Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 5, 1 January 1988 Edition 02 — Ohana Network in Food Preparation [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Ohana Network in Food Preparation

Feeding over 50,000 people is a large order for any caterer and a very challenging task. But leave it to veteran imu chief Hiram Kaikaina of Kamehameha School and he'll get the kalua pig end of it all done and ready for today's feeding with perhaps plenty to spare.

Kaikaina and a host of volunteers over two weekends put into the massive imu a total of several hundred pounds of pigs on the Kamehameha campus. The project was coordinated by former Office of Hawaiian Affairs Trustee and short-term Chairman Rockne Freitas, an assistant athletic director at the University of Hawaii, Manoa. Another crew on Maui, coordinated by former Maui Trustee and also Board Chairman Joseph Kealoha, went through the same schedule. When the pigs were taken out of the imu the next morning, the same helpers got up bright and early to salt and shred the porkers whieh were then placed in refrigerated containers. The volun-

teers were greatly assisted by some of their wives, girl friends and keikis. Kaikaina, who lives in Papakolea, is assistant grounds foreman at Kamehameha. He is eonsidered one of the leading kalua pig exponents in the state. One needs only to observe his method of operation to know why he is respected in this field. Volunteers on Oahu included many of the Kamehameha faculty, former students and even UH Manoa graduate students who wanted to be involved and actually experience what was being done.

The Kamehameha imu, with Kaikaina as its chief, has been used for many of the school's luaus. Some Hawaiian organizations have also utilized it. Virtually the same scenes existed for the preparation of the other foods you are eating today. Hundreds of volunteers formed an ohana network to get this done. And hundreds more are here to serve it to you.

Imu ehiel Hiram Kaikaina in tank top to far left watches his fellow volunteers as they take off hanana leaves to get at the well-cooked kalua pig.