The stars circled Earth before there were eyes to see them. When the planet cooled, human beings followed them across unblemished desert, tundra and ocean. As the walls of Troy were falling to the Greeks, Polynesian explorers sailed star paths across the world’s greatest ocean to settle one third of Earths’ surface. They voyaged aboard powerful double canoes, some more than a hundred feet long, against prevailing winds and currents. And they did this when Greek mariners still hugged the coast of an inland sea and Europe was populated by Stone Age farmers. Yet by the turn of the twentieth century, this story had been lost and Polynesians had become a destitute minority in their own land. Ask mainland people today about this ancient sea people and you will be told of Kon Tiki, a false tale of raft-bourn drifters at the mercy of wind and wave. Yet the ancient story lived among Hawaiian families who guarded their ancestral lore – the language, hula, curing practices and the traditional rituals. It was the gospel of their culture and it did not die, it went underground, a guttering flame waiting to be reborn. Then, in 1973, three men – a scientist, an artist and a famous waterman – joined to recreate a Hawaiian voyaging canoe, Hōkūle‘a, and sail her on the epic voyages celebrated in oli and mele – poetry and chant. Sam Lows new book, HAWAIKI RISING - HOKULEA, NAINOA THOMPSON AND THE HAWAIIAN RENAISSANCE, tells this story in the words of the men and women who voyaged aboard Hōkūle‘a. They speak of growing up at a time when their Hawaiian culture was in danger of extinction and their future in their own land was uncertain. We join Ben Finney, Tommy Holmes and Herb Kane as their vision of a sleek voyaging canoe takes shape in a Honolulu shipyard. We meet Nainoa Thompson, a young man of twenty-two when Hōkūle‘a is launched. We follow him, as he looks skyward with eyes unfettered by preconceptions to see ancient and holistic patterns ignored by Western astronomers and navigators. With Mau Piailug, a traditional navigator from the tiny Micronesian island of Satawal, we embark on a voyage from Hawaii to Tahiti and learn how he finds his way by subtle signs in nature. We experience the heartbreaking loss of Eddie Aikau – Hawaii’s most famous waterman – when Hōkūle‘a capsized after an ill-conceived voyage in 1978. And we are present as new leaders vow to continue voyaging to both honor Eddie’ life and to seek a renewal of their traditional values. Overcoming fear by trusting in the vision of islands rising from the sea, Nainoa and his crew make a 2400 mile ocean voyage from Hawaii to Tahiti – the first Hawaiians to navigate the Pacific without charts or instruments in a thousand years. The book’s title - Hawaiki Rising – contains the kaona; the hidden meaning that animates this story. It refers to the mythic Hawaiian homeland; to an ancient image of newly discovered islands rising from the sea; to the story of the demi-god Maui who fished up land with his magic hook; and to the resurgent pride of all Hawaiians as their dream of seeing Tahitian mountains rise above the horizon is finally realized. When Hōkūle‘a crewmember Sam Ka’ai carved the ki’i – the sculpted figure - that adorns the canoe’s stern, a dream came to him of a blind man reaching to the heavens. “This is an effigy of how we are after so many years of oppression,” Sam tells us. “Blind to our past, we reach up to grasp heaven one more time. The same stars are rising as they did for our fathers for many, many generations. So if you lose your way - remember that you once sailed on your mother’s lap and you were never lost. The stars turned minute-by-minute, hour-by-hour, dawn and dusk and you always came home or your kind wouldnt be here. This is an effigy of the Hōkūle‘a experience – the ohana wa’a, the family of the canoe. He is reaching above himself, beyond himself, to the story that has not changed, the forever and ever story. He is showing that we are taking hold of the old story once again.” Please see Hawaiiki Rising group on FB for more on Hokulea and the rediscovery of ancient Polynesian voyaging techniques...
Posted on: Fri, 18 Apr 2014 00:27:43 +0000
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