from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the Hawai`i International Film Festival, National Geographic’s All Roads Film Festival, Earthvision (Santa Cruz), ImagineNATIVE (Toronto), the Aotearoa Film Festival and the Berkeley Video & Film Festival.

While most of their films have aired on broadcast television in Hawai`i, several have been broadcast throughout the U.S. on PBS stations.

Perhaps their bravest and most controversial film is “Act of War - The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Nation,” a documentary first broadcast in 1993 on Hawai’i Public Television during the centennial year of the overthrow of Queen Lili’uokalani— a landmark year in the Hawaiian movement for sovereignty and independence.

Puhipau, born in Hilo in 1937 to a pure Hawaiian—kānaka maoli—mother from Keālia, Kona, and a Palestinian father, lived with 100 other Hawaiian families on Sand Island in Honolulu. In 1980, the State of Hawai‘i charged the Hawaiians with squatting on public land and evicted them, tearing down and burning their homes. Armed police arrested those who chose to resist.

Puhipau was among those charged with “obstructing government operations.”

This view of the lele at the summit of Mauna Kea, looking toward Mauna Loa, illustrates religious ceremony practiced on the sacred mountain in the documentary “Mauna Kea Temple Under Siege” www.namaka.com/catalog/spirit/ maunakea_temple.html

Marya: Is the expanding visual intelligence having an impact on our planet’s nuts-and-bolts, gardens-to-grade-schools transformation? How? What impact do your films have on our daily lives in Hawai’i?

❁Continued from page 25

26 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Marya: What is most significant in your worldview right now?

What has the most passion and meaning for you?

Joan and Puhipau: Actually, the effort to regain recognition of the continued existence and sovereignty of the Hawaiian Kingdom forms the basic premise of everything we produce.

A wrong was committed that needs to be righted. When the world once again acknowledges the independence of these islands, we feel that many modern-day problems will begin to be resolved. An island nation needs to “think island” and not be governed by the continental ideas of some distant seat of power.

When the people of this land once again control the natural resources of the archipelago and surrounding seas, using management techniques that have been passed down for centuries, we feel Hawai‘i can once again become a place of abundance and prosperity for its people. Our videos have touched on this theme time and time again.

Marya: How do social and cultural myths affect media justice— the equal access of indigenous and multi-cultural people to mass media?

Joan and Puhipau: So many kānaka maoli traditions are viewed by the dominant western culture as quaint, regional folklore, whereas in actuality they are blueprints for survival.

The phrase, “your myth, my science,” comes to mind. Hawaiian creation stories and legends come from centuries of scientific observation.

One of our favorite documentary subjects, Sam Ka‘ai, was fond of telling malihini: “We’re not better than you; we’re just longer at it.” By which he meant that kānaka maoli and Pacific peoples have been here longer and are more experienced at living on the limited resources of islands. Why would we not want to learn from them?

We try in our videos to capture the wisdom and traditions of a centuries-old culture and present them as “survival guides” to the world.

Joan and Puhipau: It’s hard to see the results of consciousness-raising.

Did our programming about Kaho‘olawe help bring about an end to the bombing and the effort to clean up and revitalize that island?

Did our documentaries on streams, such as “Stolen Waters,” help give credibility and legitimacy to those who were fighting in the courts and before the Water Commission to restore Hawai‘i’s streams?

Did our history docs, such as “Act of War – The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Nation,” that aired on PBS stations throughout the U.S. in the 1990s and have been distributed to hundreds of educational institutions worldwide, have any impact on the way people talk about Hawaiian sovereignty today?

Did “Malama Haloa – Protecting the Taro,” our piece on Jerry Konanui’s efforts to protect kalo from genetic engineering, influence lawmakers to pass anti-GMO legislation? Did it encourage more people to plant their own kalo?

Did “Mauna Kea – Temple Under Siege” contribute to a new understanding of the effects of telescope development on the summit?

Did “Ahupua‘a, Fishponds and Lo‘i” result in the resurgence of an island way of thinking?

We can only hope that our programs contributed in some small way towards those end results.

When our programs first started appearing on television in the 1980s, we heard from many people that the sound of Hawaiian voices coming from the TV set drew people into the living rooms from their kitchens; the sight of local faces made people stop their channel surfing and become glued to the tube.

We know that we have educated a lot of people in the space of 30 years. Those who first saw our programs as young children in the classroom are now teachers, and they show those same programs to their students. We recognize there is still a long way to go.

For instance, when will it be taught in the schools that Hawaiian nationals never gave their country away, that there never was a treaty of annexation between Hawai‘i and the United States?

Marya: Good question. There is a growing consciousness of peace, justice and environmental sanity in Hawai’i and beyond. How are films and stories like yours making a difference?

Joan and Puhipau: Our programs have been used quite a bit by teachers and professors in educational institutions both here in Hawai‘i and throughout the world. Some have been translated into Japanese and Spanish. They have been shown at eco-summits, United Nations gatherings and international film festivals. We feel that our programs have contributed, along with the work of hundreds of others, to planting seeds in people’s minds.

Elegance

Quality

Marya: What else would you like to share with Ke Ola readers?

Joan and Puhipau: Our most important effort in the time we have left on this earth is to preserve and archive our extensive collection of over 7,000 videotapes. These tapes contain the voices, faces and stories of hundreds of people, who collectively can contribute an encyclopedia’s worth of knowledge to future generations. Their knowledge is currently stored on fast-deteriorating videotape that depends on equipment that is becoming obsolete.

The archiving work involves countless hours of digitizing, cataloging and storing many gigabytes worth of footage on redundant drives. But once completed, our library can then be easily made available to educational institutions and the public via online sites and permanently archived at the new Henry Kuualoha Guigni Digital Archive. We welcome any support people wish to give to this monumental effort. Please contact us about tax-deductible donations. ❖

Expertise

Resources: Images courtesy of Nā Maka O Ka ‘Āina.

All programs are available on DVD at www.namaka.com Additional resource: www.mauna-a-wakea.info

Contact writer Marya Mann at Marya@LoomOfLove.com

This scene from “Act of War - The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Nation,” shows armed troops, all paid actors, reenacting the Jan. 16, 1893, landing of the U.S.S. Boston warship that sent soldiers ashore in Honolulu. Positioning themselves near ‘Iolani Palace (seen in the background), the “Bluejackets,” as naval troops were called at the time, carry real weapons.

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SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 27

Besides showing in theaters and at festivals, Nā Maka’s high-quality docudramas and inspiring media also help fill a tremendous need for Hawaiian Studies curricula in schools, libraries and universities. Check out Nā Maka o ka ‘Āina DVDs at your local library.

If they don’t have titles you want, request inter-library loan and speak to your librarian about purchasing copies.

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The Life

AS ART

Punawai ‘Ulu print scarf – Photo by Punawai

H

ilo, Hawai‘i, might not be the first place that springs to mind when you think about cutting-edge clothing manufacturing, but one local company is changing that. Punawai, a digital textile printing company, is using state-of-the-art technology and eco-friendly inks to design, print, and sew women’s apparel. Their work features original Hawaiian plant designs on fine silks, including scarves, wraps, ladies’ tops and men’s neckties. Customers may not realize the technology that’s required to create the stylish pieces but they do appreciate the outcome.

“When we started, people couldn’t believe the quality of the work,” says Punawai Rice who, along with his wife Hokulani Kaikaina, runs the company. “Their reaction was: ‘This is from Hilo?

Really?’ People were surprised that so fine a fabric and design came out of Hilo.”

It’s really not surprising though, given Punawai’s love of Hawaiian culture and passion for art. Born and raised on O’ahu, Punawai grew up spending school vacations on the Big Island with relatives. While pursuing a degree in Hawaiian Studies at UH Hilo, he took up hula, which led to meeting another Hilo designer, Sig Zane, a well-known clothing designer. Punawai wound up working for Sig for seven years, teaching himself how to use computers and computer design software along the way.

He then pursued work in marketing, but discovered he missed the creativity of art.

“I wanted to get back into art,” explains Punawai. “My original business plan was to do an original line of Hawaiian wear and maybe even print for other people,” he says.

But during the process of researching how to launch his own clothing line, Punawai came to recognize the limitations of the silk screening industry. “We found out that silk screening fabric is a dying art form. I knew we would need to do something else.”

He discovered digital textile printing and was amazed by the new technology. “I saw this digital printer and what it could do: that it could print on fine fabrics and do short runs of material,” he said. “To do a short run on fine fabric was nearly unheard of even just a decade ago. That’s how new the technology is.”

Punawai flew to California to check out the massive machine, which weighs two tons and is 10 feet long and eight feet wide.

He was so impressed with the equipment he decided to take the plunge and become the first person in Hawai‘i to use digital textile printing.

It was 2008. The economy was in a freefall, and it was, Punawai admits with a chuckle, the worst possible time to start a business.

To make matters worse, the technology was so new that it took several months to learn how to master it.

“It took us over a year to get the learning curve for the machine,” explains Punawai. “The learning curve was so steep that I decided I needed to figure out what I wanted to print first and

Digital textile printing means Punawai can select from thousands of colors for his designs.

– Photo by Denise Laitinen also think about who is my market. Because of the economy I couldn’t imagine women willing and able to spend lots of money on a new wardrobe,” says Punawai. “But they can accessorize it.

And that’s where it took off from.”

It’s a testament to the quality of his work that despite the recession, business has taken off. His designs sell briskly at trade shows and craft fairs on Hawai‘i Island and O‘ahu. And although they started with scarves, the Punawai brand now includes wraps, four types of women’s tops, and men’s ties. The apparel is on display

at the Punawai design studio in the Hilo Industrial area, which is open to the public.

“I think what’s really been key to our success is that my blank canvas is my client and what she’s wearing,” says Punawai whose designs are geared toward local professional women ranging from their 30’s to 60’s who may be working, semi-retired or retired.

“The scarves can be worn with jeans or dress pants. Everything we’ve designed and produced is based on what our customer is already wearing,” says Punawai. And therein lies the appeal.

Uniquely Hawaiian, the scarves and tops can be layered with existing clothes to instantly dress up a casual outfit or accentuate business clothes. Because they’re made of silk, they add an air of elegance, yet are sheer enough that they don’t feel heavy in hot weather or too stuffy for casual island living. Simply put, you can tell that someone who understands Hawai’i made these clothes.

“The key term for me is relevance,” explains Punawai. “If I can’t picture a color or a design on someone in Hilo then I don’t do it.”

He also spends a lot of time thinking about what is relevant to his clients. “What can they wear outside of Hilo? We may be from the country but we are well-traveled. What can our clients wear on a plane to the mainland and not feel out of place.”

A sense of place is important to Punawai. “I want Hilo women to feel proud of who they are and where they come from. Our goal is to add value and integrity to the ‘Made in Hawai‘i’ label.”

“All these things are in the back of my mind when I’m doing design,” he says.

For Punawai, the process of creating a piece of clothing usually starts with a trip to the Imiloa Astronomy Center. “I start outside with my camera and do photo shoots,” he explains. Imiloa is one

❁Continued on page 33

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 31

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32 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

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❁Continued from page 31

Punawai digital textile printer producing scarves.

Photo by Denise Laitinen.

fun part for me is color,” says Punawai, “but it’s also the most difficult part. How do you communicate color? What are the relevant colors in Hilo?”

That he can choose from thousands of colors is a benefit of the new technology. “When you’re doing silk screening on fabric you’re working with a fabric that’s been dyed and add one or two screen colors on top of that,” explains Punawai. “Now with this technology it’s unlimited. I can use as many colors as I want.”

Once the design and colors are finalized, creating silk scarves is a mouse click away. The computer is linked to the digital printer, which uses eco-friendly water-based inks. An added benefit of digital textile printing is that it only prints the size of the pattern, not the entire width of fabric, thereby saving ink and wasted material.

After the design is printed on the silk, it’s run through a dryer machine, which makes the material color- and wash-fast. Then it’s taken to the cutting table where the patterns are cut out, sewn, and ironed. It’s truly a family-run business with his wife and mother often helping out.

The entire process can be as short as one day or longer than a week. “I can design, [select] color, and print all in one day,” says Punawai. “But when you’re talking ladies tops, just working on the pattern could take a week.”

Punawai says the company plans to be around for the long haul. “I love my community. In five years I still see us here,” he says.

“We’re not going to be a big production outfit supplying department stares nationwide, we want to stay small and serve Hilo.” ❖ Visit www.punawai.com Contact writer Denise Laitinen at wahineokekai@yahoo.com.

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SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 33

PHOTO: James Cohn

of his favorite places to go because of its garden of endemic, indigenous, and Polynesian-introduced plants. For instance, if he plans on creating a design featuring the ipu he’ll try to find every stage of the ipu—from vine to fruit to blossom—and photograph it. Other plants featured in Punawai designs include laua’e (fern), kalo (taro), ‘ulu (breadfruit), na’u (Hawaiian gardenia), and awapuhi (white ginger).

He then returns to the studio and starts creating sketches.

Selecting colors to go with the design is the next challenge. “The

34 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

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OF THE LAND

The Life 36 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Grounds Supervisor Greg Telles stands under a trimmed and shaped banyan tree at Royal Sea Cliff Resort in Kailua-Kona.

“T

he tree that moves some to tears of joy, is in the eyes of others only a green thing which stands in their way.”

– William Blake In 2005, eight ficus trees were reaching upward and blanketing the sky from view. Their thick, glossy green canopies covered lawn and drive with dropping leaves and thick shade. Massive branches twined into each other in hopes of sending out aerial roots to dangle down to dirt.

That’s what banyans do.

One tree can grow into its own monolith of bark, branches, fluttery leaves and massive roots.

Over time, colonizing roots not only rise up from the ground, but also descend down from the canopy,

turning into multiple trunks to support the trees’ spreading girth.

Greg Telles, grounds supervisor of the Outrigger Royal Sea Cliff Resort, stood under each of these massive trees six years ago, sizing them up, roots to crown. He saw how they mischievously hung over a wing of the Kailua-Kona condominium complex… how they seemed to devour the landscaping, including 50-some coconut palms… how they covered the drive and parking area with dead leaves and bird droppings.

While some would say the 20-year-old trees had outgrown their welcome, Telles saw the opportunity to turn the meandering monsters into more manageable, miniature versions of themselves. And with that vision, that’s exactly what he did.

With five years of experience working with the Division of Forestry in Honolulu’s lush Manoa area, Telles decided to put his tree trimming knowledge to work.

❁Continued on page 38

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The trees are getting their six-month trim. The professional tree trimmer who is overseen by Greg Telles is Kilifi “Cliff” Finau of Aloha Greens Landscaping. The trees look nice all the time since they were cut back to their new, miniature size.

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“I learned from the old timers on O’ahu how to maintain large canopy trees like banyans and monkeypods,” said the Wai‘anae High School graduate. “So I went to management here and told them the trees could be saved and made into an asset by reshaping them into a size appropriate to the property.”

With the blessing of Royal Sea Cliff management, Greg organized a plan with Aloha Greens Landscaping to get the trees to a desired size. Similar to the principles of bonsai, the Japanese art of trimming trees grown in containers, Telles planned on eventually managing the trees by judiciously cutting back the roots, limbs and canopy on a regular basis.

But first he had to get the huge trees down to their new, much smaller size.

“The first cut we did was very drastic, taking about threefourths of the top of the tree away,” said Greg. “But we knew it would be okay because ficus trees are resilient.” With other types of trees, he says a rule of thumb is to never cut off more than half of a tree or the shock may kill it.

While Greg admits he didn’t know exactly what genus of ficus he was working with—for example if it was ficus benjamina or ficus benghalensis, the latter considered the Indian banyan tree—he was confident in the plan of action.

