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U.S.A. Page 8 n THE ASIAN REPORTER April 7, 2025 How a canoe helped turn Hawaiian culture into a source of pride and even influenced Hollywood By Audrey McAvoy The Associated Press ANEOHE, Hawai‘i — Hawai‘i’s American colonizers once banned the Hawaiian language in schools. Some Native Hawaiians tried to lighten their skin with lye. Many people believed Polynesian voyagers had simply lucked into finding the islands by drifting on logs. But a canoe launched half a century ago helped turn Hawaiian culture from a source of shame to one of pride, reviving the skill of travelling the seas by decoding the stars, waves, and weather. That vessel — a double-hulled sailing canoe called the Hokulea, after the Hawaiian name for the star Arcturus — would even influence the Disney blockbuster Moana decades later. To mark the anniversary, the Hokulea’s early crew members gathered in March for ceremonial hula and kava drinking at the Oahu beach where the canoe launched on March 8, 1975, and where they began their first training sails. “It’s a vehicle of exploration. It’s a vehicle of discovery,” Nainoa Thompson, the CEO of the Polynesian Voyaging Society, said in an interview. “It’s also been our vehicle for justice as Native Hawaiians, as Pacific Islanders, as a very unique, special culture of the Earth.” In 1980, Thompson became the first Hawaiian in six centuries to navigate to Tahiti without a compass or other modern instruments — a span of about 2,700 miles. Hawaiian culture had long been repressed Thompson, 71, remembers stories from his grandmother, born less than a decade after the U.S.-backed overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom in 1893. Teachers beat her for speaking Hawaiian, and her uncle tried to wash the brown off his skin with lye. When she had children, she didn’t teach them Hawaiian. “If her children tried to be Hawaiian, they would get hurt in the new society,” Thompson said. “And so you have to become something else.” A resurgence of Hawaiian pride and identity starting in the late 1960s and 1970s set off a cultural renaissance. Artist Herb Kane began painting ancient canoes based on drawings from European explorers and got the idea to build a double-hulled canoe with tall, triangular sails similar to those his ancestors had used hundreds of years earlier. Debunking the drifting log theory At the time, many people accepted the notion that Polynesians settled islands by accident. Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl had theorized that Polynesians arrived K WAYFINGING TRADITION. The Kaneohe canoe club welcomes Hokulea as it arrives on the shore of Kualoa Regional Park before Hokulea’s 50th birthday com- memoration last month in Kaneohe, Hawai‘i. Hokulea is a double-hulled sailing canoe whose name originates from the Hawaiian name for the star Arcturus. (AP Photo/ Mengshin Lin) program. Similar trends have surfaced in from South America, pushed west by the of Native Hawaiians. “It helped us believe in everything that the Cook Islands, French Polynesia, prevailing winds and currents. In 1947, he Samoa, and Tonga, said Mary Therese set out to prove it by floating from Peru on we were doing,” Waihe’e said. Today, two dozen schools have Perez Hattori, the director of the Pacific a log raft. He landed in the Tuamotu Islands north of Tahiti and wrote a Hawaiian language immersion programs, Islands Development Program at the and Census data show more than 27,000 East-West Center. bestseller. “We come from very, very ancient Heyerdahl’s theory took hold even people in Hawai‘i, and 34,000 on the U.S. societies,” said Hattori, who is Chamorro, though Hawaiians for generations had mainland, speak Hawaiian at home. the Indigenous people of the Mariana Bringing dignity to the elders passed down stories of people who trav- In 1978, an ill-prepared crew set out for Islands. “Hokulea sort of helped us remind elled from the distant lands — including Kahiki, possibly what is today known as Tahiti in poor weather, and the Hokulea the world of this.” Hollywood makes a blockbuster Tahiti — by canoe, bringing with them capsized just hours after leaving port. Hokulea’s influence spread in 2016 Crew member Eddie Aikau paddled his edible plants such as ulu, or breadfruit. Kane, University of Hawai‘i archaeolo- surfboard to get help. The Coast Guard when Disney released Moana, an gist Ben Finney and Honolulu surfer rescued the canoe, but Aikau was never animated film about a 16-year-old girl who learns wayfinding about 3,000 years ago. Tommy Holmes wanted to challenge the found. Thompson spoke to hundreds on the The voyaging society overhauled itself in drifting log concept. They started the Polynesian Voyaging Society, intent on response, setting clear goals and training movie’s creative team about wayfinding sailing a canoe to Tahiti without modern requirements. Thompson studied at a and the importance of canoes to Pacific said Aaron Kandell, a Honolulu planetarium and spent over a culture, instruments. They needed a navigator. Traditional year under the tutelage of Piailug. In 1980, Hawai‘i-born writer who worked on the movie. long-distance voyaging skills had all but he navigated to Tahiti. Kandell, who is not Native Hawaiian, Thompson said he felt a deep obligation disappeared, but a Peace Corps volunteer on the isolated atoll of Satawal in to fulfill Aikau’s wish to follow the path of spent a year studying navigation with the Micronesia told them about Pius “Mau” his ancestors and “pull Tahiti out of the Polynesian Voyaging Society during his Piailug, who had been taught navigation sea.” But he didn’t celebrate when the 20s and incorporated that into the script, including where Moana learns to use her from childhood. Over about a month in Hokulea got there. “I just went into a quiet, dark place and outstretched hand to track the stars and 1976, Piailug guided the Hokulea from Hawaii to Tahiti — about the same just told Eddie we pulled it out of the sea,” runs her hand in the ocean to feel the Thompson said. “There’s no high fives. It’s currents. distance from Hawai‘i to California. Crew members taught animators about Some 17,000 people thronged the too profound.” In decades since, the society has sailed coconut fiber ropes so they would look right Tahitian shore to greet them and witness what one crew member called “the the canoe around the Pacific and world, when Moana pulls on them, Kandell said. The Polynesian Voyaging Society’s including New Zealand, Japan, South spaceship of our ancestors.” initial plan was to sail to Tahiti once, Former Hawai‘i governor John Waihe’e Africa, and New York. It inspired other Pacific Island supporting a documentary, book, and was in his 20s then, and a delegate to the 1978 state Constitutional Convention. The communities to revive or newly appreciate research papers. Thompson remembers pushing Hokulea’s hull into the water with Hokulea’s success spurred delegates to their own wayfinding traditions. In Rapa Nui, Chile — also known as the crew back in 1975. make Hawaiian an official state language “It was really a moment — I didn’t even though few residents still spoke it, he Easter Island — islanders have embarked said. They also created the Office of on long-distance canoe voyages. The recognize it — but this was going to change Hawaiian Affairs to improve the wellbeing University of Guam has a navigation everything,” he said. Think you’re an organ and tissue donor? Not if you haven’t told your family. Talk to your family about organ and tissue donation. Talk to your family about donating life. For a free donor card brochure, contact: Donate Life Northwest (503) 494-7888 1-800-452-1369 www.donatelifenw.org Wondering when our next issue is published? Sign up for e-alerts at <news@asianreporter.com>! Celebrate Earth Day Everyday!
