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11.2017 | "w" vs "v" in the Hawaiian Language
12.2017 | Commonly mispronounced Hawaiian words
1.2018 | Pronunciation & the kahakō
2.2018 | Learn when to use "Ke" and "Ka" in Hawaiian
Kumu Kēhau Chrisman has been teaching ‘Olelo Hawai’i in Cottonwood, Arizona for many years. In September of 2017 Uncle Henry Kim requested that she start to write ‘olelo articles for the club newsletter. Since then, she has written 50+ lessons covering the basics as well as sharing her wealth of cultural expertise as a Kumu Hula
Poi
© copyright, B. Kehau Chrisman, August 2023
There are certain Hawaiian words that have worked their way into the English language; they have evolved and have become everyday “English” words. These are words like “lei” and “aloha”. Geologists worldwide routinely use the word ʻaʻā for the sharp, chunky type of lava, and pāhoehoe for the smooth and unbroken type of lava. Almost everyone knows what “lūʻau” means and recognizes the word “poi”.
When Hawaiians talk about poi, it usually is accompanied by a “yum” look on our faces. Here on the Mainland, though, I usually get a contradictory “yuck” look. I donʻt blame them. I went to a tourist-type Hawaiian lūʻau once at one of the Maui hotels where they served horribly watered-down poi in containers that were a little bigger than those white paper pill cups they give you when you are in the hospital! I myself said “yuck” to this, and I looked at the server and asked, “how can you serve this stuff to people???” She only shrugged. Obviously it was not her decision.
I do understand that loving poi is an acquired taste that we are raised with as a children growing up in Hawaiʻi. Itʻs the same thing about potatoes; if you were raised with potatoes, youʻd think they were delicious. Having been raised in Hawaii, and especially living on the Big Island near Waipiʻo Valley where some of the best taro is grown, I have come to know some of the different varieties of taro, and which ones make ʻono (delicious) poi. When you have eaten good poi, it is something you remember for a long time.
So letʻs explore this notion of poi with some facts that may not be generally known:
How to Say “Old Age” in Hawaiian
© copyright, B. Kehau Chrisman, August 2023
Hula has been my life for the past 40 years. I have been trained well by my Kumu, William Kawaiponimoʻikapiʻolani Correa, a descendant from the Maiki Aiu Lake hula lineage. Lessons and lectures in hula are rigorous. Indeed, it takes dedication, diligence, and motivation to achieve the highest level of skill in this art.
Chanting is also a part of the training, but it is not a major part of the hula “curriculum”. No laila (therefore, hence), it was with much pleasure and gratitude last year that kuʻu kāne (my husband) Kaʻimiloa and I were accepted into the folds of “Nā Waʻa Lālani Kahuna o Puʻu Koholā”, a hālau (school) dedicated to oli (chant), led by Kumu Sam ʻOhukaniʻōhiʻa Gon III. (We meet via Zoom every week.) Again, not for the faint of heart, the training is exacting, as memorization of the chants in the correct leo (voice, sound) is a much desired skill. And for “old brains” like ours, memorizing takes a lot longer than it did 40 years ago!
“Old brains” brings to mind an oli that we learn that is included in a book called Na Pule Kahiko (Ancient Hawaiian Prayers) by June Gutmanis. ʻO kau ola e ke akua” is a prayer for good health. Gutmanis says in her book:
“It is said that the people of old prayed constantly and that ʻthe health of the body was the main thing prayed for by the people of Hawaiʻi... This is a prayer that was said for the health of a good chief. It will always be applicable for a good leader.”
Here is the chant itself:
‘O kāu ola e ke akua
E nānā mai kāu mau pulapula
E ola
a kani ko’o,
a hau maka ’iole
a pala lauhala,
a kau i ka puaaneane
A laila, lawe aku ‘oe ia’u i ke alo o Wākea
Give life, o god
Look to your descendants;
(Give me) life
until the cane taps,
and (I am) bleary-eyed (as a) rat.
Until yellowed (as an old) hala leaf,
and reach extreme old age.
Then take me to the presence of Wākea.
Take a look especially at lines 4 through 7. These phrases recur in other chants as well. It contains the imagery that the Hawaiians used to describe Old Age—an elder, a senior citizen, a kupuna (grandparent or ancestor).
“A kani koʻo” (until the cane taps) brings to mind an elderly person walking with a cane or walking stick, with the repeated “tapping” sound of the stick touching the ground at every other step.
“A hau maka ʻiole” refers to the eyes of a rat that are bleary—and “bleary” means eyes that are unfocused or filmy from tiredness or sleep. (ʻIole is the word for “rat”.) It could also indicate that the eyes are filmy due to cataracts (clouded lens) in the eyes, a characteristic of older people (and animals).
“A pala lauhala” is translated as “until yellowed as an old hala leaf”. The reference is to the leaf of a Hala or Pandanus tree. As with all leaves that eventually fall off the living tree, they first turn yellow and then finally a dried-up brown. The word “pala” means “ripe or mature”, or “yellow” as leaves do when they are past their prime.
And finally, “a kau i ka puaaneane” is a phrase that literally means “to reach a stage of advanced old age”, according to the Pukui-Elbert Hawaiian Dictionary. The word “puaaneane” or “pūaneane” is defined as “extremity of life, extreme old age”.
What a poetic way to describe what we otherwise in English would just blandly say “old age”! Can you just hear the cane tapping, see the filmy eyes, and feel the “wrinkles” of a old leaf that has just dropped from the tree? The Hawaiian way of saying “old age” brings imagery to all our senses.