With the trees reduced to a quarter of their original size, the ficus were basically 12-foot tall stumps with a handful of ascending limbs. They were allowed to rest and recover for about a year. All the trees gradually showed life, sprouting new vertical branches.

“During the second year, we started the first shaping of the tree,” continued Greg, who explained the growing canopy was trimmed close and compact to the base of the tree’s main trunk. Greg also addressed roots that were growing vertically out of the dirt. The exposed roots were cut back and covered with fresh, sterile dirt.

In the next year or so, each tree’s canopy thickly filled in to the desired height and width of about 16 feet tall and 20 feet wide. Roots growing under the ground beyond the tree’s drip

❁Continued from page 37

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line were severed. This helped ensure the tree wouldn’t grow back as fast.

The trees were controlled by trimming—similar to the art of bonsai—but other factors like nutrition and water couldn’t be as regulated in the outdoor landscape environment. Greg notes that the many birds which roost in ficus provide a continual source of fertilizer.

“We have been consistent—and that is key—in trimming the trees to the exact same size every six months for several years now,” he says. “We give the outside of the canopy a trim all the way around, taking off two-to-three feet of green, and then go inside the canopy and cut back the dead leaves and their branches. This helps in preventing rubbish from falling from the tree.”

The same can be said about controlling errant roots. Once they start poking out of the ground again, they too need to be cut back as needed. “What’s good about the ficus is that you can aggressively control the roots, and that’s a big deal, because a lot of damage can result from out-of-control tree roots,” says Telles.

When asked how the tree maintenance plan affects the health of the tree, Greg says he thinks it’s better to gradually and consistently trim the tree, rather than shock it with drastic cutting every so often. He admits, however, that some landscape colleagues don’t agree with him.

“They think the constant trimming, similar to bonsai cultivation, is torturing the tree,” he says. “But for our situation and to keep these trees, that is what we have to do and we think it’s working fine.”

The cost of maintaining the trees bi-annually is also less than having to come in with large boom trucks and do extensive cutting, according to Greg. “This way, the grounds always look manicured and the trimmings can be recycled at the county green waste.”

The neatly trimmed ficus tree by the pool recently caught the eye of Big Isle resident Bridget Rapoza of Pepe‘ekeo. She took the time to write to Ke Ola about Greg and his efforts in patiently preserving and maintaining Royal Sea Cliff’s banyan trees.

In an email Bridget exclaimed, “I could not believe how beautiful and un-banyan it looked relative to every banyan tree I have ever seen here on the island… It is awesome to see.

And Greg is saving the functionality, the benefit of the banyan for the condo community there, and still accommodating the view goals…”

She continued her praise, writing, “Many people have told me don’t ever plant a banyan—they take over everything, will break up concrete, etc. Similarly, many developers have cut down majestic banyans for all sorts of short-term reasons.

Instead of following that common, but misguided thinking, Mr. Telles re-shaped them. Never before have I seen a bonsai banyan at that scale. Or maybe you’d call it topiary banyan. It was pretty cool. Cool enough that I thought you might want to share his thinking, to educate others to the usefulness of it. Far better to patiently shape it than to obliterate it. Most of us don’t have that patience, but I have great respect for the gardeners who do.”

You can easily see the lollipop-shaped “bonsai banyans” fronting the Royal Sea Cliff from Ali’i Drive. One is Ka’ū side of the resort’s entrance, while several others sit off to the Kohala side in the front yard. ❖ Contact writer Fern Gavelek at ferng@hawaii.rr.com.

OF THE PEOPLE

The Life

T

After samples are collected, Kaimi sniffs the samples again to make sure they contain accelerants. The arson specialist is performance fed, meaning he’s given food throughout the day for tasks accomplished, instead of regular meals. Depending on how many tasks they do, Kaimi might eat 80 times a day, but only small amounts each time.

When not at a fire, Perreira does about 60-80 drills a day with Kaimi, varying the amount and types of drills daily. For instance, he might go to a warehouse and hide canisters of accelerants for the dog to find.

Perreira and Kaimi often perform demonstrations at community events. In October, they’ll be at Hawai‘i Fire Department’s Fire Prevention Week event in Hilo. Perreira is also working on a children’s book about Kaimi that he can read to students when he visits schools.

Perreira notes that there have been instances when the fire department’s arson canine and one of the police department’s narcotics dogs worked a scene together. Kaimi worked the scene for arson and the HPD canine sniffed for drugs.

Hawai‘i Police Department has a long history using narcotics dogs, says Captain Randall Medeiros, noting that the drug sniffing canine program dates back more than 20 years. The dogs are trained to detect a variety of drugs, including heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana. Medeiros says the dogs have led to the arrest of criminals whom they otherwise wouldn’t have caught.

Scent-discriminating tracking dogs, or search dogs as they are commonly called, are newer to the department, says Medeiros. HPD received its first search dog—a bloodhound—about seven years ago.

The department has a total of seven canines: five drug sniffing dogs—three in Kona and two in Hilo—and two search dogs—one each in Hilo and Kona. The HPD canines vary in age, gender and breed, although several of the dogs are Labrador retrievers. Like other working dogs, they retire when they’re about 10 years old. They are fed regular meals and given treats when they perform a task.

The police canines don’t necessarily live with their handler— some live at a police station. For instance, Magnum, a two-year-old Lab who joined the department in July, is the search dog for West Hawai‘i. He is housed at the Kealakehe police station, but will eventually live with his handler, Officer Robert Sakata.

❁Continued on page 40

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 39

hey may look like any other dogs, but Kaimi can tell if a fire was intentionally set. Nalu can tell if you have drugs in your car. If you’re lost, Magnum will find you, and if you’re trapped in rubble from a disaster, Nui will search for you.

They are the unsung heroes of the Hawai‘i County Fire Department, Police Department, and Hawai‘i State Civil Defense Urban Search and Rescue Canine Unit. These hard-working dogs epitomize the phrase “man’s best friend”—happily taking on the roles of tracking missing persons, detecting arson fires, and sniffing out narcotics.

Each agency varies in how they acquire the dogs and how the canines are trained, but the dogs’ individual specializations do not vary.

For instance, a cadaver dog isn’t used in arson cases and a narcotics dog isn’t used to search for a missing person.

Four-year-old Kaimi, Hawai‘i County Fire Department’s sole arson canine, is trained to seek out accelerants used in residential, vehicle and wildland fires. Hawai‘i County is the only fire department in the state to have such a dog. Since May 2008 the former shelter dog and his handler, Captain Robert Perreira, have responded to 72 fires, including four on other islands. While not every fire they respond to is arson, “if the accelerant is there he’ll find it,” says Perreira. “His sense of smell is awesome.”

Unlike the police department’s canines, which were born and bred to be working dogs, Kaimi was rescued after having been abandoned at a shelter as a puppy. A shelter worker took notice of him and notified the local fire investigator, who in turn saw the dog’s training potential and alerted a national arson dog training program in Maine. Kaimi went through months of training at a facility in Illinois before joining the program in Maine.

Around the same time, Hawai‘i Fire Department received a grant from State Farm Insurance to acquire an arson dog, and Kaimi came to work in Hawai‘i. “All the costs were covered by State Farm Insurance,” says Perreira. “In addition to Kaimi’s training, they covered all my training and travel expenses to the mainland.”

Because the work of arson dogs and their handlers is crucial in trials and other legal documentation, both must annually go through recertification.

Kaimi lives and works with Perreira 24 hours a day. “He knows when I’m getting ready for work. He gets all excited. When we get to a fire scene, he can smell it and gets excited. He wants to find what he’s looking for.”

“They [arson dogs] are trained to find the source,” explains Perreira. When he and Kaimi arrive at a fire they walk the scene and identify any areas where Kaimi detects something.

Hawai‘i State Civil Defense Urban Search & Rescue Canine Unit dog—Nui—on rubble training pile on O‘ahu – Photo courtesy of Hawai‘i State Civil Defense

❁Continued from page 39

40 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

“Ideally they live with the handler,” says Medeiros. He notes that when a dog lives at a police station the handler comes to the station every day to maintain their level of training and reinforce the bond between dog and handler.

Both narcotics and search dogs go through extensive training on the mainland before joining the department. The length of the training varies from three to seven months or more “depending on how well and how quickly the dog responds to the training,” says Medeiros.

The handlers go through a weeklong training course before being paired with the canine. Because they’re involved in legal proceedings, HPD narcotics dogs are also required to go through recertification annually.

HPD relies on grant funding to acquire the animals. Magnum was donated to the police department by the Friends of the Missing Child Center of Hawai’i, who paid for him with a grant from the Atherton Foundation.

Public Safety Dogs Inc., a non-profit based in North Carolina that trains dogs for police and fire departments around the country, trained Magnum. Medeiros said the department is currently seeking grant funding to obtain another search dog from the facility because the search dog based in Hilo is approaching retirement age.

Unlike the police and fire departments, the Hawai‘i State Civil Defense Urban Search and Rescue Canine Unit, which was created in 2004, is comprised entirely of volunteers.

“We have personnel on three islands: Kaua‘i, O‘ahu, and the

Big Island,” says Shay Walden, the unit team leader. The team has eight certified live-find dogs and two recovery dogs for the entire state. The Big Island is home Hawai‘i Island Police Dept. Detective David to five certified Reiss and narcotics dog Nalu doing a drug personnel, two search demonstration of the live-find – Photo by Denise Laitinen dogs, and one of the recovery dogs.

“Our primary responsibility is disaster search and rescue, like what happened in Japan,” says Walden. She adds, “We’ve had quite a few missing persons cases.”

In June, Walden and Big Island resident Kuma Davis traveled to Saipan with Pohaku, a two-year-old back Labrador, to assist in searching for two missing girls.

The team was also used to locate victims of the 2006 Kaloko Dam breach, in which seven people died. They’re frequently called by the Honolulu Police Department and other agencies around the state to help search for people.

The participants use their own personal dogs and most work full-time in addition to volunteering. Walden, for example,

Call “Auntie Geri”

is an Officer with the Honolulu Police Department. Volunteers don’t need a military background though, just a willingness to devote time and energy.

Even if you don’t have a dog, you can volunteer as support personnel to provide first aid, communications and other functions.

“Our best support search and rescue specialists are on the Big Island,” says Walden. State Civil Defense provides equipment to the volunteers.

The training for dog and handler is extensive, although for support personnel it’s less intense. The volunteers practice training weekly, while support staff meets less often. Once a month largescale training drills occur on O‘ahu where the team has access to two rubble piles where the dogs practice looking for trapped people.

The dogs undergo a year of wilderness training and a-year-anda-half to two years of disaster response training.

“About eight months old is the ideal age to start a dog at search and rescue,” says Walden. “Two years old is about the limit because it takes a couple years to get certified.”

Big Island volunteer Juliet Moncrief started training her two-and-a-half year old dog Hina, when the dog was just eight months. Her older dog Tigger retired about a year ago.

“Once they dogs are certified they have to recertify every couple of years,” says Kuma Davis who, like Moncrief, has been involved with the team for several years.

Both Moncrief and Davis are certified wilderness search specialists and urban disaster search specialists. Certification is under state urban search and

rescue standards, which are almost identical to FEMA standards. “It takes about 12-18 months to become a certified canine handler,” says Davis.

“I’ve always enjoyed working with dogs and this aspect is really amazing,” says Moncrief. “It enables me to give back to the community through my passion, which is working with dogs.”

The team welcomes new volunteers. “We’re Hawai‘i County Fire Dept. arson dog, always looking for more Kaimi, and handler Captain Robert people,” says Walden.

Perreira working a vehicle fire scene She encourages people – Photo by Robert Perreira interested in joining the program to contact them via their website www.searchandrescuehawaii.org. ❖ Contact writer Denise Laitinen at wahineokekai@yahoo.com.

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The Life OF THE LAND

Photo courtesy of The Kohala Center

G

“The only way to save the turtle’s life was by surgical amputation of the flipper.”

The state’s expert sea turtle veterinarian, Dr. Robert Morris, performed the operation—the 55th front-flipper amputation he had completed here in 13 years—with great success. According to Balazs, he and his staff have tracked and recaptured a number of Dr. Morris’ sea turtle “amputees,” finding them in good condition years following the operations. “Lefty,” who returned to his home at Kahalu‘u Bay just 10 days after his amputation, is the most recent survivor.

Reef protection volunteers report frequent sightings of “Lefty,” who is acclimating well to his life back in the bay!

On Hawai‘i Island, the Kohala Center, an independent, not-forprofit community-based center for research, conservation and education, leads the charge in raising awareness about the fragile ocean environment and its inhabitants, including endangered species such as the green sea turtle. Its ReefTeach program at Kailua-Kona’s popular Kahalu‘u Bay is overseen by Cindi Punihaole and reaches thousands of island visitors and residents annually with its preserve-and-protect message.

According to county records, public use of this county park, with its spectacular and easily accessible snorkeling spot, tops 400,000 users annually. That fact, coupled with the great diversity of fish and coral found there, made it the perfect location when the ReefTeach program was introduced in 2000.

For more than a decade, trained volunteers (see sidebar for more information on joining the volunteer effort) have encouraged beachgoers to enjoy the unique marine experience without adversely impacting the fragile coral, reef-dwelling fish and the nearly-always-present sea turtles.

Among the high points of their “look, but don’t touch” doctrine: • Never touch or stand on coral • Do not remove anything from the coral reef • Do not feed the fish • Do not disturb, touch, attempt to ride or otherwise harass turtles

❁Continued on page 44

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 43

reen sea turtles (honu in Hawaiian) are among Hawai‘i’s most popular, positively charming marine creatures. Revered by ancient Hawaiians, one legend tells the story of a mystical honu, Kauila, who resided in the waters off Hawai‘i Island. Kauila, as the legend goes, possessed special powers that allowed her to change into human form to watch over the village children playing near the shore. Myth or reality, the legend may have inspired some early Hawaiian families to consider the green sea turtle a personal family deity or aumakua, never to be eaten or harmed.

Fortunately, those families’ intentions to protect the honu live today in the form of initiatives by numerous federal and state protection agencies, as well as non-profit groups and legions of trained volunteers.

Early this year, one resident of Kahalu‘u Bay in Kailua-Kona unwittingly became the poster turtle for organizations working to increase awareness about the growing threat to marine life as the world’s oceans become more and more dangerously cluttered with strangulating fiber, netting and trash.

In February, beach-goers at Kahalu‘u Bay spotted a green sea turtle -- now affectionately known as “Lefty”)—with something wrapped around its right flipper. They alerted the on-site ReefTeach volunteers, who immediately initiated a multi-day effort to capture and assess the turtle’s injuries with the help of Justin Viezbicke, National Marine Sanctuary program coordinator for Hawai‘i Island.

Officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on O‘ahu were alerted and “Lefty” was transported to the facility there (the only one in the state outfitted to treat sea turtles) for further evaluation and medical treatment.

“Lefty’s right flipper was entangled in light-weight fishing line and that isn’t a good thing”, says George Balazs, who heads up NOAA’s Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center Marine Turtle Research Program. “Several wraps of the line just tightened and tightened over weeks and likely months. The line constricted blood flow and the tissue and bones died,” Balazs said.

44 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

❁Continued from page 43 swimming and feeding in ocean waters or resting on beaches or rocky shorelines All of these directives are in line with federal and state wildlife laws fully protecting the five species of sea turtles found in Hawai‘i, the green sea turtle being by far the most common here. Under the federal Endangered Species Act, violators may be assessed fines of up to $100,000 and penalties may include time in jail.

Viezbicke works closely with government agencies and educational organizations here, including ReefTeach. He monitors and assesses endangered marine life populations and regulates negative environmental and human impacts on them. The program protects green sea turtles, monk seals and humpback whales, among other sea creatures.

“The most important message we can deliver is reminding people that these are wild animals in their natural environment.

