Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 27, Number 2, 1 Pepeluali 2010 — Growing native gourds nets new enterprise [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Growing native gourds nets new enterprise

By Liza Simon Public Affairs Specialist Ask anyone in the hula community about where they get the raw material for their ipu drums and many will say they now turn to California suppliers for the gourds they fashion into the rhythmic and resonant percussion instruments of Hawaiian dance. Landa and Kalim Smith recently learned of the Hawai'i gourd gap - caused by insect invasions, wetter than normal weather and Hawai'i's loss of agricultural land to increased development - while visiting Landa's Aunty Donna Jensen, a kumu hula, in Hawai'i Island. They decided they wanted to help by eultivating a gourd crop at their home in the Viejas Indian Reservation in San Diego County, where they work as teachers at a tribal school and also have three acres of fertile land. "Aunty Donna thought it was a good idea to grow the gourds on native soil, because she says you ean feel the mana of the plaee that the

ipu comes from," said Kalim, who is of Cree Indian descent and who has also farmed gourds for making rattles used in Native American ceremonial singing. Though Landa grew up mainly in California, she traces her interest in ipu heke to her Native Hawaiian 'ohana, including many who are talented in hula and traditional Hawaiian music. So began the couple's unique enterprise - an indigenous fam-ily-owned mahi ipu - a farm for organically grown ipu heke gourds. After harvesting a successful crop for Aunty Donna, the Smiths moved quickly to e-commerce. Orders have eome in from hālau in Hawai'i, California, Japan and, surprise of surprises, from Russia - with love, no doubt, for hula. The couple's web site promotes the propagation of ipu heke gourds "from native lands to your hands," a tag line they take to heart. "It's a unifying force for natives of different backgrounds to eome together and revitalize something that might otherwise be lost," said Landa, drawing a rough parallel between the perpetuation of ipu heke farming with the ongoing revival of

indigenous languages. The Smiths recently got word that they've been accepted as vendors at the upcoming arts exhibition held alongside the Merrie Monarch Festival this April in Hilo. They are excited to meet customers face to face, enabling them to better customize gourds to individual tastes. "An amazing attention in cultivating and cleaning the gourd sets the sound of the instrument," Kalim said, adding that the "native way" he learned from his elders was to care for the gourds as if they were his children. In the San Diego County elimate, the planting-to-harvest cycle lasts one year. "To grow gourds basically requires a few good seeds and a lot of patience," Kalim said. After harvest, the task of scooping the pith from the gourds and shining the hard shell surface into an attractive ipu drum ean be grueling, said Landa. "But I also have a very good feeling that I've begun a new chapter in my life with respect to contributing to a native tradition," she said. Landa's father, Wayne Hopkins, a welder by trade, joins the "assembly line" for cleaning and varnishing the gourds. They have also taken steps to grow the business beyond a family enterprise and build a mahi ipu eooperative with several nearby Indian reservations in San Diego County. "This is a way to give other natives a ehanee to stay home and make a living," said Kalim, explaining that the laek of jobs on reservations forces an exodus of Native Americans into big cities with all its accompanying woes of urban poverty. Even though they count it a blessing that they have plenty of land, some of the farm areas in the new cooperative were plagued by drought last year. Despite this, Native American interest in growing Native Hawaiian ipu heke gourds runs high, Kalim reports. "I feel this joy every time I make an ipu from something that I have grown. This connection to the soil is in my blood. This is just one example of how mueh native peoples share. As we discover more about eaeh other, I think we will find many more commonalities that we enjoy." ■ For information, visit ipufarm. eom or eall 619-490-6218.

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Native ipu makers - soon to be featured at the Merrie Monarch Festival arts exhibition - display their product near a San Diego beach. From left, Wayne Hopkins, Landa Ku'uleialoha Smith and husband Kalim Smith. - Courtesy photo by Gary Ballard