“E hō mai ka ʻike”
© copyright, Kehau Chrisman, July 2023
During the week of June 5, I was gifted with a new Edith Kanakaʻole quarter. One of my hula haumāna (hula student) got a whole collection of these quarters from her bank and cheerfully gave one to each of her hula sisters. This quarter is the seventh one in the series of American Women Quarters Program by the U.S. Mint and was released into circulation in March. In an article released by the U.S. Mint, hereʻs what they had to say about Aunty Edith:
Edith Kanakaʻole was an indigenous Hawaiian composer, chanter, kumu hula, and a custodian of native culture, traditions, and the natural land. Her moʻolelo, or stories, served to rescue aspects of Hawaiian history, customs, and traditions that were disappearing due to the cultural bigotry of the time. Kanakaʻole assisted in the development of the first Hawaiian language program for public school students at the Keaukaha School. Her life philosophy was, “Teach all who come.”
As my students got their unique quarters (picture included at the end of this article—the lighting makes the silver quarter look yellowish), they wanted to know what the meaning was of the Hawaiian words on the bottom of Aunty Edithʻs picture, “E hō mai ka ʻike”. In three words, I can give the translation as “Grant us knowledge”, but this also makes for a good ʻōlelo lesson.
The first letter “e” in the phrase is actually a verb marker. It marks the sentence as an imperative, or command form. It would be like giving a command in English similar to “Sit!” or “Eat!” A more polite way to say a command would be to say, “Letʻs sit” or “Letʻs eat”.
The word “hō” is translated in the Pukui/Elbert Hawaiian dictionary as “to give, transfer, go”. In parentheses, it also says “followed by directionals”.
We have many directionals in all of our languages. Up, down. Right, left. Inside, outside. Front, back. All these indicate some direction. In Hawaiian, we have a directional labeled as “toward the speaker” (mai), or “away from the speaker” (aku). So if the word “hō” is followed by the directional “mai”, the literal translation is “give (to me)”. The phrase “hō aku” would translate to “take it away from me”.
And then, finally, we get to the matter of exactly what is begin “given to me”. And that would be “ka ʻike”. The word “ka” means “the”. In the Hawaiian Dictionary, the word “ʻike” has a myriad of meanings: “to see, know, feel, greet, recognize, understand; understanding, recognition, comprehension and hence learning”. I suppose in a broad sense, it could also mean “wisdom”.
“E hō mai ka ʻike” then can be translated as “Grant us wisdom”. It is the first line of a chant that Aunty Edith Kanakaʻole wrote that is widely chanted in Hawaiʻi today. It is a chant asking for inspiration and understanding/knowledge.
E hō mai ka ʻike mai luna mai e
ʻO nā mea huna noʻeau o nā mele e
E hō mai, e hō mai, e hō mai, e.
Bring understanding from above
The secret knowledge of the chants
Bring here, bring here, bring here.
Ipu Pāwehe (Decorated Gourds)
“Ola Ka Noʻeau” (“Excellence in Hawaiian Artistry”) is the name of a new exhibit at the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum in Honolulu. (For those of you unfamiliar with that museum, it is THE museum of Hawaiʻi and is world famous.) This exhibit will be on display until October 28, 2023. We are very proud to announce that my husband Ka’imiloa Chrisman is one of the six featured master craftsmen in the exhibit, along with his haumana (student) of ipu pāwehe from Kailua-Kona, Momi Greene. Momi was one of Ka’imiloa’s apprentices back in 1990s when he was awarded a grant from the Native Hawaiian Culture and Arts Program to teach gourd-growing of rare Hawaiian gourds to seven select people on the Big Island of Hawai’i. An adjunct to this grant was the study of Hawaii’s unique gourd-decorating (ipu pāwehe).
When Kaʻimiloa first took an interest in this art, he was told by various craftsmen and elders, “We know the ancient Hawaiians did this art, because our museums have specimens of them. But no one knows how they did this art. That knowledge is lost.” Kaʻimiloa was not willing to accept the words “cannot” or “lost forever”. For the next 15 years, through diligent and time-consuming research and painstaking experimentation, he resurrected this lost art. Today, we know how the Hawaiians did this unique art using only cold natural dyes, thanks to his perseverance and patience.
By definition in the Pukui-Elbert Hawaiian dictionary, the word “ipu” is used to describe “the bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria, also called L. vulgaris), a wide-spreading vine, blooming flowers, and smooth green and mottled or white fruits varying widely in shape and size.” It is also a “general name for vessel or container, as dish, mug, calabash, pot, cup, pipe”. Among the other definitions, the term is also used to describe the drum instrument made of either a single gourd or by joining “two gourds of unequal size”. Today in Hawaiʻi, we generally say “ipu” means “gourd”.
The word “pāwehe” is the “generic name for colored geometric motifs, as on makaloa mats made on Niʻihau, bowls, and gourds”. The Hawai’i ipu pāwehe in the museums today have geometric designs. It is thought that the pāwehe gourd technique and design is of Kauaʻi and Niʻihau origin.
What exactly is ipu pāwehe? Whatʻs so unique about it? There are other cultures who decorate gourds. Why are the Hawaiian decorated gourds, these ipu pāwehe, so special?
On first glance at an ipu pāwehe, a personʻs thought is that the shell of the gourd is painted on the outside. Indeed, thatʻs how so many other cultures of the world would decorate their gourds. But scraping your fingernails on the outer design will tell you differently. The “paint” is not evident and there is nothing to scrape off. These Hawaiian gourds are unique in that they are dyed from the INSIDE OUT.
But how? How do you “paint” something without paint?? What Kaʻimiloa discovered was that you must start with a mature yet still GREEN gourd. The design is cut or scraped onto the gourd’s outer skin, leaving a “scarred” area or line. After removing the top stem and making a hole there, the plant-dye solution is placed inside of the gourd. The dye, through osmosis—as the gourd dries out in its natural process—seeps through the semi-hard shell. Where the skin is scarred takes no dye, and where the skin is undisturbed takes on the color of the dye. Itʻs an ingenious technique, and no where else in the world is this technique found.
Kaʻimiloa Chrisman, via his insane amount of patience and drive, rediscovered this Hawaiian lost art and brought it back to life. Today, there are several of his haumana who have worked this art and various others are doing it now using modern, boiled-down dyes. My Hālau (school) and I are proud to have Kaʻimiloa in our midst to share his vast knowledge of Hawaiian culture with us.