The best thing we all can do is view these marine animals from afar to avoid interfering with their natural behaviors. The less human interaction the better,” he says.

Inadvertently disturbing sleep patterns, by approaching resting turtles too closely; touching or otherwise disturbing turtles by swimming after them; chasing them from their normal f eeding areas: all these, he says, can create serious long-term problems by potentially disrupting centuries of pre-programmed instincts.

Beyond direct contact, humans pose additional hazards to turtles and other sea creatures in the form of steadily growing amounts of marine trash in oceans worldwide. Death or injury due to entanglement in monofilament fishing lines and netting has grown substantially over the past two decades, according to studies, threatening a number of already endangered species. Marine experts estimate sea turtles alone account for thousands of entanglements annually in long lines, drift nets and discarded fishing gear. Ingestion of plastics and other toxic materials found in these “islands of floating trash” is responsible for even more deaths.

While Kahalu‘u is one of the most active snorkeling and turtle viewing locations on Hawai‘i Island, green sea turtles can be found in abundance at numerous locations islandwide; and, of course, the same rules and regulations espoused by volunteers at Kahalu‘u Bay apply at all beaches and shorelines in the state.

(See sidebar “Best Spots”) ❖

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Make a difference in your community through membership Join ‘Imiloa today and help inspire Hawai’i’s future explorers and innovators in science, technology, engineering and math…benefits of membership include: • • • • •

Members-only discounts in Sky Garden Restaurant and museum store Members-only events and previews Free admission year-round Advance notice of exhibit openings, programs and shows Discounts to educational after school programs, spring break and summer camps for kids, and after-hours programs like ‘Imiloa After Dark and Maunakea Skies.

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• To report injured turtles or turtles in distress, phone Justin Viezbicke at 808.987.0765.

• For suspected law enforcement violations, such as killing, harming, or harassing a turtle, call the NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service Law Enforcement Branch at 800.853.1964.

• More details about The Kohala Center’s many special projects and ongoing programs can be found online at www.kohalacenter.org.

Contact writer Margaret Kearns at margaretekearns@gmail.com.

Some of the Best Spots toView Sea Turtles on Hawai‘i Island

The green sea turtle is found on beaches, shorelines and ocean waters around the Big Island. In addition to Kailua-Kona’s Kahalu‘u Bay, check out the locations detailed below: Punalu’u Beach Park is the most famous black sand beach on Hawai‘i Island. Located off Hwy. 11 on the Ka‘ū District’s south shore (between Na‘alehu and Pahala), Punalu‘u Beach Park is also home to numerous green sea turtles. The protected cove is great for swimming and snorkeling—just remember to give the turtles a wide berth in the water and on the beach!

•

Anaeho‘omalu Beach Park on the spectacular Kohala Coast, north of Kona at Waikoloa Beach Resort, is a long strip of gently sloping white sand with shallow, usually-calm ocean conditions—perfect for swimming and snorkeling with the turtles that frequent the area. For the best turtle viewing head to the south end of the beach.

•

Mauna Lani Beach Resort, just a few miles up the coast from Anaeho‘omalu Beach Park, boasts miles of dramatic lava shoreline, with tidepools, ponds, sheltered coves and beaches with active coral reefs teeming with tropical fish and green sea turtles. You’ll find turtles resting on the shore and swimming in the shallow waters just offshore.

•

Honaunau in South Kona offers crystal clear waters fringed by pahoehoe lava in most of the area’s best snorkeling spots – “Two Step” being perhaps the most popular. It’s named for the naturally carved lava steps that provide relatively easy entry into the bay. Tropical fish and green sea turtles are plentiful here! The cove at Pu‘uhonua O Honaunau National Park is also graced by many turtles that poke their heads up to spy on visitors.

Turtles resting at Punalu‘u Black Sand Beach – Photos by Karen Valentine

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 45

•

OF THE LAND

The Life The creative private chef and expert food presenter, Olelo pa‘a Faith Ogawa, is our host for a delicious breadfruit-focused luncheon.

–Photo by Angela Tillson

46 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

O

lelo pa‘a Faith Ogawa respects and loves the land through the preparation and celebration of food. The private chef and food educator, who prepares meals for Fortune 500 executives and celebrities, will participate in the Breadfruit Festival– Ho’oulu ka ‘Ulu, September 24, at the Amy BH Greenwell Ethnobotanical Garden.

As an expert culinary presenter, Olelo pa’a will demonstrate how to use and prepare the not-so common fruit, ulu (breadfruit)—one which she feels should be cultivated more to help feed our island. The Waikoloa Village resident will also help judge the festival’s breadfruit recipe contest.

To show all the wonderful ways to enjoy breadfruit—and share her personal spiritual feelings about growing and using food in Hawai‘i—Olelo pa‘a recently prepared a spectacular, multi-course lunch for Ke Ola magazine Co-Publisher Barbara Garcia and this writer.

“After I invited you folks for lunch and asked your preferences, I meditated on what to make, thinking about how to use the breadfruit, and what you might like,” mused Olelo pa‘a, who grew up on an O‘ahu sugar plantation. “I plan my menus but I also go with the flow and may change things when it’s time to get busy.”

Similar to other cooks in the kitchen, Olelo pa‘a says she talks to the food and asks aloud, “What am I going to do with you?”

“To me, breadfruit is a gift to us from the land; it is a connection to the land, which I respect and recognize,” she emphasizes.

“When I receive food, I pay attention and honor it by using it to the best of my ability.”

Believing that everything, animate and inanimate, is energy, Olelo pa‘a confides she talks to the land everyday. “I ask, ‘How can I be of service to you?’ I say, ‘Thank you, I love you, Hawai‘i.’ The land is telling me to share the mana‘o (belief ) that we are all stewards of the land and we’re here to mālama (care for) it.”

She believes we each need to take 100 percent responsibility and let go, and in doing so, “what is right and perfect unfolds.” She shares, “I cleanse myself of any negative energy or memories I may have with the land where the food is grown. This allows me to be inspired, working with the purpose of the food.”

Olelo pa‘a adds that often we can walk around doing tasks unconsciously and miss the opportunity to do things consciously.

She likes to go outside in her yard, look at her surroundings, listen to the wind and feel the energy it offers.

“The more we pay attention to nature, the more nature shares with us,” the culinary guru continues. “You have to be in the moment and let go to go with the flow. The more I do things that way, the more things become effortless and joyful.”

Olelo pa’a’s love and enjoyment of preparing and serving food was evident during our lunch, which starred breadfruit and a host of local ingredients. When cooking, the chef goes to great effort to always use as much locally grown ingredients as possible. “Sure it tastes better and it’s fresh, so better for you, but it’s the right thing to do,” she says. With each dish she placed before us, she talked about how each component made the dish just right.

First Course

First up was a fresh lobster and yellow tomato gazpacho garnished with ogo (an edible red seaweed) relish and served with a chunky guacamole and deep-fried ‘ulu (breadfruit) chips. When she served this beautiful course, she stated, “I’m discovering ‘ulu tastes good with fat (like that in the guacamole’s avocado), but it can also be used in recipes with less fat.”

She also shared the details about every ingredient she used, peppering the conversation with anecdotes about food producers, “The lobster is from Keahole’s Kona Cold Lobsters, they are such honest and hard-working folks.”

Second Course

Salads were served next, using boiled breadfruit. First, a dish with fresh green beans and a Creamy Soy Dressing, followed by ‘ulu salad topped with poached salmon. “Breadfruit can be used like a potato, or starch, in making refreshing salads,” she said, smiling with delight at the variety of delicious combinations.

Third Course

The next course featured tender, shredded grass-fed beef in a delicious broth with chunks of boiled ‘ulu. It was spectacular! The golden sweet flavor of the ‘ulu came through the fragrant broth, which was garnished with slices of red tomatoes. “Isn’t the grassfed beef wonderful?” she asked us as we savored every drop of the flavorful liquid.

Dessert Course

While taking a whole roasted ripe breadfruit out of the oven to prepare our dessert, Olelo pa’a said she has always liked breadfruit, which can easily be used as both a vegetable or a fruit in recipes.

For dessert, she scooped out the “meat” of the whole breadfruit, similar to a squash. She served it warm with ice cream and a flaming, orange flambé sauce perfectly flavored with award-winning Koloa rum. I brought some of the roasted breadfruit home and repeated the dish, heating it up in the microwave and tweaking the sauce with lilikoi juice, instead of orange. Used this way, breadfruit acts like banana.

Olelo pa‘a recently became a champion for breadfruit after meeting Dr. Diane Ragone of the Breadfruit Institute at Kaua‘i’s National Tropical Botanical Garden. The institute promotes the conservation and use of breadfruit for food and reforestation, manages the world’s largest collection of breadfruit and is engaged in a global hunger initiative for food security.

The chef used two kinds of breadfruit for our lunch, but said Dr. Ragone has collected more than 200 varieties and “there are even more.”

After reading an article by Dr. Ragone, Olelo pa’a asked her how to get some breadfruit when she couldn’t find it here. She wanted to use breadfruit to prepare food for a North America media trip produced by the Hawai‘i Visitor’s Bureau. “Dr. Ragone and I became friends and I felt her passion for her mission to end starvation and hunger with breadfruit,” she said.

This spring, Dr. Ragone invited Olelo pa‘a to Kaua‘i to do an educational video on how to cook with breadfruit. At press time, the video is still in production.

“Breadfruit is one of the world’s highest-yielding food plants,” says Olelo pa’a. “Dr. Ragone and another colleague have identified productive and nutritious varieties.“

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Fresh lobster and yellow tomato gazpacho, garnished with ogo relish and served with a chunky guacamole and deep-fried ‘ulu (breadfruit) chips

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 47

Fresh, local, full of aloha.

The versatility of breadfruit is one of its attributes, she says, and by showing others how to use it, she hopes to change the perception that it is an unknown food. “I want to encourage its use and help make people feel comfortable using it.”

Olelo pa’a says she feels “grateful and honored” that she works with food and can tell the story of how to use it. “I think working with food has opened doors for me on all levels: professionally, personally and spiritually,” she muses.

“Having lunch prepared by Chef Olelo pa’a was not only a wonderful experience in breadfruit tasting, it was also a heartwarming experience, observing her connection to the ‘aina (land),” said Barbara. “I never knew breadfruit could be prepared so many different ways and taste so good.” ❁Continued on page 48

‘Ulu Green Bean Salad by Chef Olelo pa’a

A delicious broth featuring shredded Hawai‘i Island grass-fed beef with chunks of boiled ‘ulu.

❁Continued from page 47 When asked why she felt it was important to cook for us, Chef explains, “Part of it is honoring you and your time and Ke Ola’s effort. I want you to feel the essence and the best way is to taste, see and feel the transformation of the food. It’s like your mom’s cooking, you can feel the love.”

And we did. For the land, for the food, for each other and for the Creator of all, we were surrounded by love. ❖ Resources: National Breadfruit Institute: www.breadfruit.org Chef Olelo pa’a: www.glowhawaii.com

48 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Contact writer Fern Gavelek at ferng@hawaii.rr.com.

4 - 6 servings Ingredients: 1lb. peeled and large cubed, cooked, immature breadfruit 8 oz. green beans; blanched 1 cup fresh, blanched corn kernels 2 hard-boiled and shredded eggs (I use farm raised eggs from Hawai‘i Island) Creamy Soy Dressing: 1 cup mayonnaise 1 tsp. soy sauce 1 1/4 tsp. mirin wine 1/4 tsp. fresh lemon juice Mix dressing ingredients in a bowl. Place breadfruit and vegetables on a platter and serve dressing on the side or place on the beans and top with the shredded boiled eggs. For a lighter version, squeeze our locally-grown lemon and drizzle olive oil on the salad with a sprinkle of sea salt. Enjoy.

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Kale in their garden

The Life

Light (left) and Sun, two of the original founders of Gentle World

OF THE LAND

I

The Transition

Things weren’t always so peaceful, however.

Forty-one years ago, Sun and her husband Light were witness to a graphic film that depicted how animals are slaughtered.

That bloody carnage motivated them to change their carnivorous lifestyle.

“We were idealistic, we were going to find the truth. It was a very powerful time and going vegan felt right,” said Sun, who chose her name. Like her husband Light and other Gentle World members, Summer and Sky, they select a single moniker, believing that names are powerful. You associate yourself with that identity, and so they chose something associated with nature, and perhaps something to reach for.

“I felt liberated. It was a different kind of freedom,” she said.

But back then, they didn’t even know there was a word for non-carnivores. There were no vegan cookies or vegan pizza, let alone a health food store. About the only thing they knew was safe to eat was spaghetti. So, they started to grow their own

food and gradually stopped eating and using any animal products whatsoever.

“People told us we were going to die. They said ‘What are you going to eat?’” said Light. “It was a big thing for us back then.”

Hard-core vegans eat nothing that has to do with animals or their by-products. This includes meat, dairy, and byproducts like honey. Their diet is entirely plant-based and they do not wear leather, wool or silk.

The origin of the word ‘vegan’ is largely credited to Donald Watson, who, in 1944 created the first Vegan Society to promote a philosophy that aims to exclude all forms of animal cruelty, exploitation and animal products.

Extreme, yes. The Vegan philosophy is one based in an intrinsic belief that doing harm, any harm, is the root of all that is wrong with the world. It promotes a life based in kindness.

As you can imagine, living your life by this conviction is at odds with what most of the rest of the world is doing. So, when Sun and Light began this journey 40 years ago, they sought out like-minded people for support and a sense of community. They formed Gentle World as a way to educate.

“People know why, but not how,” Sun said. “So we teach people the basics, step by step, what to buy and how to replace the foods they love with plant-based food.”

The original members of Gentle World started experimenting and trying to re-create the foods they loved with plant-based ingredients. Things like lasagna and carrot cake. The results were so successful they wrote the first vegan cookbook, Incredibly Delicious; The Vegan Paradigm Cookbook, published in 1980.

“We make everything taste like something else. And that’s the point. You don’t have to be without,” Sun said.

A lot of the meat and dairy substitutions are soy- or wheatbased. Milk is made from rice, almonds or sunflower seeds;

❁Continued on page 50

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 49

t’s easy to dismiss peace of mind and peace on planet Earth as utopian ideals. However, a visit with our vegan friends, with 40 years of a truly peaceful lifestyle under their belts, gives us tangible proof that we are actually evolving in that direction.

(Disclaimer: this writer is a carnivore.)

Gentle World is a 30-year-old, non-profit organization based in Kohala, dedicated to the vegan way of life and helping create a more peaceful society by educating people about the reasons for being vegan, the benefits of a plant-based life, and how to go about making that transition.

“The only thing to live for is what you believe in,” said Sun, one of Gentle World’s founders. “When your conscience is at peace, your body is at peace.”

“Poof”

50 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

❁Continued from page 49 eggs are replaced with a soy-based product. Tofu and seitan, another wheat-based product, serve as meat replacements, and nutritional yeast is used like cheese. Nutritionally, tahini is high in calcium, dark greens such as kale and spinach are high in magnesium, and nutritional yeast is high in vitamin B12.

Sun admits that getting people to change their eating habits can be difficult.

“We had to give up our comfort foods. But once the transition is made, it’s better all around,” she said. “Now, there is not enough time in the day to eat all I want, and I don’t have to worry about gaining weight.”

Initially, learning new techniques takes effort, as does getting past addictions, one of the most difficult of which is cheese.

Unnatural to begin with -- what other animal drinks the milk of another? -- research has found a molecule in cheese called “casein” that has similar properties to morphine, which is why it is one of the hardest foods to give up. (More can be found by googling Dr. Campbell the China study, and casein.)

“People look at it as a challenge, and overlook the rewards of being vegan. The rewards are so far beyond anything you might give up,” Sun said.

