Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 28, Number 8, 1 ʻAukake 2011 — Pacific voyagers transcend cultures [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Pacific voyagers transcend cultures

By Lynn Cook Blessings of wind, rain and sun anointed the participants gathered at Kualoa Park for the traditional greetings before the opening of the Kava Bowl Oeean Summit. Arriving at the end of June, first in Hilo and then on O'ahu, seven canoes brought brave explorers from distant island nations - Fiji, the Cook Islands, Tahiti, Aotearoa, Tonga, New Ouinea and Samoa - voyaging to Hawai'i for the first time in many hundreds of years. These eanoe crews were paying homage to Hōkūle'a, Makali'i and Hawai'iloa, the Hawaiian canoes that broke the historic barrier between the ancient celestial navigation skills of the Polynesians and the oil-powered world of modern travel that pushed aside those skills. Asked why they voyaged, the Tahitians answered in unison: "Hōkūle'a eame to us to give us hope. Now we voyaged here to give hope back."

ALOHA WA'A In her greeting to the crews, OHA Trustee Haunani Apoliona noted that the event "really brings voyaging into the 21 st century." "We are growing the next generation of voyagers, hoping to reconnect and reaffirm the oeean exploration traditions of our Paeihe Islands," she said. The eanoe community and those on O'ahu who got word of the arrival eame to greet the crews at Kualoa, and on the same day, to bid them farewell as they set sail for Kaua'i, San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego. The event was all part of Te Mana o Te Moana, the Spirit of the Sea, with the mission of bringing global awareness about the threats to the oeean that unites the Paeihe nations and the world. Sponsored by the nonprofit Okeanos Foundation founded by German native Dieter Paulmann, the vessels - powered by wind and sun alone - make

up this Vaka Moana, or fleet of deep-sea voyaging canoes. The foundation covered the cost of building seven canoes, providing escort vessels, visas, airfare for crew, administration costs and provisions. TELLING TALES Hawai'i folks shared food and music. Crew members shared their stories. From the Tahiti eanoe, Moeata Galenon talked of the day when she was 14

years old. "The Hōkūle'a crew eame to my school and from that moment, 30 years ago, I had a strong desire to cross the equator," she says. "And now I have." She hopes to be invited to join a leg

oi ine wonuwiue voyage oi Hōkūle'a in 2013. "It is not so mueh about discovering the world," she says. "It is about teaching the world, being part of something with great meaning." Nicholas Marr says he eame from Aotearoa to Hawai'i, to the Big Island, and discovered Makali'i builder Clay Bertelmann. He sailed with Makali'i and Hōkūle'a and retumed eaeh year to teach in the voyaging program for children. His joy on the New Zealand crew has been to uphold the memory of the

ancestors - his and those of all who voyaged. His goal is to know a few things and do them well. "We need to teach our children," he says. "They don't know how important they used to be." Marr has a "day job," working on oil

ngs. He says it aiiows him to understand the industry and pay the bills until he ean sail again. Dieter Paulmann was accessible and enthusiastic, discussing the opportunities he believes ean ultimately save the oceans. At Kualoa, at the Hawai'iloa fundraising event at Bishop Museum, at the Kava Bowl Oeean Summit and at a farewell event at the Sand Island pier, Paulmann repeated his message, "If the oeean dies, we all die." Evaluating the cost of inaehon, he asked, "How mueh is the oeean worth to you?" His concerns, and the concerns of the world experts, include acidification and anoxia that create dead zones in the oeean. These zones suffer loss of fish life from overconsumption and dying reef habitats, sound polluhon that impacts the migratory patterns of sea mammals, and plastic polluhon, whieh creates massive floating islands of debris that kill marine life within their range.

VOICE OF WISDOM With the goal of health for the oeean and of "mother earth" Māori elder Pauline Tangiora eame as an individual to the Kava Bowl conference to speak her mind about the need for wrongs to be righted. She held hope because the conference was not bound by Western rules. "Like the kava ceremony, we sit on the same level. We need to speak eye to eye," she said, "and this conference was different in that way. There has been a shift of understandina." Her titles are many. She

is a member of the World Future Council and was formerly with the World Council for Indigenous Peoples. She talks of nuclear testing and the sea burial of the remains of the test chemicals. She speaks out on how

governments must invest, at whatever cost, in solving the ehemieal problems, finding ways to combat the growing occurrence of sickness of women and children and the sickness of the creatures of the oeean. Haunani Apoliona and Nainoa Thompson share the vision of youth being raised up to reconnect the Paeihe islands. Apoliona says informing policymakers is the objective of oeean education, and the community that is informed ean be inspired to act. Thompson's message supports the words of Tangiora. He says: "I would argue that the largest and most magnificent, and the most powerful oeean of them all is the Paeihe. And, if we lose the Paeihe, ecologically it's over. What will save the earth is to save the oceans." ■ Lynn Cook is a loeal freelance journalist sharing the arts anel culture ofHawai'i with a global auāienee.

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On right, Tua Pittman of the Cook lslands eanoe, Marumaru Atua, receives a warm Hawaiian weleome at Kualoa Park. - Photo: Olivier Koning

Gūlenon

Marr

The Samoa eanoe, Gaualofa, sails in Hawaiian waters. - Photo: Olivier Koning. Headshots by Lynn Cook

Tanqiora