As I said in a previous article, “Ua manomano a lehulehu i ka ʻikena a ka Hawaiʻi”. Numerous and great is the knowledge of Hawaiians. Believe it—be Proud to Be Hawaiian!
Here is an ipu pāwehe that was made by Kaʻimiloa about 25 years ago. If you look closely, you will note the smooth exterior surface. This was one of the many experimental ipu pāwehe. The dye used here was commercial dye and not plant substance dye. Once the technique was mastered, the next step was to use the plant dyes that the Hawaiians used.
Below are some photos from the Bishop Museum exhibit, taken in March 2023.
(All photos above and below are copyrighted, and were taken by Kehau Chrisman.)
The Title Board of the exhibition features work from different artists. The ipu pāwehe (second pic from the left) is one of Kaʻimiloaʻs creations.
This is the ipad display describing each of the ipu pāwehe gourds on display in the Museumʻs lighted case. The top three gourds are Kaʻimiloaʻs. The second row are gourds that Momi Greene made, and the single one on the bottom is an ancient ipu pāwehe from the Museumʻs collection.
Read more about the exhibit on the Bishop Museum website:
https://www.bishopmuseum.org/okn/
The Concept of the Verb “ to Have”
The Hawaiian language has many verbs, but “to have” is not one of them. It seems impossible that this important word in human language does not exist in Hawaiian! But Hawaiian does have an equivalent: the “concept” of possession.
The word “have” in English indicates “possession”. If you “have” something, you “possess” it, for example, “I have a car.” In Hawaiian, we donʻt need a separate word for the verb “have”. We already have the concept of possession. Letʻs explore this.
In English, there are Possessive Pronouns in words like “my, your, his, her, its, ours, theirs”. It indicates that something belongs to someone. For example, “my house” means the “house that belongs to me”. “Your book” means a “book that belongs to you”. “Their dog” means the “dog that belongs to them”. The words “me”, “you”, and “them” are regular pronouns. When we move to “possessive pronouns” the words change to “my”, “your”, and “theirs”. In English, then, we change a letter here (“me” to “my”), or add a letter there (“you” to “your”), and we instantly know the concept of “belonging” or “possession”.
Now, let’s put Possessive Pronouns into a Hawaiian Pidgin English sense. Instead of “my house”, think of the phrase “belong me house”. Instead of “their house”, think “belong them house”. The word in Hawaiian for “belong” is “kō”. The word for “them” is “lākou” and “house” is “hale”. Adding all that into the equation, in order to say “their house”, we need to convert to “belong them house”. And in Hawaiian that conveniently translates, word for word, to “kō lākou hale”.
Whatʻs this all have to do with the verb “to have”? Well, if you want to say, “they have a house”, you simply convert the proper English (“they have a house”) to Pidgin English which would be “a house belong them”. Translate that directly into the Hawaiian language, and it would be “he hale kō lākou”. It is the “CONCEPT” of possession that one needs to recognize, versus trying to translate word-for-word into Hawaiian. More examples:
He mau hale kō ʻoukou. All of you have houses.
He lei kona. She has a lei. [Irregular form: kō ʻoia (belong she) transforms to kona.]
He aloha kō kākou. We have love.
“Nā Waiho’olu’u (The Colors)”
Learning about “colors” in Hawaiian becomes more of a cultural journey than just a language tour. In order to understand more about the Hawaiian concept of colors, some insight into ethnobotany (the study of a region’s plants and their usage) of Hawaiʻi and clothing of Ancient Hawai’i is helpful.
When Ka’imiloa and I lived on the Big Island of Hawai’i, we made a special effort to only grow native plants in our yard and garden. What I noticed was that any flowers that were produced on these indigenous plants were small and not very colorful. The kukui tree had tiny white flowers (1/4”), the ‘ilima plant bloomed delicate inch-wide yellow blossoms, and the pāʻū-o-hiʻiaka sported a pale blue flower which was no bigger than ¾”. Our ‘iliheʻe plant was strong and healthy, with small 5-petalled white flowers. They were uluwehi (lush and verdant) plants—green as anything—but there were no vibrant colors in the pua liʻiliʻi (little flowers). Certainly, our yard was not like the colorful tulip fields of Holland! The varietal names of colors and hues in the Hawaiian language, then, is limited. (For information and pictures of these native plants of Hawai’i, check out www.hawaiiannativeplants.com , Hui Kū Maoli Ola.)
Before the introduction of fabric by the missionaries and Western visitors, Hawaiian clothing was made from kapa—beaten bark of the wauke (mulberry) plant. In its purest form, the kapa is off-white in color (unless it was made from the bark of the mamaki, which is brown when beaten into sheets). In a kind of technological advancement, the Hawaiian kapa surpassed the kapa of other parts of the Pacific in that they learned to use a fermentation process, to additionally beat the kapa with a patterned beater, and to color their kapa with a plant-dye mixture. They knew that ‘ōlena (turmeric) made a yellow color. They found that the berry from the ‘ukiʻuki grass plant could make a color ranging from green to blue. All parts of different plants were used to create beautiful color-tinted kapa that have retained most of their original color today, 200 years later!
Once the kapa was done with the beating process and ready to be made into apparel, blankets, etc., a container of dye was prepared with the desired color. The dye contained fresh water (wai). The word luʻu means to “plunge in water, immerse, to dip in”. And the causative marker, hoʻo, combined with luʻu means “to cause to immerse”. The word then for “color” in Hawaiian is “waihoʻoluʻu”. Other meanings include “dye, water for coloring”.