Indeed, studies have shown the vegan diet to be more than nutritionally adequate, with less chance of heart attacks and cancer. At a recent routine check-up, the nurse was astonished that 74-year-old Light is on no medications.

In fact, no one at Gentle World has any health issues. Any health issues they did have, previous to switching to a plantbased diet, have completely disappeared. For example, Angel had asthma and skin problems, Sun had colitis and chronic bladder infections.

Young people are still in touch with their right and wrong buttons, and they trust their motivations, Sun explained. For older people, the switch to a plant-based diet usually happens because of health issues.

“They (older people) all have something wrong with them,” Sun stated. “The profound thing is, veganism helps all of it. We don’t worry (about our health) the way others do.”

Gentle World even extends the vegan diet to their pets, with the help of supplements. Their rescued dog, Valiant, stands tall with a shiny coat, bright eyes and a clean bill of health from the veterinarian.

The very first vegan cookbook, written

by Gentle World in 1980

Banini (Vanilla Malted Shake)

Sunshine (left) and Angel chopping greens from their garden

The Global Evolution

For more detail, go to gentleworld.org. Sign up for their newsletter or check them out on Facebook.

Contact writer Cynthia Sweeney at sweeneywrites@yahoo.com

Slice frozen bananas. In a blender or Vita-Mix, start with three cups of ice cold water. Add the remaining ingredients and blend. Slowly add more water until it reaches desired consistency.

Optional: Add 1 Tbsp maple syrup or ¼ cup vanilla soy milk (or other non-dairy milk) Variation: Add fresh strawberry, carob, mint or peanut butter

Zucchini Mushroom Baked Omelette | Serves 4 1 onion, diced 8-9 mushrooms, sliced 2 medium-sized zucchini, diced dash of tamari or substitute 1/2 t. dried dill weed dash of garlic and onion powder nutritional yeast (to taste) 2 lbs. (4 C.) medium-firm organic tofu, rinsed & drained 2 T. tahini 1 t. turmeric 2 T. nutritional yeast 2 T. tamari or substitute 1/2-1 T. herb seasoning (such as Herbamare) 1. Sauté onion in oil or water until translucent. Add mushrooms and zucchini with a little tamari, dill, garlic and onion powder and a sprinkle of nutritional yeast. Cook until soft.

2. Mash tofu in a bowl. Add remaining ingredients and mix.

3. Add sauté to the tofu batter and mix well.

4. Flatten batter onto a baking sheet lined with baking paper (batter should be about one inch high). Bake in a pre-heated oven at 350° for 30 minutes or until golden-brown.

These recipes have been reproduced from Incredibly Delicious: Recipes for a New Paradigm by Gentle World, which includes over 500 recipes and all sorts of tips to help make the transition to veganism easy and delicious.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 51

New Zealand is a place largely known for its meat and dairy.

Gentle World also has a sister site there. They have a farm with over 450 acres on the Northern Island, with several vegan-organic gardens including large watermelon patches and a wide variety of vegetables, fruit and ornamental trees.

“Ten years ago, when we first started the center there, ‘vegan’ was a bad word,” Sun confided.

Today, health and vitality is more than enough reward for the choice they made 40 years ago. The fact that the rest of the world seems to be catching on, is icing on the carrot cake, so to speak.

“For many years we spoke to people who were not interested,” Light observed. “Now there are more than ever.”

Indeed, former president Bill Clinton, in a widely documented effort, recently went on a plant-based diet to lose weight for his daughter, Chelsea’s wedding. Dr. Oz, Oprah’s health guru, is now touting the benefits of eating vegan. And, even more exciting, there is a cornucopia of new products on the market including vegan ice cream and vegan pizza.

“Things we dreamed of,” Sun said. “You can pretty much have it all. The truth is out. People are evolving and becoming more aware.”

While Gentle World is a living testament to the health benefits from a plant-based diet, their philosophy extends to environmental and spiritual issues as well. As Sun said, the lifestyle is almost a religion, and the awareness of not killing animals can extend to regard for human life as well.

“To say it is a diet does it such a disservice,” said Sun. “It’s not just a diet. I really feel that vegan evolution is the greatest hope we have for peace on earth.” ❖

4 cups ice cold water (but don’t add ice to the blender) 4 bananas, peeled & frozen 1 fresh banana 1/4 cup tahini 1 tsp. vanilla

North

Saturday & Tuesday: Hawi Farmers Market, North Kohala, across from Post Office and Nakahara Store, under the banyans (Saturdays 8 a.m. – whenever everyone goes home; Tuesdays 2 – 6 p.m.)

Saturday: Waimea Town Market at Parker School, 65-1224 Lindsey Rd., Waimea/Kamuela.

8 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Saturday: Waimea Hawaiian Homestead Farmers Market, 64759 Kahilu Rd., located at Kuhio Hale Bldg. (off of Mamalahoa

Hwy., two miles east of Waimea town). 7 a.m. – noon Saturday: Honoka‘a Farmers Market, Mamane St., Honoka‘a, Honoka‘a Trading Co., Old Botelho Bldg. 7:30 a.m. – 2 p.m.

Tuesday & Friday: Kekela Farms Organic Farmers Market, 64-604 Mana Rd., Waimea. 100% organic. 2 – 5 p.m.

Wednesday: Midweek Farmer’s Market, Anna Ranch, 65-1480 Kawaihae Rd., (nestled beneath Hoku‘ula, aka Buster Brown), Kamuela. 12:30 – 5:30 p.m.

East

Sunday: Laupahoehoe Farmers Market. Next to the Minit Stop on Hwy. 19. 9 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Sunday – Monday: Panaewa Hawaiian Home Lands Farmers Market, Puainako and Ohuohu Streets by Walmart, Hilo.

8 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday & Thursday: Hilo Farmers Market, corner of Mamo and Kamehameha Ave., downtown Hilo. 7 a.m. – 4 p.m.

Sunday: Akebono Farmers Market. Luquin’s/Akebono Theater parking lot.

7 a.m. – 2 p.m.

52 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Sunday: Maku‘u Farmers Market, Kea‘au-Pahoa bypass road. 8 a.m. – 2 p.m.

Tuesday – Saturday: Kea‘au Village Market, 16-6550 Old Volcano Rd., Kea‘au.

7 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Saturday: Kino‘ole Farmers Market. Kino‘ole Shopping Plaza, 1990 Kino‘ole St., Hilo, 7 a.m. – noon Saturday: SPACE Farmers Market, S.P.A.C.E. Seaview Performing Arts Center for Education, 12-247 West Pohakupele Loop, Kalapana.

8 a.m. – noon Saturday: Hilo Coffee Mill, 17-995 Volcano Rd., Mountain View (on Hwy. 11 between the 12 and 13 mile marker).

8 a.m.–1 p.m.

Saturday & Wednesday: Hilo Farmers Market, corner of Mamo and Kamehameha Ave., downtown Hilo. 6 a.m. – 4 p.m.

Please send info on new markets or changes to editor@keolamagazine.com.

South

Friday: Green Market, Ocean View Community Center, 92-8924 Leilani Circle, Ocean View. 2 – 6 pm.

Sunday: Volcano Farmers Market, Cooper Center, 1000 Wright Rd., Volcano Village.

6 – 9 a.m.

Saturday & Wednesday: Na‘alehu Farmers Market, Ace Hardware lawn.

8 a.m. – noon

West

Saturday: Keauhou Farmers Market, Keauhou Shopping Center, Keauhou.

8 a.m. – noon Saturday: Waikoloa Village Farmers Market, 68-3625 Paniolo Ave., Waikoloa Community Church parking lot across from Waikoloa Elementary School.

7:30 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Sunday: South Kona Green Market, Captain Cook, Kealakekua Ranch Center (behind ChoiceMart and Ace Hardware).

9 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Wednesday: Kings’ Shops Farmers Market, Waikoloa Beach Resort, Kohala Coast.

8:30 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Wednesday: Keauhou Wednesday Market, Front lawn, Outrigger Keauhou Beach Resort.

10 a.m. – 2 p.m.

Wednesday-Sunday: Kona Farmers Market, corner of Ali‘i Drive and Hualalai Rd. 7 a.m. – 4 p.m.

The Soi and Choy Family of Greens

T

By Devany Vickery-Davidson

An amazing way to use tatsoi is in a Thai appetizer called miang kham (leaves with garnishes). You may use bok choy leaves, choy sum or spinach leaves for this recipe that seems to delight everyone who tastes it. You can view the recipe with step-by-step pictures at: http://bit.ly/ct6hlR There is only one restaurant on the island that serves this dish, Lotus Café in Kona.

Wilted Asian Greens

This is an easy salad/side dish idea to use with tatsoi, but you could also use baby bok choy in this recipe. Mizunza is another Asian green used in salads and is available locally: ¼ cup rice vinegar (not seasoned) 3 tablespoons soy sauce 2 ½ teaspoons sugar 1 ½ teaspoons finely grated, peeled fresh ginger 1 ½ teaspoons Asian sesame oil 6 cups pea shoots or pea sprouts (3 oz.)

6 cups tatsoi (3 oz.)

6 cups mizuna (3 oz.)

1. Heat vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, ginger, and sesame oil in a small saucepan over moderately low heat, stirring, until sugar is dissolved (do not let boil). Pour hot dressing over greens in a large bowl and toss well. Serve immediately.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 53

hese luscious, healthy greens, bok soi and bok choy, historically have been used in Asian Cuisines, but their abundance has led to incorporating them in a variety of ways. As sturdy greens, they are most commonly braised, and also can be used in some interesting ways. For example, use them in place of spinach in pasta or Greek dishes, and they are great tossed into soups and stirfry. Bok soi and bok choy are available all year on Hawai’i Island. They are grown organically and locally in Hilo and near Waimea and readily available at most farmers markets and some health food stores on the island.

The dark green leaves of these greens are high in beta-carotene and Vitamins A, C, and K; they also have good amounts of calcium, potassium, phosphorous and iron.

The most common of these greens is bok choy, also known as pak choi or spoon cabbage. In most common types—white-stemmed, green-stemmed, and “soup spoon”—both the leaves and stems are edible. Baby bok choy, the sweetest and most tender of the bok choy, is becoming more and more available around the world.

Choy sum is also known as yu choy; one type is called Chinese oil vegetable and another is Chinese broccoli. The slightly-bitter stems are more tender than the leaves, although all parts of the vegetable, even the tiny yellow flowers, are edible. Thick stems should be trimmed, peeled, then steamed or poached.

Tatsoi is less common and is also called spinach mustard, spoon mustard or rosette bok choy. It is more tender than and not quite as bitter as many Asian greens. When grown to maturity, tatsoi looks like a rosette with the leaves growing larger and larger in a concentric circle. Braising or slightly wilting the greens brings on a new flavor.

They become rich and dark and are best when the stems are still slightly crunchy.

By Fern Gavelek

T

PAVA

Three island-grown fruits combine to make PAVA. –Photo courtesy of KTA Superstores

he PA stands for PApaya and the VA is for GuaVA. PAVA is an island juice beverage specifically created to use up the excess crop of these two island fruits. The juicy jive also includes pineapple, Maui cane sugar and water. As such, the nectar is made with all Hawai‘i ingredients and is totally manufactured on Hawai‘i Island.

Derek Kurisu, executive vice president of KTA Super Stores, is credited with planting the seed for PAVA around 2003. As the founder of the Hawai‘i Island grocery chain’s locally-produced Mountain Apple line of products, Derek was aware of the need to use the island’s excess fruit, including the “cull crop,” or fruit with market imperfections.

Two students at the University of Hawai‘i’s College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources (CTAHR) were tasked with forumulating such a product, and the final recipe was chosen after conducting local taste tests.

The production of PAVA involves two Big Island companies: Calavo Growers in Kea‘au and Meadow Gold in Hilo. Calavo works with Hawai‘i Island papaya and guava growers to create the

54 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Angelo Jose and his wife Luisanna Jose of Kea‘au are some of the local farmers who supply fruit for PAVA through membership in the Hawai‘i Guava Growers Co Op. –Photo by Eric Weinert, Calavo Growers Inc.

puree used to make PAVA. The company leases over 1,000 acres of land in Puna to 30-some members of the Hawai‘i Guava Growers Cooperative, based in Kea‘au.

A commercially developed variety of guava—Beaumont—is sourced from them.

“We buy the papaya from these farmers and provide them with packing and distribution services,” explains Eric Weinert, general manager of Calavo’s Hawai’i operation. He says Calavo processes over one-half million pounds of guava and papaya annually to make PAVA. The papaya and guava purees are not only used for PAVA, but also other products, which are sold to customers in Hawai‘i, Japan and the U.S. Mainland.

Fruit for PAVA is de-seeded and put through a juicer before going through aseptic processing, a flash-heating pasteurization that destroys any bacteria and gives the puree a longer shelf life.

After sealing in sterilized packaging, the processed guava and papaya are delivered to Meadow Gold in Hilo for turning into PAVA. To finish the nectar, pineapple juice, cane sugar and water are added and the beverage is pasteurized. It’s packed in half-gallon cartons, designed by Hawai‘i artist Eddy Yamamoto.

Kurisu says PAVA has more vitamin C than orange juice—an eight-ounce serving provides 150 percent of the Daily Food Value, or what you need each day.

Enjoy samples of PAVA at the Meadow Gold booth at Mealani’s Taste of the Hawaiian Range on Sept. 30. PAVA is sold as a readyto-serve beverage in the refrigerator dairy case at KTA Super Stores in Kailua-Kona, Keauhou Shopping Center, downtown Hilo, Hilo-Puainako, Waimea Center and at Waikoloa Village Market at Waikoloa Highlands Center. For info, phone 989-5555.

Meetthefarmers Meetthechefs

Farmer-Chef Presentation the last Saturday of each month during 2011 at the Keauhou Shopping Center

FEATURING LOCALLY GROWN PRODUCE Learn how the Farmers grew it, watch the Chefs prepare it, and taste the results! FREE!

Brought to you in partnership with the USDA FARMERS’ MARKET PROMOTION PROGRAM

Lavalicious Toffee

T

Story and photos by Denise Laitinen

Theresa Brulc of Volcano

A 3-D toffee replica of the Big Island, made entirely of Lavalicious toffee. The lava flow has coffee sprinkled in chocolate with red Korean pepper flake, the snow capped peaks of Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa are coconut, Green Sand beach is crushed pistachios, and the beaches on the Kona Coast are crushed macadamia nuts.

Where to find Lavalicious: Volcano Farmer’s Market, every Sunday from 6 – 9:30 a.m. and occasionally at Sea View Farmer’s Market, Kalapana, Saturdays, 8 a.m. – noon. For more info: Phone 808.238.8912; website www.Lavalicious@live.com. Lavalicious is also on Facebook.

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SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 55

heresa Brulc of Volcano didn’t want her kids to eat a lot of processed, packaged food, so she created a Hawaiian version of a childhood favorite: English toffee.

“My toffee has three ingredients: pure cane sugar, butter, and vanilla. English toffee is traditionally made covered in chocolate and almonds,” explains Theresa. “I wanted to make mine with local ingredients, so I use macadamia nuts instead of almonds.”

Lavalicious offers eight to 12 different flavors of toffee, depending on the time of year. The tantalizing toffees include: Snow Capped Mauna Kea (white chocolate coconut toffee), Eruption (salty and spicy), and Tsunami (macadamia nut, coconut, white and dark chocolate). Other flavors include macadamia nut, coffee, lilikoi coconut, lilikoi macadamia nut, dark chocolate coconut mint, cinnamon, ling hing mui, and pineapple coconut.

“I’m the first person to do these innovative flavors,” says Theresa.

“People have never heard of cinnamon in toffee before and they’re surprised at how good it tastes. Lilikoi is the one flavor that sells out every time, no matter where I go.” All are made from local ingredients.

Even the vanilla is locally grown and produced at the Hawaiian Vanilla Company in Pa‘auilo.

Fortunately folks don’t have to limit themselves to choosing just one type of toffee. Lavalicious toffee comes in distinctive, 10 oz. green metal tins, and you can choose up to four different flavors to fill the tin. The toffee tins are extremely popular for Christmas gifts, as well as corporate thank-you gifts. Aside from the sampler tins of toffee, she also sells 2 oz., 4 oz., and 6 oz. bags of a single flavor toffee.

“The most popular thing I make is a 3-D image of the Big Island that is geographically correct,” says Theresa. The large image of the Big Island is made entirely of toffee and covered in chocolate. She even creates mountain peaks for Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa and uses toppings to represent other island features. The special toffee creation is served at events on a koa plate surrounded by fresh hibiscus flowers or on a platter covered with ti leaf.

Lavalicious, buttery Hawaiian toffee can be found at farmers’ markets and craft fairs around the island. It’s served to guests at local bed and breakfast inns and at catered functions. Theresa also worked with the chefs at several restaurants—Kaleo’s in Pahoa and Kilauea Lodge in Volcano—to create a dessert featuring her toffee along with ice cream.

56 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

The Life IN MUSIC

S

Auntie Nona, as everyone calls her, cooked up the idea for a week-long immersion music camp 10 years ago, when her son Keola’s career was at a turning point.

“I was doing a workshop in Seattle,” he says. “I only had three hours, then I had to go do a gig somewhere else and another workshop. I would hear the music being played, but I never had any time for the context.” The room, the notes, the rhythm seemed flat.

A weird disconnect between his music and the sense of place that inspired it led him back to Hawai‘i to see his mom.

“She said, ‘You know what, Keola, it’s because you don’t have the time, and because of that, you can’t explain the context. We need to ask people to come to Hawai‘i to join us,’ and that’s how Music Camp was started.”

Here at Keauhou, overlooking the iridescent waters of Kahalu’u Bay, students enjoy what Keola calls “contextual learning,” studying the living history of Hawai’i in the ancient royal compound.

Amid three carefully tended heiau and secret gardens sprouting pūnāwai, or freshwater springs, the Beamer ‘ohana message falls on fertile ground.

Moanalani Beamer, Keola’s wife and Camp Kumu Hula, chants the traditional welcoming oli, the “Oli Aloha,” describing the aromas of hala and lehua. She learned from Auntie Nona that “the plants represent male and female presences in the ancient tradition. The chant says that, like the male and female, we have long awaited your coming, and now that you’re here, love has come with you.”

Keola picks up the thread of her story. “You know when Moana was talking about these fragrances, it reminds me that in Hawaiian culture we really believe in learning in the context of the environment.

When Moana smells a green rose [and dances the Green Rose Hula], it fills her whole being. She knows it. She has sensed Beamer Family Portrait it.” This sensitivity is the – Photo courtesy of the context for the music and Beamer family the culture, he says.

❁Continued on page 58

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 57

lack key artist Keola Beamer, world traveler, performer, composer and master musician—a Hawaiian who has earned a place on Billboard’s Top World Music Albums chart – also has a sense of place.

Today it’s Keauhou, a historically significant locale that has become the new site of the Beamer ‘ohana’s bi-annual Aloha Music Camp, an authentic Hawaiian immersion experience led by expert teachers. In a not-so-accidental coincidence, the place has special meaning to the family’s heritage [see page 72, “Ka Puana”]. It is near the site of a major battle involving a direct descendent, Chiefess Manono, wife of Kekuaokalani, who challenged King Kamehameha II for Hawaiian spiritual beliefs.

It’s late June at this year’s summer camp, and a scent of green rose floats in the moist air at the Keauhou Beach Resort. A gathering of students and first-rate artists: Hawaiian slack key guitar, ‘ukulele and hula; voice, lei-making and oli; ancient arts of ipu- and ‘ukulele- making. And adding to the experience: how to charge a field with chant, build ‘ohana, savor the value of timeless, fun-loving talk story—parts of Hawaiian culture you can’t read about in Atlanta or study in the musical tablature. You have to be here, in the context, in Hawai’i, says Keola, to have the Hawaiian sense of place.

Keola, who feels at home on Hawai’I Island, where he grew up on the Beamers’ Waimea ranch, says, “Each island has its mana, or its spiritual essence.”

On the resort lanai, the lively ‘ohana is talking story, an art that Keola enjoys almost as much as strumming the strings of his custom-made, Dennis Lake slack-key guitar.

“The Chinese would say its chi, its energetic spirit; certain places have their different sort of micro energies. Whenever I’m on Kauai, for example, the energy there is dangerous because I feel that I should just. . . . surf.” A sudden burst of laughter. “And the last time I did go surfing there, after about 30 years, I got on a board and I was paddling out and this arm got tired.” He droops one of his famous hands down toward the floor. More laughing. “And I heard someone swimming up behind, a young woman, and she goes, ‘Uncle, you need help?’”

Keola’s comic look of disappointment cracks up everyone on the hotel’s Kama’aina Terrace. The gentle man with large, graceful hands, white hair and magnetic eyes credits his famed mother, the late Winona Kapuailohiamanonokalani Desha Beamer, for the many traits and skills she left to all her sons, hānai daughters and an extended network of protégés around the world.

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58 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

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With an extended ‘ohana of devoted artists, scholars and supporters, the Beamer family believes that here at Keauhou students can feel Hawaii’s ancient family Luthier Dennis Lake helps students complete their own ‘ukulele in just one week, using a cigar tree, both roots and branches, box as the body – Photo by Karen Valentine and carry the ❁Continued from page 57 story forward.

Mohala Hou, meaning Hawai‘i’s “new blossoming,” is the name chosen a decade ago for the Beamers’ non-profit foundation, which offers scholarships and programs for youth-at-risk and others who want to immerse themselves in island culture at Aloha Music Camp.

“We’re really grateful, says Keola. “I mean, like the Reverend Dennis Kamakahi, [also a kumu at the camp], we all came from the guitar world, and at one time we were afraid this would die out completely. As a culture, we were holding the information so tightly so all the tunings were secret. A family passed them down from father to son. It was so hard to learn. There was no written material.”

That changed when Keola, at the age of 19, wrote the first method book on Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar, based on a 16th century tablature system for the lute. All this, to “keep aloha alive,” says Keola. “Mālama ko aloha.”

Monday: Pō‘akahi (poh ah-kah-hee)

Away from the hum of modernity, on the slopes of Hualalai volcano, turning down the din of surface noise and turning up the volume on the ancient calming breath, the breath of the long ha.

The Ma-Ha-lo. Gratitude.

Luthier Dennis Lake is offering “Build Your Own Pineapple Ukulele” in the coconut grove. Then Kumu Kapono’ai Molitau is helping a dozen students meld two gourds to make custom ipu heke that will accompany the voices in his oli class.

Under the soaring white tent in the Royal Gardens, the subject today, like every day, is love and melody, love and texture, love and tempo.

Tuesday: Pō‘alua (po ah-loo-a)

Even though the lesson is hula, the class is making lei. And even though Moanalani Beamer began hula training at the age of four with Kumu Hula Johnny Hokoana and later starred in Maui’s prestigious hotel shows, her guiding influence was Auntie Nona, her beloved mother-in-law.

“Today’s project is really small,” she says, her mellow brown eyes smiling. “We know the numbers of fern tips needed for haku lei, and we pick only those.” Leading dancers in the fundamental preparation for hula, connecting with nature, the search for natural lei materials must be conscious. At a ti plant, she says, “Don’t pick it clean. Leaving behind stuff is okay. Not everything is for you. If you’re a hoarder, no.”

Returning to the hula tent, Moana shows how to lay out greens, ferns and flowers in organized lines to create the kupe’e, ankle adornments, that bond dancers with the earth.

In the intermediate hula class later, dancers’ arms and hips flow to the tunes of “Henehene Kou ‘Aka” – “You Laugh so Pleasingly.”

Bridges between ground and sky, with ‘ami and kāholo, we move on gliding feet. Slack key guitar and heavenly voices in the distance.

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Wednesday: Pō‘akolu (poh ah-ko-loo)

❁Continued on page 60

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SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 59

Sounds of playful strings. In the cool, fragrant Banyan Gardens, Kaliko Beamer-Trapp is teaching intermediate ‘ūkulele. Relaxed students sit on chairs under an open-air tent with sheet music perched in front of them. Some barefoot, some Hawaiian, some not, everyone is attentive.

Kaliko is strumming, talking, answering cell phones, taking messages, singing, and saying, “I can’t believe we’re doing all this in a week. What key are we in?” Kaliko laughs.

“F,” somebody declares.

“What key do you want?” says Kaliko. “It’s up to you. Just be sure and add a C7 here. Just give it some strummy stuff.” They dive into the frolicking plink plink, plink plink of “Beautiful Kahana,” a song by Mary J. Montano from Auntie Nona’s songbook and interpreted into English by Kaliko himself.

Playing loose, free and on key a few minutes later, all the students unify.

Kaliko, a British scholar, came into Auntie Nona’s family at a time when she feared the culture would die out. The Beamer family made him hānai in 1995 in a surprise ceremony, and he now teaches in the Hawaiian Language program at Kumu Kapono’ai Molitau teaches UH-Hilo when he’s not students how to make an ipu heke producing language that will accompany the voices in his immersion CDs. oli class.

To put an exclamation mark upon these facts, you have to look back to the 1930s, when Nona was a student at Kamehameha School, a time when the Hawaiian educational system had outlawed the cultural language, dances and songs! Auntie, at age 16, orchestrated school protests, singing and—Pele forbid—doing standing hula during a tea for the school trustees—offenses for which she was suspended…twice.

“My mother used to be very saddened by that,” says Keola Beamer. “She had to go to Columbia in New York and take anthropology because that is the closest she could get to a teaching degree in Hawaiian culture.”

“Where there was no Hawaiian language class,” adds Moanalani. “So she had to take German!” Auwē!

Those experiences infused Auntie Nona and the Beamer extended family with an unwavering passion for restoring, rediscovering and sharing the genuine forms, tones and tonics of real “Hawaiiana,” a term the grand lady of Hawaiian culture coined herself in a 1948 speech to teachers.

❁Continued from page 59 Music campers from Iowa, Japan, Hilo and Hawi find the ancient platform for creativity, the shrine that blossoms under watchful eyes of appreciation, the perspective Auntie Nona emphasized more than any. Appreciating what the rest of the planet seems to have forgotten: mahalo and music, movement and mana.

In the papa ‘olelo language class on the Kalanikai Lanai, Kaliko teaches that the feeling behind the words conveys everything.

Being as careful with ‘okina placement and pronunciation as in finger-plantings on the slack key guitar with Keola, the learning catches you off-guard. You’re picking up the voice, the sound and the kauna—hidden messages behind the words—because they’re fun, pleasurable, sweet.

60 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

Thursday: Pō‘aha (poh ah-ha)

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We always go the extra step for you, whatever it takes!

In Melinda Caroll’s voice training class, the teacher intones, “All the parts, all your voices, create this beautiful texture. Relax, enjoy, make your move, and let yourself go into the sound. Whatever comes out, let’s just have fun,” says Melinda, another of Auntie’s protégés. Textured men’s voices blend with the sopranos, not yet perfect, but moving, perky yet soothing.

It does what Auntie Nona said music must do. “It’s more important what you feel,” she said. “The feeling is what translates to the doing. And without feeling, there is no doing. So you don’t transmit it to other people unless something is ignited in your heart. Whether it’s good or sad or bad, it’s got to start there first.”

KonaBob, aka Robert Stoffer, stands beside Melinda, serving up the backbeat with his fretless, lightweight wonder, the Walkingbass. The creativity of people never ceases to amaze me.

In Hawai’i, geniuses are like geckos. Under every palm tree.

Outside on the Kama’aina Terrace, we overlook King David Kalākaua’s Po’o Pond and the ancient canoe landing. More talk story. Keola muses on the “full circle of learning” fostered at Music Camp. “The music is a vehicle for the culture we come from,” says Keola. “We all come up different sides of the pyramid, Moana with her hula, me with the guitar stuff, and Kopono’ai with the oli.

We’re all working towards the same place of ‘mālama ko aloha.’

Keep the aloha alive. It’s all about music and all about aloha.”

A group of school children are preparing to sing “Hawai’i Pono’i” on the verandah. “There’s a full circle of learning here,” Keola points out. “See those Explorations Academy students there. Mom and Dr. Mitchell had this outreach van at Kamehameha Schools on O‘ahu, where they would go to different places and have their workshops, then get back in the van, and go around and teach,

Linda Nagai

Shawn Sato

Helping you create those magical memories

Melinda Caroll conducts voice class while KonaBob plays the WalkingBass (left) overlooking the gardens at Keauhou Beach Resort – Photo by Karen Valentine

just the two of them. That blossomed into Explorations all across the state, and so I really feel my mom’s presence when I look at these kids.”

A blessing shower of rain begins to fall on the glistening green of Keauhou.

It’s only Thursday but the expectation over Saturday night’s hō‘ike is palpable.

Hō’ike means “show or revelation.” As I wonder what Lono and Laka Kaliko Beamer-Trapp teaches both Hawaiian will reveal on language class and beginning ‘ukulele. – Saturday night, Photo by Karen Valentine the sun sets and a rainbow rises to surprise us. The whole western sky glows in streams of purple, rose and gold.

Friday: Pō‘alima (poh ah-lee-mah)

The dappled light of another day in paradise awakens, warm but clear, blue and fresh. Cool breezes flow down from Hualalai and late afternoon showers chase away any remnants of tropical lassitude during this day of preparation for Hō‘ike. Everyone lets the mana flow and the body remember what its cells have absorbed all week.

Saturday: Pō‘aono (poh ah-o-no)

RESOURCES: Aloha Music Camp c/o Mohala Hou Foundation ~ www.alohamusiccamp.com ~ Phone: 1.808.531.6617.

The Mohala Hou Foundation offers programs to expand Hawaiian cultural understanding and practice through “Guitars in the Classroom” and a scholarship program for kumu, kūpuna and Hawaiian youth to attend Aloha Music Camp ~ www.maholohou.org.

Winter Camp is scheduled for February, 2012 Read more about www.kbeamer.com and www.konaweb.com Contact writer Marya Mann at marya.mann@gmail.com.

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SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 61

How beautiful Hō‘ike is! Nobody knows what’s going to happen. Newly crafted ‘ukulele and ipu heke are displayed.

Their proud creators grin. Flowers in hair, aloha shirts, ti leaf lei.

Audience and performers, everyone is talking story. Drenched in pleasure, we watch as the liquid fire of strings, the cool tones of ipu and a breath of fresh aloha takes the stage. Bravaloha!

Something magnificent glows inside the students, the teachers, the expectant audience members. A light behind the eyes, the secret gleam of sonic ecstasy. When neurons switch into their naturally pono positions, is that beaming a state we could actually call a “beamer”? Expanded smell, sight, touch, taste, sound and feeling. A field beyond words.

That’s why we make music and dance! ❖

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62 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

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September-October 2011 ❖ H A P P E N I N G S ❖

SEPTEMBER 4-Way Stop Friday, Sept. 2 Hilo Opening reception for Randy Takaki, Kaori Ukaji, Stephen Lang and Randy Shiroma’s mixed media, 2-D, 3-D installation in clay, paper, wood, concrete and metal. East Hawai‘i Cultural Center, 141 Kalākaua Street. 5:30 p.m. Exhibits open Sept.

3-28, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. except Sunday.

808.961.5711.

15th Annual Run For Hope Friday – Sunday, Sept. 2 – 4 Hualalai Resort Three-day event at Four Seasons Resort Hualālai in Ka‘upulehu benefits cancer research in Hawai’i. Taste of Hawai’i Island on Friday night features some of the island’s best chefs and restaurants; Saturday offers golf scramble and tennis tourney; Sunday is the 10K Run/5K Run/Walk. 808.325.8052 or www.fsrh.net/pr/run_for_hope.pdf.