There are colors that are recognized in Hawaiian culture and have their own names:
White ⚪ keʻokeʻo, kea
Red 🔴 ‘ula, ʻulaʻula
Black ⚫ ʻeleʻele, hiwa
Yellow 🟡 melemele, lena, ‘ōlena (turmeric)
Purple 🟣 poni
Green 🟢 ‘ōmaʻomaʻo
Pink 🌸 ʻākala (an endemic raspberry)
Orange 🟠 ʻalani
Gold ⭐ kula
And finally, there are broad spectrum descriptions of colors for which there is no English equivalent:
Lipo 🌊 Deep blue-black, as of a cavern, the sea, or dense forest.
Uli 🌃 Any dark color, including the deep blue of the sea, the ordinary green of vegetation, and the dark of black clouds.
Here is a picture from an article in the Maui No Ka ʻOi magazine, January-February 2011. The story centered around a kapa researcher named Lisa Raymond and her experiments with Hawaiian dye. The berries in the picture are ʻukiʻuki berries, and the kapa samples show the different colors from her experiments. You can read more about her work here at
https://www.mauimagazine.net/shades-of-the-past/
“Hukilau”
On a random opening of a page in the Pukui-Elbert Hawaiian Dictionary, I saw a word that would be a good topic for this month’s ‘ōlelo lesson. Itʻs a word that also is a title of a song that every tourist knows whoʻs ever been to Hawaiʻi. “Hukilau”. I bet every one of you has heard it and maybe can even sing it (lyrics courtesy of www.huapala.org):
“Oh we're going to a hukilau
A huki huki huki huki hukilau
Everybody loves the hukilau
Where the laulau is the kaukau at the lūʻau”
“We throw our nets out into the sea
And all the ʻamaʻama come a swimming to me
Oh, we're going to a hukilau
A huki huki huki hukilau”
“What a beautiful day for fishing
That old Hawaiian way
Where the hukilau nets are swishing
Down in old Laie bay”
“Ua lehulehu a manomano…”
Before I left Hawai’i in 2003 to come to Arizona, I bought a jacket from the Hawaiian language immersion school in our area, Pūnana Leo o Waimea. That jacket is still with me and I proudly wear it. There is an ‘olelo no’eau (proverb) screened on the back side of it:
“Ua lehulehu a manomano ka ‘ikena a ka Hawai’i.”
(Numerous and great is the knowledge of Hawaiians.)
40 = kaʻau forty
400 = lau much
4,000 = mano numerous
40,000 = kini many
400,000 = lehu very many
The idea of reduplicating a word in Hawaiian emphasizes its quality and quantity. We do the same thing in English, not so much with reduplicating the word, but with tonal emphasis. “This house is big. But that one is BIG!” (“Nui kēia hale. Akā, nuinui kēlā hale!”) The word nui means big. Doubling “nui” into “nuinui” means itʻs really big. And then, for efficiencyʻs sake, the word sometimes gets contracted to “nunui” (still meaning, really big).
So going back to the proverb above, “lehulehu” would mean “really very many”, and “manomano” would mean “really numerous”. The word “ ʻikena” is translated as “knowing”. And the phrase “a ka Hawaiʻi” means “of the Hawaiians”. (The word “o” and “a” both mean “of”, and the decision to use one or the other is an ʻolelo lesson that is complex.)
We can take this lesson even further. The name of our Hawaiian Civic Club is “Lau Kanaka no Hawaiʻi”. From the chart above, we can see that “lau” means “much”. “Kanaka” means “persons or individuals”. And the phrase “no Hawaiʻi” means “for Hawaiʻi”. So, if some of our membership never knew what our club name means, I hope I have enlightened them!
“Pineapple is Not Hawaiian”
It’s always amusing to me that when you order a Hawaiian Pizza, it’s topped with Canadian ham and pineapple. Amusing…because pineapple is not a native plant to Hawai’i, but is indigenous to South America (Brazil). When I tell people that, they are always surprised. Having seen pineapple countless times at Hawaiian lū’au (feasts), they just assume it’s Hawaiian. That couldn’t be more incorrect.
I understand this misconception. A notable and large pineapple industry was built in Hawai’i in the early 1900s, especially on the island of Lāna’i (lending to its name today of “Lāna’i—the Pineapple Island”). For a while there, Hawai’i supplied about 80% of the pineapple to the world. Presently, though, there are no more pineapple fields or industry in Hawai’i, but Lāna’i is still called the Pineapple Isle.
There isn’t even a native word in Hawaiian for pineapple. The closest we have is the word “ka halakahiki”. “Ka” means “the,”, and “hala” is the name of the pandanus tree—a tree whose dried leaves are used to make numerous woven articles like mats and fans. The word “kahiki” is sometimes equated with “Tahiti”. In reality, “kahiki” is a referral to a “faraway place”. So the “foreign pandanus” is the name for pineapple. How does this make any sense?
When you look at the hala tree “fruit”, it’s easy to see why there is a connection between the two. I’m including both a picture of the hala fruit, and a picture of a pineapple. You can easily see how similar the outside of one looks like the other. And that’s why the Hawaiians called it a “hala” fruit—the pineapple looks just like a hala fruit. But it’s not a hala from Hawai’i, but rather a hala from kahiki (foreign). Ka-hala-kahiki.
So maybe a Hawaiian Pizza would be better topped with kalua pig? Or lomi salmon” sweet potato (‘uala)? Taro (kalo)? No cheese, please!
Pictured below: the fruit of a Pandanus (Hala) tree vs a pineapple with green leaves
“Aloha: Love First, Greetings Second”
There are times when I sit on the airplane going to Hawai’i, and someone sitting next to me who is going to visit Hawai’i says to me proudly, “I know how to say ‘hello’ and ‘good-bye’ in Hawaiian. It’s ‘aloha’!” I can’t always launch into a full-on lecture at that point, but I sure would like to inform that person that the word “aloha” is much more than a greeting word.
The word “aloha” in the Pukui-Elbert Hawaiian Dictionary has the following definition:
“love, affection, compassion, mercy, pity, kindness, charity; greeting, regards; sweetheart, loved one; beloved, loving; to love, show kindness, mercy, pity, charity, affection, to remember with affection; to greet, hail. Greetings! Hello! Good-by! Farewell! Alas!”
The focus, then, of this word is not a greeting, but the “love and affection” that is implied when the word “aloha” is spoken.
I like to give this imaginary scenario to my students in the Hālau, who often come to class with this same misconception of “aloha”. Picture yourself witnessing a friendly interaction between a missionary and a local Hawaiian back in 1820. Eager to create some sort of written “dictionary” to be able to communicate in the Hawaiian language, the missionary asks the Hawaiian, “how do you say ‘hello’ in your language?” Puzzled, the Hawaiian person doesn’t know what ‘hello’ means. The missionary further explains, “what do you say when you see someone you haven’t seen for a long time and want to greet them?” [The missionary is expecting the one-word Hawaiian equivalent to that one-word English greeting.]
“Ah”, the Hawaiian says, “we say ‘aloha’”. [Bingo. There’s that anticipated word.]
“And what do you say when you are leaving that person to go somewhere else?”
The Hawaiian replies, “we say ‘aloha’”. [Double Bingo.]
Happy with his new-found vocabulary, the missionary writes in his newly-fabricated “dictionary” that the word “aloha” means both “hello” and “goodbye”.
What the missionary failed to ask was, why do Hawaiians say “aloha”? Could it be that in Hawaiian, when we greet someone, we impart onto that person “love and affection” by saying “aloha”? And that when in Hawaiʻi, we depart from that someone, we impart onto that person the same “love and affection” as well? It just doesnʻt seem right that a word with such depth of meaning as “aloha” gets passed off simply as “hello”. It purveys much, much more than just a common “hello” or “goodbye”.
There are other specific words for “greeting” in Hawaiian. ʻAnoʻai is one of them, and specifically means “greetings; to greet; news”. “Welina” is also another word that specifically greets someone, and is usually presented as, “welina me ke aloha” (greetings with love). Definitely, though, “aloha” is the more common greeting.
I am hoping that now when each of you say this “greeting” to someone, that you do indeed feel the compassion and love that comes along with it. Aloha!
‘Ōahi: Firebrand Throwing on Kauaʻi
One of the definitions for ʻōahi (literally, projecting fire, with the word ahi meaning fire) in the Pukui-Elbert Hawaiian dictionary is “hurling fire, as from a cliff for ancient spectacle”. [By the way, the word for the fish is ʻahi. It has an ʻokina before the letter a, and this is a good example of how important this ʻokina, or backwards apostrophe, is.] This term came to mind because of one of the songs on this yearʻs Album of the Year, an award given by Nā Hōkū Hanohano (Hawaiiʻs version of the Grammy awards for recording artists). The winning album is “Native Lands” by Kulāiwi, and the song that caught my “ear” is “Peʻahi o Makana”, written by Devin Kamealoha Forrest. Itʻs a song based on ʻōahi, and itʻs beautiful. You can have a listen to it on www.kulaiwimusic.com .
This ʻōahi practice of hurling firebrands seems to have been only done on the island of Kauaʻi, and only for special occasions as an evening spectacle. It is said that the last time this display was practiced at Hāʻena was during a visit by Queen Emma to Kauaʻi back in the 1800s. The scene is Hāʻena Beach on the north end of Kauaʻi, where the road ends and the Nā Pali coast begins. At a certain time of the year, very strong winds would blow directly out to sea. Courageous and hardy people would brave a climb up the near-vertical cliffs of the high hill called Makana (1590 feet elevation). The climb itself was not difficult, but in the extremely strong winds, it was treacherous.
Pāpala was a lightweight wood which had hollow pith when dried, and was lit with fire for this display. If the wind caught it and it flew straight, the flames would travel down the hollow center pith, and indeed it would look like a rocket. If the wind caught it just so and it started to tumble end-over-end, what a sight that would have been!
In times past, if you were a spectator during this event, you would notice that there were people out in canoes off shore. They were there for a reason. As the firebrands descended in the ocean water, the canoes would try to catch one before it hit the waterʻs surface. (A person would to be pretty darn good at maneuvering the canoe to catch one!) It is said that, if a person was successful in catching one, they would take the firebrand and burn their skin to commemorate their success.
Another story about this firebranding, according to the composer of the aforementioned song, is that sweetheart lovers (ipo) would try to catch a firebrand before it fell into the water, and then burn their skin to prove their fiery, ardent love for one another (ipo ahi).
I learned one more thing from studying this song, “Peʻahi o Makana”. Some of us are familiar with the common and prolific lauaʻe fern which has a scent similar to the maile vine and is used in making lei. I discovered that what we are used to calling lauaʻe is not native to our islands, and is actually a native plant from Western Australia. The Hawaiʻi native lauaʻe fern is also called “peʻahi” (hence, the title of the song), is extremely rare today, very fragrant, and the leaf has three lobes. See the pic attached, photo by John Giordani. The lauaʻe fern is on the left, and the peʻahi or true lauaʻe fern is on the right.
“Pali ē ke kua, mahina ē ke alo”
Last week I was explaining a line in the song “Aia i Ka Maui” to my haumana (students) in the Hālau (school). Itʻs an older song written by Solomon Kaʻōpio from the late 1800s about a ship called the “Ka Maui” that made its trek from Kauaʻi to Niʻihau and back. The third verse says,
ʻAʻole no wau he wahine uʻi
Ka mea e like aku me ka mahina.
(I am not such a beauty
As compared to the loveliness of the moon.)
I found myself having to explain to my haumana that the Hawaiians have a proverb, “Pali ē ke kua, mahina ē ke alo” which means literally “straight as a cliff is my back, bright as the moon is my face”. Figuratively, though, itʻs meant to describe someone of beauty. If your back is straight and your face is bright, thatʻs what Hawaiians consider attractive, and this is applies to both females and males.