Queen Lili‘uokalani Canoe Races

37th Parker Ranch Round-up Club Rodeo Saturday-Sunday, Sept. 3-4 Waimea Annual fundraiser provides scholarships for school-age children of Parker Ranch employees. Two days of family-style fun offers team roping, bull riding, bareback broncs, barrel racing and more. Parker Ranch Rodeo Arena in Waimea, noon to

Hilo Hula Days 100 Days of Aloha by the Bay

Saturday, Sept. 3 Waikoloa Beach Resort Part of Hawai’i Island Festival; 30 Days of Aloha, noon at Hilton Waikoloa Village.

Help sustain the festival by purchasing keepsake ribbons. The ribbons and a fee are required to attend the festival’s Ms. Aloha Nui, Poke and Falsetto Contests. hawaiiislandfestival.org.

All Tuesdays plus Sept. 15, 22, 23 and 30 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. rain or shine. Free at the Mo’oheau Bandstand on the Bayfront of Historic Downtown Hilo. Live Hawaiian entertainment with the Mo’oheau Seranaders and special guests. Coordinated and produced by the Hilo Downtown Improvement Association. 329 Kamehameha Ave. 808.935.8850 or askalice@downtownhilo.com.

East Hawai‘i Dance Festival Contest

Words and Wine, Local Authors

Poke Contest

Saturday, Sept. 3 Hilo Divisions for Hula, Ballroom, Swing, Foreign and Break Dance at the Palace Theatre, $10 Adv/$12 Door. 6 p.m.

808.935.9085 or ehcc.org.

Kindy Sproat Falsetto & Storytelling Contest Saturday, Sept. 3 Waikoloa Beach Resort Part of Hawai’i Island Festival; 30 Days of Aloha, 6 p.m. at the Waikoloa Beach Marriott. Help sustain the festival by purchasing keepsake ribbons. The ribbons and a fee are required to attend the Ms. Aloha Nui, Poke and Falsetto Contests. hawaiiislandfestival.org.

Kona Style Slack Key Guitar Festival Sunday, Sept. 4 Keauhou Hawai‘i’s trademark method of tuning and playing the guitar “slack-key” is showcased at this free music festival. Fifteen of the best slack-key artists from Hawai‘i and the Big Island perform authentic Hawaiian music. Noon - 5 p.m. Outdoors at Sheraton Keauhou Bay Resort and Spa in Keauhou.

808.226.2697 or www.slackkeyfestival.com.

Upcountry Faire Monday, Sept. 5 Kealakekua Christ Church Episcopal partners with Family Support Services in a day of family fun activities: games and prizes, bouncy castle, keiki pony rides, Momentum Climbing wall, face painting and balloon animals.

Lots of food and treats. Over 3,000 square feet undercover—rain or shine. 9 a.m.

– 2 p.m. at Christ Church, at the bottom of Konawaena High School Road. Free.

808.323.3429, 808.328.7345 or email bjkoala@pendragonhawaii.com.

Tuesday, Sept. 6 Keauhou Kona Stories book store in the Keauhou Shopping Center hosts a local author reception with free wine and pupus the first Tuesday of each month at 6 p.m. Meet three or four local authors, who offer 10-minute presentations of their work.

Q & A and talk story. 808.324.0350.

Ka Ulu Lauhala O Kona Festival Wednesday – Saturday, Sept. 7 – 11 Keauhou Weaving Master Aunty Elizabeth Lee presides over this 16th annual lauhala retreat offering workshops, craft fair, fashion show and more at the Keauhou Beach Resort.

Registration: 808-989-6008. Accommodations: 808-324-2515 and request the Lauhala Conference room rate. Details: http://sites.google.com/site/kalululauhalaokona/.

Art and Traditions of Hula at Kilauea Thursday, Sept. 8; Saturday, Sept. 24 Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park Kumu Maile Yamanaka presents a handson educational lesson in basic hula 10:3011:30 a.m., lei making noon-1 p.m. and basic ‘ukulele/Hawaiian music 1:30-2:30 p.m. at Volcano Art Center Gallery inside Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park. Free; park entrance fees apply. 808.967.8222 or www.volcanoartcenter.org.

12th Bamboo Festival Sunday, Sept. 11 Papaikou The Hawai‘i Bamboo Society presents its annual bamboo festival 8 a.m. – 3 p.m. at the Papaikou Hongwanji, located on the makai side of Hwy. 19, between mile markers 7/ 8, north of Hilo on the Onomea Drive scenic loop. Vendors, demos and exhibits. 808.315.9870.

❁Continued on page 64

First time in KONA !

Makalapua Stadium Cinemas October 15 1pm

Donezetti’s

ANNA BOLENA October 29 1pm

Mozart’s

DON GIOVANNI November 5 1pm

Wagner’s

SIEGFRIED November 19 1pm

Glass’s

SATYAGRAHA December 10 1pm

Gounod’s

FAUST January-April 2012 6 more operas including MANON and LA TRAVIATA Co-presented by Aloha Performing Arts Company and Kahilu Theatre Foundation

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 63

Friday – Monday, Sept. 2 – 5 Kona Coast The largest long-distance canoe race in the world, the Queen Lili‘uokalani Canoe Race attracts dozens of canoe hālau (clubs) and hundreds of paddlers from Hawai‘i and beyond. The event features single- hull, double-hull and individual races along with a torchlight parade, dance and lū‘au awards ceremony. 808.334.9481 or www.queenliliorace.com.

sunset both days. Sunday 9 a.m. livestock auction. Food vendors. 808.885.7311 or www.parkerranch.com.

METROPOLITAN OPERA HD LIVE

❁Continued from page 63 Fiction Book Club Tuesday, Sept. 13 Keauhou Kona Stories book store in the Keauhou Shopping Center hosts the Fiction Book Club each month on the second Tuesday, 6:30 p.m. Call in advance to find out what the group is reading; bring a pupu or beverage to share and join in. Free.

808.324.0350.

Kupuna Hula Festival Wednesday – Thursday, Sept. 14 – 15 Keauhou Some of the most experienced and talented kupuna (elders) hula dancers perform at the Sheraton Keauhou Bay Resort and Spa. Hawaiian crafts fair both days 8 a.m. – 4 p.m. Performances start 5 p.m. 808.322.1812 or hawaiiislandfestival.org.

Native Hawaiian Birds Program and Hike Keauhou Bird Conservation Center and Kipuka Puaulu Saturday, Sept. 17 Volcano See and learn about native Hawaiian birds at the Keauhou Bird Conservation Center (KBCC), located in Volcano. It is part of The Zoological Society of San Diego’s Hawai‘i Endangered Bird Conservation Program, which aims to aid endangered species at

❖ H A P P E N I N G S ❖ the landscape level. Jack Jeffrey and KBCC staff lead tour and hike. After lunch at Kipuka Puaulu, drive 10 miles to the top of Mauna Loa Road and hike one-mile round trip to see native bird species in the wild. 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. Lunch is included.

808.887.6411 or info@kohalacenter.org.

Na Mea Hawai‘i Hula Kahiko Performance Saturday, Sept. 17 Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park See traditional hula and chant performed outdoors on the hula platform overlooking Kīlauea Crater, featuring Halau Hula Kalehuaki‘eki‘eika‘iu. 10:30 a.m. Hawaiian cultural demonstrations at Volcano Art Center Gallery, 9:30 a.m. - 1:30 p.m.

Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park. Free; park entrance fees apply. 808.967.8222 or www.volcanoartcenter.org.

Paniolo Parade and Ho‘olaulea

Saturday, Sept. 17 Waimea Part of the Hawai‘i Island Festival, this parade celebrates the Hawaiian paniolo or cowboy with many colorful entries and Hawaiian Island princesses on horseback.

Followed by crafts show, games, arts, island food and entertainment.

10 a.m. – 4 p.m. Free. Fun for the whole family. 808.936.4376.

La ‘Ike Day at Kahalu’u Bay

Fifth Peace Parade & Festival

Saturday, Sept. 17 Kona Celebrate the culture and science of Kahalu’u Bay with ono food, Hawaiian music and entertainment, fresh lei making and coconut weaving. The ReefTeach team shares information about coral reefs. Presented by The Kohala Center and sponsored by the Hawai’i Tourism Authority. 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Kahalu’u Beach Park main pavilion, Kailua-Kona. Free. 808.895.1010, email cpunihaole @kohalacenter.org or www.kohalacenter.org/kahaluubay/ about.html.

Sunday Sept. 18 Honoka’a [See Spotlight] The Fifth Parade & Festival for United Nations International Day of Peace. Parade begins at 11 a.m., festival from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Honoka’a Sports Complex with music, food booths, silent auction and a big community Bon Dance. www.PeaceDayParade.org or email info@peacedayparade.org.

Aloha Saturday Festival Saturday, Sept. 17 Hilo Free Hawaiian Concert at Kalākaua Park, Noon – 4 p.m. 808.961.5711 or ehcc.org.

Fall Art Market Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 17 and 18 Volcano Village Weekend of exceptional fine arts, featuring original works of photography, painting, jewelry and sculpture available for sale directly from artists. Free art demos and hands-on activities, local foods and more. 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. Volcano Art Center Niaulani Campus, Volcano Village.

808.967.8222 or www.volcanoartcenter.org.

HAWAII ARTISTS

64 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

I Big Island Arts Annual.com

Spotlight:

Fifth Peace Parade & Festival

Sunday Sept. 18 Honoka’a Drum, march and dance—give peace a chance! The Fifth Parade & Festival for United Nations International Day of Peace is a free, multicultural, multi-generational event to celebrate peace, compassion and awareness of global interdependence.

Parade starts off 11 a.m. with marching bands, dancers, taiko drummers, colorful floats, street performers and more. From 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., enjoy food and fun in the

Honoka’a Sports Complex with live music, food booths, silent auction and a community Bon Dance. www.PeaceDayParade.org or email info@peacedayparade.org.

Photo info: Honoka‘a Elementary School students in international costume – Photo by Glory Guerpo

Paula Fuga – Free Concert Sunday, Sept. 18 Kailua-Kona To launch Kau Kau Kailua Restaurant Week, Hawaiian reggae songstress Paula Fuga, who has collaborated with the likes of Jack Johnson and Ziggy Marley, will perform a free concert during the monthly Kokua Kailua event, when Ali‘i Drive becomes a festive pedestrian-only marketplace.

5 – 6 p.m.

Kokua Kailua Hulihe’e Palace Concert and Village Stroll Sunday, Sept. 18 Kailua-Kona Free band performance on the palace’s lawn at 4 p.m., presented by the Daughters of Hawai‘i. This month’s event honors Queen Lili‘uokalani. Bring your own beach mat or chair. 808.329.9555.

Kau Kau Kailua Sept. 18 – Sept. 24 Kailua-Kona In the Hawaiian language, “kau kau” means food and this week-long event is all about letting visitors and residents experience delicious food at a variety of restaurants in the historic and charming village of Kailua on the Kona Coast. Waterfront dining, superb three-course dinner menus and much more with special menus and values. Log on to www.HistoricKailuaVillage.com for complete details and a sneak peak at menu offerings posted to date.

Check back often as restaurants continue to add their Kau Kau Kailua Restaurant Week menus to the site.

Oceans -11 MTS/IEEE Kona Education Symposium Monday-Thursday, Sept. 19 – 22 Waikoloa Beach Resort Major international conference at the Hilton Waikoloa Village expected to attract more than 2,000 participants, with leading experts in the fields of ocean engineering, technology and conservation. Theme: “Oceans of Opportunity: International Cooperation and Partnerships Across the Pacific.” Education Symposium is open to local educators. The full conference features tutorials, comprehensive technical program of lectures and presentations, student program, and oceans technology trade exhibition. The last time Hawai`i

❖ H A P P E N I N G S ❖ creations, cook-off, propagation information, culture and history, arts and crafts and more. Free. 9 a.m. – 3 p.m. Amy B.H. Greenwell Ethnobotanical Garden.

808.960.3727 or www.breadfruit.info.

Spotlight:

Breadfruit Festival—Ho‘oulu ka ‘Ulu Saturday, Sept. 24 Captain Cook “Rooted in the Past and Bearing Fruit for the Future,” celebrates breadfruit or ‘ulu at Amy B.H. Greenwell Ethnobotanical Garden from 9 a.m. – 3 p.m. The garden also unveils its new visitor center at noon with a dedication. Enjoy cooking demonstrations by local celebrity chefs, food booths featuring breadfruit; judging and sampling of the “I Love Breadfruit” Cook-Off Contest, where anyone can enter their favorite breadfruit dish. Contest is open to all Hawai‘i Island residents (see details online). Entries due Sept. 12.

Enjoy Hawaiian and Pacific Islander cultural activities including ‘ulumaika (breadfruit bowling), talks on the culture and history of breadfruit, ‘olelo no‘eau

Earthdance 2011 Friday – Sunday, Sept. 23 – 25 Honoka‘a Part of the world’s largest synchronized music and dance festival for peace, presented by Off the Grid Productions and uniting over 500 locations in 80 countries

(proverbs), woodworking, quilting demonstrations, tapa making, ‘ulu poi making and more. Workshops on breadfruit propagation, tree care and maintenance, economic opportunities, the Hunger Initiative and other topics presented by experts Dr. Diane Ragone and Ian Cole of the Breadfruit Institute of the National Tropical Botanical Garden. Art exhibit of finalists in a fine art contest and a youth poster contest. Breadfruit trees are available for sale on festival day, but supplies are limited and advance purchase for pick-up at the festival is encouraged by contacting hooulu@hawaiihomegrown. net. www.breadfruit.info.

Photo by Craig Elevitch

worldwide. Come and join in the weekend of camping, music, art, vending and dancing on 250 acres at the Kava Farm in Honoka’a. Located between Honoka’a and Pa’auilo, around the 39-mile marker. Live bands, DJ, laser light show, fire dancing, visual art, organic food venders and more. www.Offthegridpro.com or Facebook.com/Offthegridpro.

Breadfruit Festival Saturday, Sept. 24 Captain Cook [See Spotlight] A celebration of the culinary culture of this staple of the Hawaiian diet. Breadfruit cooking demos by local chefs, food booths with breadfruit

Saturday, Sept. 24 Hilo Panaewa Rainforest Zoo celebrates Namaste’s 14th birthday with his traditional “ice cake” featuring 14 bone candles this year—presented at 9 a.m. At 10:30 a.m., he receives a special birthday present. Free cake and ice cream for everyone at noon while supplies last. A special turkey dinner will be given to Namaste at 3:30 p.m. Live music all day; keiki games, crafts, petting zoo, face painting and more. Fundraiser supports Friends of the Zoo. The Panaewa Zoo’s hours are 9 a.m. -4 p.m. daily. Free.

808.959.9233 or www.hilozoo.com.

Lions Feast 2011 Saturday, Sept. 24 Kailua-Kona Lions Club of Kona fundraiser at Maka’eo Pavilion at Old Airport Beach Park, 5:30 – 9 p.m. A feast featuring local grass-fed steak and fresh Keahole lobster. Lots of pupu, fresh fruits and desserts, including a chocolate fountain.

Entertainment by Ernie Cruz Sr., Jeff “Kumu” Keanaaina, and Kona Daifukuji Taiko Youth Group. $55 presale/$65 at the door. 808.987.1029 or www.e-clubhouse. org/sites/konahi/calendar.php.

Sunday, Sept. 25 Hilo Annual festival celebrating the birthday of Hawai‘i’s beloved Queen Lili‘uokalani, the last reigning monarch of Hawai‘i—held in the beautiful surroundings of the queen’s historical namesake, Lili‘uokalani Gardens.