This led me to a reference of a song called “Mi Nei” which has those exact two lines (pali ē ke kua, mahina ē ke alo), written by Charles E. King. And that led me down another path to talk about Charles E. King, the famous composer, author, legislator, educator of Hawaiʻi. His life achievements are being an authority on Hawaiian songs, teacher at Kamehameha Schools, conductor of the Royal Hawaiian Band, and a senator in the Hawaii Legislator in the 1920s. (You can read more on Wikipedia by searching “Charles E. King”.)
Charles Edward King was born in 1874 in the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi at Nuʻuanu on Queen Emmaʻs (his godmother) estate. He was of part-Hawaiian ancestry and graduated from Kamehameha School for Boys in 1891. He is most widely known as the composer of “Ke Kali Nei Au” (a love song), which everyone knows today as “The Hawaiian Wedding Song”. Interestingly, Mr. King never meant for this song to be a wedding song and he never wrote any English words to it. Someone else wrote some English words to this melody, Elvis recorded it, and all of a sudden itʻs a song that is usually played at weddings. Thatʻs a bit of trivia that is not widely known today!
[The reprinted Kingʻs Book of Hawaiian Melodies (originally published in 1943), and the sequel called Kingʻs Songs of Hawaiʻi (1950) is available on ebay for about $25. The original vintage version of the 1943 book is listed for about $50.]
“Your sister is called what?”
In my hula hālau, we are working on learning some new mele (songs) for our presentation at the 2023 Arizona Aloha Festival. One of those songs is called “Lahela Kuʻu Pōkiʻi”. It is translated on www.huapala.org (a website that has an incredible collection of Hawaiian song lyrics, by the way) as “Rachel, My Little One”. Allow me to clarify that.
The word “pōkiʻi” is actually one of the many words that the Hawaiian language has to describe a personʻs relationship with his/her siblings.
The word “kaikuaana” is used to describe an older sibling of the same sex to you. So, if you are a male and have an older brother, that older brother is “kaikuaana” to you. It would be likewise if you are a female and have an older sister.
To describe a younger sibling of the same sex, you use the word “kaikaina”.
You donʻt have any same sex siblings? If you are a female, and you have brother, that brother is “kaikunāne” to you. If you are a male, and you have a sister, that sister is “kaikuwahine” to you.
This all may sound confusing, but it illustrates how birth order is important in Hawaiian culture. Were I to introduce my sister as “Have you met my kaikuaana Leilani?” A person I’m speaking to would immediately know Leilaniʻs relationship to me—she’s an older sister—and they would expect me to behave accordingly.
And this all doesnʻt just apply to sisters and brothers. For example, my older cousin, same sex, is also called “kaikuaana”.
If you are an only child, you can be called “kama kahi” (one child), or “hua kahi” (one fruit or seed), or “hānau kahi” (one born).
The general word “pōkiʻi” refers to the “youngest of siblings”, with no reference to whether this youngest is male or female. Knowing that then, “Lahela Kuʻu Pōkiʻi” is better translated as “Rachel, my youngest sibling”. It was a song written by Vicki Iʻi Rodrigues and Lovey Lui Conn years ago. Maybe youʻve heard it before?
“Puana nei ku’u mele iā ‘oe ku’u pōki’i,
No nā lā i piha hau’oli, nā lā o ke aloha,
He mele nō Lahela kuʻu pōkiʻi.”
“My song for you thus ends, my youngest sibling,
For the days filled with happiness and love.
A song for Rachel, my youngest sibling.”
There’s a Hawaiian proverb (‘Ōlelo Noʻeau, literally “skilled language”) that says
“Ua lehulehu a manomano ka ʻikena a ka Hawaiʻi”
Great and numerous is the knowledge of the Hawaiians.
— ʻŌlelo Noʻeau (proverb) No. 2814 - Mary Kawena Pukuʻi
“The Lūʻau”
Just like the words “aloha” and “lei”, the word “lūʻau” has made its way into the English language, often not requiring a translation on the part of the speaker to the malihini (visitor). Today, we all know this word to mean a dinner or feast of some kind where poi, kalua pig, squid lūʻau, and haupia are served. Malihini to our Hawaiʻi island home make it a point to attend at least one lūʻau dinner during their visit, complete with Polynesian dance revue entertainment (which includes dancing not only from Hawaiʻi, but from Tahiti, Samoa, and New Zealand). The crowd usually loves it; they especially like watching the wahine Tahitian dancer wiggle her hips at high velocity!
The word “lūʻau”, according to the Pukui-Elbert Hawaiian Dictionary, refers to the taro leaves or “young taro tops, especially as baked with coconut cream and chicken or octopus”. It goes on to explain that a reporter in the Pacific Commercial Advertiser newspaper back in 1856, coined the term “lūʻau” as the name for a feast. Almost two centuries later, the name has stuck. But this is the not the original term in Hawaiʻi used for a feast.
Pāʻina is the proper word used for a “meal, dinner, or small party with dinner”.
ʻAhaʻaina is the term used when you want to describe a “feast, dinner party, or banquet”. The word literally means “gathering, food”, or meal gathering. There are many different types of ʻahaʻaina. ʻAhaʻaina ʻūniki is a graduation feast, as for hula dancing or lua (Hawaiian martial arts) fighting. ʻAhaʻaina kahukahu is a “feast given at the completion of a studentʻs first work (as mat, quilt, tapa, net), or of a childʻs first fish catch; one purpose was to ask the gods to grant greater knowledge and skill to the craftsman”. Babyʻs First Lūʻau is one that should be familiar to all of us who were raised in the islands....the ʻahaʻaina piha makahiki (literally, feast for completion of the year). My manaʻo (thought) is that during the 19th century when so many people died from introduced diseases, if an infant made it through his/her first year, it was indeed something to celebrate.
Itʻs not wrong to use the word lūʻau for a feast today. My purpose here is to make the reader aware of the correct word inherent in the Hawaiian language for a feast. And by the way, the slang word that we use for food, “kaukau”, doesnʻt exist in the Hawaiian language. The word “kaukau” is listed in the dictionary as a “chant of lamentation, as addressing the dead directly”. I donʻt think thatʻs what you want to say when you want to talk about food! My own thought is that it might have been a term adapted from some Chinese word way back in time (sugar plantation days). In any case, you can start to use the correct term for food, “mea ʻai”.
"Puakenikeni, Pīkake, and Pakalana"
Lei are an important part in Hawaiian culture, as it is in other Pacific cultures, India, Indonesia, and some parts of China. In my Hula Hālau, Iʻm very particular about what leis we wear. Of course, in Arizona, we donʻt have the luxury of having fresh flowers. But I always want my students to wear good representations of the “real thing”, even though they are made of silk.
In the picture that is included with this lesson, you will see good replicas of the puakenikeni flower, the pīkake flower, and the pakalana flower. (Photo courtesy of Aloha Outlet.) All of them are super fragrant in real life, each having their own special scent. None of them are native plants to Hawaiʻi, but they are beloved flowers nonetheless.
The larger orange flower is called “puakenikeni”. (Disregard the yellow hibiscus that is added as an adornment in this lei.) It grows on trees, and is a little smaller than the average plumeria flower. When they first start to bloom, they are actually ivory in color. As they mature, they start to turn orange, until in their final stages, they are a dark burnt orange color and then fall off the tree. From the beginning of their life to the end, they keep their sweet fragrance. “Pua” of course is the Hawaiian word for “flower”. The word “keni” is a Hawaiianization of the word “ten”. It is said that in the early years of the 1900s, this flower sold for ten cents each.
The white flower is the Arabian Jasmine. Itʻs a small, beautifully-scented flower about half-inch in diameter. We know the name of this flower in Hawaiʻi as “pīkake” (PEE-kah-keh), which is another Hawaiianization of the English word “peacock”. Curiously, the characteristics of this flower have nothing to do with a peacock. The story is that Princess Kaʻiulani was very fond of the peacocks that were at her home at ʻAinahau. She was also fond of this Arabian Jasmine. So, she named the jasmine “pīkake”, after her lovely peacocks.
Lastly, the yet smaller yellow-green flower that you see is called “pakalana”. The scientific name is Telosma cordata. Sometimes called the “Chinese violet”, it was introduced to and popularized in Hawaiʻi by the Chinese immigrants of the 1800s. It grows on a woody vine with heart-shaped leaves. I have my own theory about where this name came from. When I was growing up in Honolulu, my Chinese grandmother taught me about a fragrant flower called “pak lan” that grows on a tree. The flower is highly fragrant, and its “haole” name is White Champaca. I think since both flowers are incredibly scented, the name “pak lan” got adapted to the vine flower and got transformed to “pakalana”.
In this lei, each flower is sewn into its own lei and then all three are twisted together for a nice affect. Today, it is difficult to find this lei for purchase. And this is my quest: to find more of these leis for my hula students. If any of you find a supply of them, or would like to sell me yours, please email me at arizonahula@gmail.com!
"The Hula Pāʻū (Skirt)"
This week Iʻm trying to ready some hula skirts for some of my hula students, and thought this a good topic for an ʻōlelo (language) lesson. The Hawaiian word for this hula skirt is pāʻū (pronounced PAH—OO, with equal emphasis on both syllables). The “equal” emphasis is important here, because changing that stress/accent pattern can change the meaning of the word completely (more on that later).
The first definition in the Hawaiian dictionary for the word pāʻū is “womanʻs skirt,sarong; skirt worn by women horseback riders”, with a definition of “pāʻū hula” as “any kind of dance skirt”. We were always taught in hula that women need to wear some kind of lower torso covering if the women are to dance. In almost every hālau (school), the fabric used for the skirt, the style of skirt fastening (elastic or cord tie), and how the skirt is worn is proprietary to that hālau. Those women who are caught “off guard” when asked to dance hula are sometimes seen scampering around to find some sort of sarong or pareau, or even a towel, to wrap around their lower torso, if they are wearing shorts/pants. If you see this happening, you know they were properly trained in hula.
The significance of the pāʻū is sometimes misunderstood, especially here on the Mainland. Many people think of it as a “costume”, and when “authorized” to wear a pāʻū, are very pleased with themselves to be awarded the right to wear one. When I was growing up in hula, the pāʻū was not considered a costume, but quite like an “exercise apparatus”. All of our pāʻū were made with SIX yards of 44”-wide fabric (folded over and uncut), which could get quite heavy and hot in warm weather. The idea is akin to using leg weights wrapped around your ankles when you are doing some leg lift exercise. With the weight of six yards of fabric now on your lower torso, you must work extra hard to move that much fabric when you move your hips in dancing hula. It makes your hips stronger and more flexible.
I always tell my students that if your pāʻū is not moving when you are dancing, then you are not dancing hula properly—that you are only moving your feet and not your hips. (And hula, after all, is 99% hips.) Soon they all learn that, at least here in Arizona, the glamour of wearing a pāʻū hula is highly overrated!
Hereʻs a little ʻōlelo lesson on correct pronunciation. Remember that the correct way to pronounce the word for a womanʻs skirt is “PAH-OO” (pāʻū). “PAH-oo” (paʻu) means “soot, smudge; ink dregs, ink powder; ink used for tattooing made of burned kukui shells”. “pah-OO” (paʻū) means “moist, damp, soaked, drenched, moldy”.
And finally, “PAHoo” or “Pow” (pau) means “finished, ended, through, terminated, completed”. “We are pau with this article on the pāʻū.”
“Many Hands Working in Unison—Laulima and Lōkahi”
The National Museum of the American Indian, as part of the many Smithsonian Institute museums located at the National Mall in Washington DC, is scheduled to open back up on May 21, 2021, after being closed for over a year. On their website, www.americanindian.si.edu, they have a series of online programs listed for the month of May.