Music, food, hula, flower drop and multiethnic dancing. Hula by worldwide hula hālau; music by major island entertainers.

Shuttle to and from Civic Auditorium parking area. 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. 808.961.8706.

Nonfiction Book Club Tuesday, Sept. 27 Keauhou Kona Stories book store in the Keauhou Shopping Center hosts the “Just the Facts” Nonfiction Book Club on the fourth Tuesday each month, 6:30 p.m. Call in advance to find out what the group is reading; bring a pupu or beverage to share and join in. Free.

808.324.0350.

Art and Traditions of Hula at Kīlauea Saturday, Sept. 24 Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park Kumu Maile Yamanaka presents a hands-on educational lesson in basic hula 10:30-11:30 a.m., lei making 12-1 p.m. and basic ‘ukulele/Hawaiian music 1:302:30 p.m. at Volcano Art Center Gallery, Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park. Free; park entrance fees apply. 808.967.8222 or www.volcanoartcenter.org.

Photo courtesy Mealani’s Taste of the Hawaiian Range

Mealani’s Taste of the Hawaiian Range and Agricultural Festival Friday, Sept. 30 Waikoloa Beach Resort The 16th annual ag extravaganza touts the isle’s grass-fed beef industry while bringing together local ranchers, farmers,

❁Continued on page 66

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | 65

hosted this conference was in 2001, in Honolulu. It is expected to pump about $5 million into the Big Island economy.

Registration available in variety of categories, from Life/Emeritus member to student non-members with participant fees varying accordingly—single day participation or full conference. Interested educators may also register for the Education Symposium on the web site. http:// www.oceans11mtsieeekona.org/main. cfm/CID/16/Registration/.

Birthday Celebration For Namaste, The White Bengal Tiger

Ka Queen Lili‘uokalani Hula Festival He Hali‘a Aloha No

❖ H A P P E N I N G S ❖ restaurateurs and food fans to taste dishes prepared by 35 of the state’s top chefs.

Hilton Waikoloa Village, 6 – 8 p.m. Culinary stations feature grass-fed beef, pork, lamb, goat, mutton and wild boar—plus fresh island fruit and vegetables. Food vendor and sustainability booths; talk story with the people growing our island food. “GrassFed Beef Cooking 101” class at 3 p.m. This year’s guest presenter is KTA’s Derek Kurisu of TV’s “Living in Paradise.” Tickets online at http://www.TasteOfTheHawaiianRange. com. $40 presale and $60 at the door; cooking demo fee is $10. 808.987.3432.

OCTOBER Saturday, Oct. 1 Kapa‘au The Big Island’s biggest country fair expands to a new 10-acre location in Kapa‘au, one mile past the King Kamehameha Statue, makai of ‘Iole Road.

Fair features live, all-day entertainment, more than 150 food and craft booths, a keiki zone, and old favorite contests like Spam-carving and lua decorating. In the arenas, watch the graceful “Hawai‘i Paso Fino” horses’ dance and see paniolo riding and roping. 9 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. Free.

808.333.8712 or www.kohalacountryfair.com.

Portuguese Festival Saturday, Oct. 1 Kealakekua Portuguese immigrants, among various ethnic groups to settle in Hawai‘i, are honored with this event to showcase their heritage, cuisine and culture.

Enjoy cultural demonstrations such as saddlemaking, agricultural products, food booths featuring Portuguese favorites,

The Art & Traditions of Hula at Kīlauea Saturday, Oct. 1 Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park Kumu Leilehua Yuen and Manu Josiah present a hula kāhiko “informance” at the hula platform 10:30-11:30 a.m., lei making demonstration 12-1 p.m. and basic ‘ukulele / music lesson 1:30-2:30 p.m. at Volcano Art Center Gallery, Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park. Free; park entrance fees apply. 808.967.8222 or www.volcanoartcenter.org.

Hilo Hula Days - 100 Days of Aloha by the Bay All Tuesdays plus Oct. 3, 5, 7, 13, 17, 22, 27, 28 and 31 Hilo Live Hawaiian music and hula with the Mo’oheau Seranaders and special guests.

11 a.m. – 1 p.m. rain or shine. Free at the Mo’oheau Bandstand on the Bayfront of Historic Downtown Hilo. Coordinated and produced by the Hilo Downtown Improvement Association. 329 Kamehameha Ave. 808.935.8850 or askalice@downtownhilo.com.

Words and Wine, Local Authors Tuesday, Oct. 4 Keauhou Kona Stories book store in the Keauhou Shopping Center hosts a local author reception with free wine and pupus the first Tuesday of each month at 6 p.m. Meet three or four local authors, who offer 10-minute presentations of their work.

Q & A and talk story. 808.324.0350.

©2011 Alzheimer’s Association. All Rights Reserved.

66 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

27th Annual Kohala Country Fair

live entertainment, as well as historical exhibits. At Kona Historical Society’s pasture in Kealakekua. 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.

Free. 808.322.2788 or www.konahistorical.org.

THE TEAM LEADER WHO SAW A DISEASE STEAL HER MOTHER’S PAST

Faces of Hawai‘i

Moku O Keawe Kapa Festival

Oct. 1 – Oct. 22 Volcano Village A unique photography exhibition portraying the faces of Hawaii’s people, with entries selected by Craig F. Walker, staff photographer for the Denver Post and 2010 winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Photography, to be compiled into a book, Faces of Hawai‘i. Volcano Art Center’s Niaulani Campus, Old Volcano Rd. Free.

808.967.8222 or www.volcanoartcenter.org

Friday – Sunday, Oct. 7 – 9 Captain Cook Learn about the native Hawaiian art of kapa, a cloth pounded from the bark of the wauke tree and decorated with natural dyes. Three-day workshop for both expert and beginner kapa artists. Hawaiian arts, music, hula performances and food create a festive atmosphere. Visitors try their hand at kapa making. Amy B.H. Greenwell Ethnobotanical Gardens, Hwy. 11 in Captain Cook. 9 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. Free.

808.323.3318 or www.bishopmuseum.org.

Jazz: Terence Blanchard Thursday, Oct. 6 Waimea Kahilu Theater presents New Orleans jazz musician Terence Blanchard. With more than 29 albums to his credit, the multiGrammy Award winner and nominee, was awarded for his instrumental solo for “Be-Bop” on “Live at the 2007 Monterey Jazz Festival,” and in 2008, for his CD, “A Tale of God’s Will (A Requiem for Katrina),” a beautifully haunting and impassioned song cycle about Hurricane Katrina. 7 p.m.

Tickets $25-$65. Box Office: 808.885.6868 or www.kahilutheatre.org.

23rd Trash Art Fashion Show Friday, Oct. 7 Hilo Trash Art Contest awards presentation and opening reception for the Trash Art Exhibit.

Exhibit opens Oct. 8-26, 10 a.m.-4 p.m., except Sunday. Free. 808.961.5711, East Hawai‘i Cultural Center, 141 Kalakaua St.

Hilo Wayfinding Festival Friday – Sunday, Oct. 7 – 9 Hilo Third annual event celebrates historic sailing feats of Pacific peoples using celestial navigation along with current efforts to revive and expand skills and interest in long-distance canoe voyaging. Free activities include panel presentations and workshops led by Hawai‘i’s master canoe navigators. Imiloa Astronomy Center.

808.969.9704 or www.imiloahawaii.org.

THE TEAM LEADER WHO SAW A DISEASE STEAL HER MOTHER’S PAST HILO AND IS DETERMINED Hilo, Hawaii NOT TO LET IT TAKE Mo`oheau Bandstand HER DAUGHTER’S FUTURE. Saturday, Oct. 15, 2011 8:00 AM BE A PART OF THE MOVEMENT

“Little Shop of Horrors” Oct. 7 – 23 Hilo The Palace Theatre presents its 10th annual production of “Little Shop of Horrors,” a rock musical about a hapless florist shop worker who raises a plant that grows out of control and feeds on human blood. Music in the style of early 1960s rock and roll, doo-wop and early Motown. Fridays and Saturdays, Oct. 7, 8, 14, 15, 21 and 22 at 7 p.m.; Sundays, Oct. 16 and 23 at 2:30 p.m.

Box office open 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday - Friday [except holidays]. For credit card orders, 808.934.7010.

Big Island Woodworkers and Artists Exhibit Oct. 7 – 27 Hilo The forests of the Big Island abound in native and exotic hardwoods, which star in this show as beautiful pieces of furniture made by island woodworkers. Exhibited with other art media, including oil paintings and glass sculptures. Artists’ reception Friday, Oct. 7, from 5 – 7 p.m. Wailoa Center. Free. Weekdays only 8:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. (noon – 4:30 p.m. Wednesday).

808.933.0416.

alz.org/walk

TO RECLAIM THE FUTURE. KONA START A TEAM. JOIN A TEAM. 800.272.3900 Old Kona Airport - Pavilion #3 Kailua-Kona Saturday, Oct. 1, 2011 8:30 AM Onsite Registration WALK NAME | LOCATION | DATE | TIME

©2011 Alzheimer’s Association. All Rights Reserved.

❁Continued from page 65

❖ H A P P E N I N G S ❖ Ford Ironman Triathlon World Championship Saturday, Oct. 8 Kona/Kohala The top 1,800 triathletes from around the world (50 countries and 50 states) converge in Kona for the Superbowl of triathlon events: a 2.4-mile ocean swim, a 112-mile bike and a 26.2-mile run.

This is the big one – a world-class sports event! Temporary road closings in Kona.

813.868.5929 / 813.868.5914 or www.ironman.com/worldchampionship.

“The Diary of Anne Frank” Oct. 8 – 22 Kainaliu In this transcendentally powerful, stage adaptation of the beloved autobiography of a WWII Holocaust victim, Anne Frank emerges from history a living, lyrical, intensely gifted young girl, who confronts her rapidly changing life and the increasing horror of her time with astonishing honesty, wit and determination. An impassioned drama about the lives of eight people hiding from the Nazis in a concealed storage attic. Fridays and Saturdays, Oct. 8, 14, 15, 21 and 22 at 7:30 p.m.; Sundays Oct. 9 and 16 at 2:30 p.m. Tickets $5 – $20, reservations recommended; also at the door one hour prior to show time.

Order online at www.apachawaii.org. 808.322.9924 or email info@apachawaii.org.

An Evening with Cyril Pahinui and Peter Moon

Tues., Oct. 11 Keauhou Kona Stories book store in the Keauhou Shopping Center hosts the Fiction Book Club each month on the second Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. Call in advance to find out what the group is reading; bring a pupu or beverage to share and join in. Free.

808.324.0350.

Cemetery Tours at Kona’s Christ Church Fridays, Oct. 14, 21 & 28 Kealakekua Join costumed interpreters from the Kona Historical Society through the cemetery of one of the island’s oldest churches—Christ Church in mauka Kona—as they relay stories of famous residents and ordinary citizens buried there. 6 p.m. at Christ Church in Kealakekua, at highway intersection with Konawaena High School Road.

808.323.3222 or www.konahistorical.org.

Vog Relief

Aloha Saturday Festival Saturday, Oct. 15 Hilo Free Hawaii Concert in Kalākaua Park, Noon - 4 p.m. 808.961.5711 or ehcc.org.

BALANCE & HARMONY'S Vog Relief is the first formula readily available to provide relief from the unique hazards of Vog.* It is a concentration of high quality pure herbs in vegetable capsules, which allows for rapid delivery and assimilation of the herbs.

Kona Chocolate Festival and Symposium Saturday, Oct. 15 Keauhou This sweet and distinctive festival celebrates chocolate, chocolate and more chocolate. Taste creations by the top chefs and chocolatiers of the Big Island, enjoy wines, gourmet dining, live music and more. Keauhou Beach Resort.

808.987.8722 or www.konachocolatefestival.com.

Kona History Cruise Sunday, Oct. 16 Kona Coast An ocean adventure aboard a sailing catamaran to learn about some of the

❁Continued on page 68

"I've been taking Vog Relief for several months now and have enjoyed the benefits. I'm grateful for this natural, herbal remedy."

- Barbara Garcia, Kona

Available at: MALAMA COMPOUNDING PHARMACY, KEALAKEKUA HEALTHWAYS II, PARKER RANCH SHOPPING CENTER, WAIMEA KONA NATURAL FOODS, CROSSROADS SHOPPING CENTER, KAILUAAKONA The statements here have not been evaluated by the Food & Drug Administration.These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. The use of herbs during pregnancy or while nursing is not recommended, unless used under medical supervision.

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Saturday, Oct. 8 Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park Cyril Pahinui, son of music legend, Gabby Pahinui, is one of Hawai’i’s most gifted guitarists and singers. He performs with another Hawaiian music legend, Peter Moon, perhaps best-known for the incredibly popular and influential “Sunday Manoa” recordings. Kilauea Theater in Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park. Tickets $30. No reserved seating. 808.967.8222 or www.volcanoartcenter.org or email concerts@volcanoartcenter.org.

Fiction Book Club

❖ H A P P E N I N G S ❖

KAHILU THEATRE e Terencard Blan. c6 h7PM OC T

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68 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

BOX OFFICE 885-6868 M–F 9am-3pm

Nonfiction Book Club

❁Continued from page 67 many interesting Hawaiian historical sites found on the Kona Coast. Sponsored by the Kona Historical Society with narration

by Kona’s John Mitchell. Enjoy pupus and drinks. 2 – 5 p.m. Fee. 808.322.2788 or www.konahistorical.org.

Kokua Kailua Hulihe’e Palace Concert and Village Stroll Sunday, Aug. 15 Kailua-Kona Free Hawaiian hula featuring the Merrie Monarchs Men’s Glee Club on the palace’s lawn at 4 p.m., presented by the Daughters of Hawai‘i. This month’s event honors Princes Kai‘ulani. Bring your own beach mat or chair. 808.329.9555.

Puna Chefs and Farms Culinary Arts Festival Oct. 24 – Oct. 31 Puna This event is a full week of experiencing culinary delights at Puna dining spots, and, in hands-on classes, discovering secrets of creating wholesome, delicious HawaiianPacific cuisine, including sustainable aqua and agriculture production and meal presentation. At Kalani Oceanside Retreat near Pahoa in Puna. Fee. 808.965.0468 or www.kalani.com.

Tuesday, Oct. 25 Keauhou Kona Stories book store in the Keauhou Shopping Center hosts the “Just the Facts” Nonfiction Book Club on the fourth Tuesday each month, 6:30 p.m. Call in advance to find out what the group is reading; bring a pupu or beverage to share and join in. Free.

808.324.0350.

Hawaii Body and Beauty Trade Fair October 28-29 Hilo Variety of exhibits, demonstrations, seminars, entertainment, drawings. Winners need not be present. Entrance fee is good for both days. 10 a.m. – 7 p.m. AfookChinen Civic Auditorium Complex. Open to the public. 808.341.8614 or hawaii. babtradefair@gmail.com.

Obake– Ghost Stories Friday and Saturday, Oct. 28 and 29 Hamakua Coast Celebrate Halloween local-style at this popular annual event, an evening of spooky obake or ghost stories featuring Tita Kathy Collins. 7 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 28 at Motonaga Garage, Akiko’s Bed and Breakfast in Wailea Village at the 15-mile marker on Hwy. 19. $8 reservations 808.963.6422; and 7 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 29 at the Hotel Honoka‘a Club in Honoka‘a; $8, 808.775.0678.

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❖ H A P P E N I N G S ❖ “The Rocky Horror Picture Show”

Black & White Night

Friday – Monday, Oct. 28 – 31 Kainaliu Aloha Theater presents a Halloween cult classic. That sweet transvestite and his motley crew return to do the Time Warp again! Complete with sass from the audience, cascading toilet paper and an array of other audience participation props, this deliberately kitschy rock ‘n’ roll, sci-fi gothic is more fun than ever. 7:30 p.m. Tickets $17 – $20. Reservations recommended; sales also at the door one hour prior to show time. Order online www.apachawaii.org.

808.322.9924 or email info@apachawaii.org.

Friday, Nov. 4 Hilo Downtown Hilo’s biggest strolling party with numerous live music venues, fashion shows, a treasure hunt, free food, author and artist receptions. Everyone dresses in black and white, from shorts and T-shirts to gowns and suits to enter the “Best Dressed Black & White Contest” for cash prizes. 5 – 10 p.m. Free. 808.935.8850 or www.downtownhilo.com.

“Kulanihako`i: Living Waters” Saturday, Oct. 29 Waimea New hula drama featuring Kumu Hula Hokulani Holt at Kahilu Theatre. Drawing from epic Hawaiian myths over 2,000 years old to depict the many facets of water and its continuous relationship with the ocean, land and sky are told through the eyes of contemporary Native Hawaiians through hula kahiko, traditional chant, music and dramatic interpretation. 8 p.m. Ticket prices range from $25-$60. Box Office: 808.885.6868. www.kahilutheatre.org

Halloween Pet Walk

COMING IN NOVEMBER Moku o Keawe International Hula Festival Nov. 3 – 5 Waikoloa Beach Resort A multi-day event celebrating the hula and its arts, this festival features hula hālau (troupes) from Hawai‘i, Japan and elsewhere competing in kūpuna (senior), kahiko (ancient) and ‘auana (modern) divisions. Master instructors teach workshops and cultural classes. Waikoloa Beach Marriott Resort. 808.886.8822 or www.mokuokeawe.org.

Nov. 4 – 6 Captain Cook “Kalai” means carving in Hawaiian, and this event offers expert stone and wood carvers on site making poi boards and stones. Watch and learn about the tools, materials and process. Free. 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. Nov. 4 and 5; 10 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Nov. 6 at Amy B.H. Greenwell Ethnobotanical Garden, Hwy. 11 in Captain Cook.

808.323.3318 or www.bishopmuseum.org.

Kona Coffee Cultural Festival Nov. 4 – 13 Throughout Kona Since its inception in 1970, the Kona Coffee Cultural Festival’s mission has been to preserve, perpetuate and promote Kona’s 180year coffee heritage. This year’s celebration offers nearly 50 events including tastings, art exhibits, cupping competition, farm tours, contests, parades, sporting events and special events. 808.326.7820 or www.konacoffeefest.com.

Big Island Fall Arts Festival Exhibit

Nov. 4 – 23 Hilo This show highlights the creativity and talent in all media of top Hawai‘i Island artists, now in its 35th year. You can meet the artists on Friday, Nov. 4 from 5:30 – 7:30 p.m. at an opening reception. Otherwise the show is open in three galleries from 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. daily at the East Hawai‘i Cultural Center. Free. Call 808.961.5711 or visit www.ehcc.org.

Holualoa Village Coffee and Art Stroll Saturday, Nov. 5 Holualoa The Holualoa Village Coffee Stroll is a part of the annual Kona Coffee Cultural Festival.

Sample estate- grown Kona coffee from two dozen local farms at art galleries and roadside shops along Hwy. 180 in this mountainside artists’ community. Gifts, a keiki art contest, live music and more. 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. 808.322.8484 or www.holualoahawaii.com.

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Sunday, October 30 Hilo Hawai‘i Island Humane Society organizes this fun, family-friendly Halloween weekend event. Registration 8 a.m., walk 9 a.m.

Meet at Queen Lili‘uokalani Park. Contests and prizes. Walkers with or without pets are urged to raise pledges and support Hawai‘i Island Humane Society. Raise $50 or more in pledges and get a free tee shirt! www.FirstGiving.com/HIHSPetWalk to create your own or team fundraising page.

808.329.1175.

Kalai Open House

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70 | www.KeOlaMagazine.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011

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DOES YOUR BUSINESS NEED A JOLT? JOLT  

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T H E

L I F E

I N

B U S I N E S S

Glimpses into the stories behind a few of our ads

Jet Vacation

Ali‘i Woodtailors

T T

Paul Endresen (left) and Tom Sorensen, owners

he slogan, “Helping you create those magical memories,” explains the philosophy of Jet Vacation travel agency. Owner Linda Nagai says she followed her father’s dream of having a customerservice-based travel agency located on family property in Kona.

Linda, who was born and raised in Kona, was co-owner of a travel agency on O‘ahu when she took the opportunity to come home to Kona.

“The travel industry was not doing well because the airlines cut paying commissions to agencies, and Kona was saturated with travel agencies, so to keep my father’s dream alive I ran the travel agency out of my home, creating Japan tours and booking reservations for friends and family. As travel agencies started closing and people were having to pay high prices for travel, I felt that the time was right to open a travel agency storefront on our Ali‘i Drive property.

Linda’s daughter Shawn had joined her in the travel business in Honolulu and accumulated over 20 years of travel industry experience herself. She is now manager of Jet Vacation, and the mother-daughter team is working together “to be there for the people of Hawai‘i. Knowing that the economy has also affected them, we decided to dedicate ourselves to work at finding the best prices to make it possible for more people to experience a memorable vacation or just visiting friends and family,” Linda says. The agency assists with some business travel, but its main focus is leisure travel.

“Our hope is to assist the ‘locals’—whether for work or pleasure, we want them to enjoy their time away from home. For the visitors we want to help them to know that it’s reasonable to fly to Hawai‘i and offer guidance with places to visit and activities to enjoy that will give them a taste of Hawai‘i’s aloha spirit.

“For our customers, we take the stress out of hours of researching flights and other vacation needs. Our experienced staff will work on an itinerary to fit your travel needs, whether it be just a visit to the Disney properties, Las Vegas, international travel or even creating a special tour. Being a family-owned and operated business, we treat all of our customers as family and their travel plans as if we were the ones traveling. We can beat most Internet rates and charge no service fees on most tickets,” says Linda.

Location: 75-6000 Ali‘i Drive, Kailua-Kona, in front of Sea Village Condominium Phone: 808-329-5452 or 808-938-9164 (after hours) Email: shawn@jetvacationdestinations.com Website: www.jetvacationdestinations.com

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om Sorensen and Paul Endresen are the owners of Ali‘i Woodtailors custom woodworking shop in South Kona. The two master woodworkers became partners and opened their first business in Washington state in1984.

The two men moved to Hawai‘i in 2005 after vacationing here and found the old, well-built Noguchi coffee mill at the edge of Captain Cook. Its history dates back to 1928. They have generous floor space for all the exceptional quality woods, plus saws, sanders, drafting tables and office space needed.

Tom grew up in the woodworking trade in Denmark and Paul earned his master’s of fine arts at the Cornish Institute in Seattle, Washington.

Large contracts for cabinetry, doors and other wood decor require a crew of woodworkers. At times, Ali‘i Woodtailors supports the efforts of students who are completing their experience to attain graduation from European schools. This generous assistance stems from Tom and Paul’s awareness of what it takes to get through the layers of training to become master woodworkers. Of course, local highly skilled woodworkers are also regularly employed.

Fine homes and businesses around the island brag about the heirloom quality of design and production that Ali‘i Woodtailors provide. Clients relish the opportunity to work closely with Tom and Paul to get absolute satisfaction. This is exactly what tailoring is all about.

Location: One mile South of Kealakekua Ranch Center in Captain Cook on the mauka side of Mamalahoa Hwy. Phone: 808-640-2905 Email: woodtailors@yahoo.com

Owner Linda Nagai (at right) and Manager Shawn Sato

Tax planning is a year round event!

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808-329-3403

     

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T H E

L I F E

I N

B U S I N E S S

Glimpses into the stories behind a few of our ads

Fireplace & Home Center Fireplace & Home Center owners and trained consultants: (left to right) Kelly Whelan, Jeffrey Mermel, Sally Mermel, Mary Davy, Carole Makanui, Jennifer Pietri and Mel Bidal

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anet Louise, owner of Village Toy Shop, comes from a family of entrepreneurs. Her grandparents ran retail, tailoring and lodging enterprises and her parents owned an Italian restaurant, Giovanni’s Pizza, in Fullerton, CA. Growing up with these role Owner Janet Louise and some of models inspired her desire the educational toys on display at to be self-employed.

Village Toy Shop “Part of the reason I moved to East Hawai‘i in 2001,” Janet says, “is because I thought this would be a good place to manifest my vision, a place where ‘mom-and-pop’ businesses still successfully exist. Shortly after moving here I found myself at Wal-Mart looking for a birthday gift for a friend’s grand-daughter and I wondered ‘Where else can one buy toys in the Hilo area?’ With a little research I learned that there was a great need for quality, educational toys. My journey into the magical world of the specialty toy business had begun.”

The Village Toy Shop opened in 2004 in the Kea’au Village Market and two years later moved into downtown Hilo .

“We like being downtown, situated between two restaurants with good traffic, ample parking, nice restrooms, a great landlord and reasonable rent,” she says.

Janet analyzed the market and determined how to make Village Toy Shop a unique, ‘destination shopping experience,’ setting it apart from “Big-Box” stores.

“Small retailers cannot compete with national chains on price.

We can offer a variety of toys not found elsewhere in town, along with a fun shopping experience and help in selecting just the right toys,” she says, and is happy to report that the business is growing.

Parents, grandparents, teachers, therapists, aunties and uncles and the young (and young-at-heart) are all part of the Village Toy Shop customer base. It offers unique toys that encourage creativity and allow child-directed play. Shoppers will find the classic toys they remember from childhood and toys that help young children learn basic skills, art, science, music, games, construction and “active play.”

Janet has a background working with families as a child care provider and household manager. “Over the years I learned quite a bit about early childhood development and the value of open-ended, unstructured, creative playtime. It is my objective to develop this business so that it can continue on for generations to come. It’s exciting to know we’re creating childhood memories and contributing to the education and development of our community’s precious young people. I encourage everyone to look at our website for more information.”

Store location: 235 Waianuenue Ave., downtown Hilo Phone: 808-969-7888 Email: villagetoyshophilo@gmail.com Website: www.villagetoyshophilo.com

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effrey Mermel, founder and owner of the Fireplace & Home Center in Historic Downtown Hilo, says he learned about fireplaces or wood stoves back in 1979 when his fiancé, Sally, owner of The Most Irresistible Shop in Hilo, suggested he get a woodstove for his house in Volcano Village, where “I was trying to get her to move. She thought it would keep our house cozy and dry.”

After researching products, they ordered two woodstoves.

It cost about the same amount to ship two as one, he says, so they put the second one up for sale in Sally’s gift shop.

They then realized someone had to be on hand to help customers with technical questions and so Jeffrey, who was an artist at the time, found himself becoming a retailer.

They started carrying other brands of fireplaces and stoves, needing more display space, and soon The Fireplace & Home Center was born as a separate business. It is still located side by side with The Most Irresistible Shop in Hilo, sharing the same common doorway.

Over the 32 years since its founding in 1979, the Fireplace & Home Center has grown to carry all the major brands of stoves and fireplaces: Jotul, Heat & Glo, Morso, Heatilator and more. With customers across all the Hawaiian Islands they have found that “it isn’t just folks up in the mountains that want stoves and fireplaces. People get them to take the chill off, get rid of dampness when the rains come, and many just for the sheer joy of a cozy, crackling fire.”

Mermel says, “Nowadays, people also are turning to electric fireplaces and even ethanol, a biofuel that requires no chimney system.”

The specialty retailer also carries traditional Finnish saunas and the newer, infrared style of sauna, plus charcoal grills and smokers by Big Green Egg— a popular grill donated to many Big Island fundraisers.

The downtown Hilo showroom has more than 30 displays, arranged for the homeowner to visualize just how it would appear in their home. The sales staff are all highly trained to assist the customer in planning, design, installation and especially service after the purchase, says Mermel.

Location: 256 Kamehameha Ave., downtown Hilo Phone: 808.961.5646 Toll Free: 1.800.760.5646 www.fireplacehawaii.com

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Village Toy Shop

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before, and he leaves to go fight the battle. Manono watches, and early on, she sees her husband fall, shot in the leg. She runs down wailing. “`Auwē, make ke kāne, `auwē.” Then Kekua is shot in the head. He’s killed.

When Grandma told it to us, every time, I started to cry.

So Manono covers her husband’s face with his cape, picks up his spear and goes into the battle. And she keeps chanting, “Ko aloha la ea, Ko aloha la ea.” Keep your love, keep your love. No matter what obstacles come to Hawai`i, keep your love.

Boy, that’s pretty powerful. But it was real. In those days when the chief fell, the warriors pretty much ran away, but Manono had courageously come down from her hāli‘i pūnana, picked up her lover’s spear and carried forward into battle.

When the warriors saw her do that, they regained strength, and so she led the rest of them into battle. Princess Manono evoked the oli that became a major philosophical tenant in our family. It was “mālama ko aloha”—keep your love. Manono’s chant said to keep your love for the old ways of Hawaiian religion and culture.

While chanting “mālama ko aloha,” she was killed by a musket ball and perished.

The battle was lost and the surviving warriors were placed in a stockade. All night they chanted “mālama ko aloha,” and Kalanimoku, leader of the Monarchy troops, felt bad. After all, these were his countrymen too, and some of them his own family.

After they kept up this “mālama ko aloha,” all night, the next day, he released them from the stockade to return to their families.

— THE REFRAIN

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t was the time of great upheaval in Hawaiian culture.

The scene is 1819, the year of the death of Kamehameha I, a tumultuous time, and Liholiho becomes Kamehameha II. He is pushed by his mother Ka’ahumanu to favor the abolition of the kapu system, discarding the old religious ways.

The conservative Hawaiians led by High Chief Kekuaokalani and his wife, Princess Manono, have left Kamehameha’s royal court in Kailua and returned to the south end of Kona, near Keauhou.

In the chant, Manono asks her husband if she can take part in the fray, and he says no. He will fix a hāli`i for her, a nest made of uluhe fern. She can rest there and watch the progress of the battle, he says. But Manono wants to get in the fray. Kekuaokalani’s army, with only their hand-hewn spears and clubs, against Liholiho’s forces with cannon and musket. `Auwē. They were no match.

The Kamehameha lineage was very intelligent and they understood the potential of English weapons. Our ancestors didn’t have those Western things. It was Hawaiian against Hawaiian though. The Hawaiians did it themselves. This was before the missionaries arrived in 1820.

So Kekua makes the hāli‘i, a place for Manono to view the battle from above the lava flats. They’re lovers, they make love that night

Ka Puana

Auntie Nona Beamer told the story of an ancient chant to her ancestor, Princess Manono, “E Manono lā `ea,” which is archived by the Hula Preservation Society. Together with her son Keola’s rendering of these historic events, here is a tale of the ancient battle, a version probably very different from what we read in the revisionist history books.

Aunty Nona Beamer, with her ipu heke.

That lesson, or that philosophical thought, “keep your love,” is the philosophical inheritance that I received from my ancestors, and that means that within each of us, there’s a beautiful bowl of light, the inner compass of aloha. If we can keep it alive, then this gives us resilience in life. Aloha becomes more than a Lekeleke Burial Grounds, at the word, it becomes a way of south end of Ali’i Drive, is a hillside being in the world. carved with the rock terraces, tears I just wish I had the guts and gumption that she had, and glory of ancient Hawai’i. Slanting toward a field of lava leading to picking up that spear and going into battle. That was the sea, this was the site of the fierce, culture-shifting Battle of Kuamo’o, the last battle, 1819, the “the day the Hawaiian gods died” in battle of Kuamo`o. That’s why this chant and this hula the travel books. is so important. Not just as a family message, but it’s the belief that that’s the way the world should live, in love. It still brings a lump in my throat.

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