One of these program is “The Story of the Lūʻau”, which features Kumu Hula Vicky Holt Takamine and Chef Kealoha Domingo. The video is available for viewing on youtube right now, and it is very well put together. Hereʻs the link. There are actually three videos there: “The History and Culture of the Lūʻau” (11:28), “Traditional Foods Explained by Chef Kealoha Domingo” (14:44), and “Hula—An Expression of Cultural Understanding” (16:14). All are great presentations, but the one I want to draw your attention to is the first one.
In this video Kumu Hula Vicky and Chef Kealoha discuss the significance of the lūʻau, and the dynamics that go into making any event happen (in this case, it was Chef Kealohaʻs 50th birthday party lūʻau). What I saw throughout the video, and what I want to share with you all, are the scenes of all the aspects of making a lūʻau happen, and how many people are involved in each [food, music, hula, lei making, imu (underground oven) prep for the puaʻa (pig), decorations, cleaning the kalo (taro), grating the niu (coconut), etc.] It clearly shows the Hawaiian concept of “Laulima”, which literally means “many hands”, and translates to “cooperation, joint action, working together”. This is an important Hawaiian value, but in and of itself is really of much greater value when you partner it with another Hawaiian value called “Lōkahi”, which means “unity, agreement, accord, unison, harmony”. You can have a lot of people working together, but if they are not of like minds with a common goal, the task will be not be as productive.
In my opinion, “Laukahi” and “Lōkahi” must always go together. As a simple example, sometimes during an important event, people will come up to me and ask, “what can I do to help?” While I appreciate their willingness to kōkua (help), it shows me that if this person had really been watching the dynamics of the group, and been in harmony with the group, this person would have already found a place where he/she could help. Without asking. So again, “working together” and “being in unison and harmony with the group” go hand-in-hand. Finally, I would like to end with the proverb mentioned in the video: “ʻAʻohe hana nui ke alu ʻia”. ʻAʻohe means “none or no more”. Hana is the word for “work”. Nui, of course, is “big”. Ke means “the”. Alu translate to “cooperation”, and ʻia is simply a verb marker. Translated, this ʻōlelo noʻeau (No. 142) says, “No task is too big when done together by all”. Itʻs a good proverb for all of us to remember.
The song “Kaulana Nā Pua” was written by Ellen Keho’ohiwaokalani Wright Prendergast in 1893, by request of some members of the Royal Hawaiian Band who “voiced their unhappiness at the takeover of the Hawaiian Kingdom” (Nā Mele o Hawai’i Nei by Elbert & Mahoe). Listen to “Kaulana Nā Pua” on youtube here. A good book to read about the overthrow and events leading to it is Hawaii’s Story by Hawaii’s Queen written by Queen Liliʻuokalani herself.
For this month’s ʻolelo lesson, I will reference the second verse of this song:
Pane mai Hawai’i moku o Keawe
Kōkua nā Hono a’o Pi’ilani
Kākoʻo mai Kauaʻi o Mano
Paʻapū me ke one o Kākuhihewa.
Hawaiʻi, land of Keawe answers
Piʻilaniʻs bays help
Manoʻs Kauaʻi lends support
And so do the sands of Kākuhihewa.
Some songs will make reference to the individual islands by only listing a famous aliʻi or chief of that particular island who ruled during a time of peace and prosperity. The point is that you have to know who these chiefs are in order to make sense of the song. Students well-versed in Hawaiian culture will recognize these names instantly and know which islands the song or chant is talking about.
Here is a list of some of these chiefs: Keawe, for the island of Hawaiʻi Piʻilani, for the island of Maui (or, sometimes listing his grandson Kamalālāwalu) Kākuhihewa, for the island of Oʻahu Manokalanipō, for the island of Kauaʻi Kahelelani, for the island of Niʻihau You should be able, now, to recognize which islands are being referred to, depending on the specific chiefs mentioned. Hereʻs a verse from a recent composition called “Kū Haʻaheo” written by Kumu Hula Hina Wong-Kalu (also on youtube).
Can you fill in the blanks with the appropriate islands?
Auhea wale ʻoukou pūʻali koa o Keawe
Me ko Kamalālāwalu la me Kākuhihewa
ʻAlu mai pualu mai me ko Manokalanipō
Kaʻi mai ana me nā kama a Kahelelani.
Where are you soldiers of ______
Along with those of _____ and ______
Unite, join together with those of _____
Marching alongside the descendants of _______
LA’AMIA, THE CALABASH TREE
Many people have seen the little gourds that sit on the bottom of our Hawaiian feather- top rattle instruments used in hula. The instrument is called ʻulīʻulī. And please—for your sake, so people don’t laugh at you—learn how to pronounce this correctly. The word has a kahakō over the two “ī”s; that indicates that that syllable is stressed and held a little longer than usual. Consequently, it is pronounced “oo-LEE—oo-LEE”. NOT, OO-leeOO-lee. Your stress accent on a word can make all the difference. If you pronounce it the wrong way (OO-lee-OO-lee...wrong!), it’s a bastardization of the word ule, and I say “bastardization” because that word is properly pronounced “OO-leh” (not “OO-lee”). The point is here that ule means… (ahem)...male genitalia. Itʻs certainly not something that I hold in my hand, shaking it, to dance hula with. (Go ahead, you can laugh at that image! ) So what is it?! “oo-LEE—oo-LEE”. Correct!
In Ancient Hawaiʻi, the ʻulīʻulī was probably made from small 4- or 5-inch diameter gourds (Lagenaria siceraria), likely filled with little pebbles. The more pebbles used, the more rattling sound it makes. By Captain Cookʻs time (1778), some instruments were made with tops of rooster feathers, but early ones apparently were not.
In the early 1800s, a tree was introduced to Hawaiʻi, from places like Mexico, Central America, and northern South America. The tree was called Calabash Tree (Cresentia cujete). Once the Hawaiians discovered that these little “tree gourds” grew exactly to the size that was needed for making an ʻulīʻulī, and pairs were easy to find, it was much in demand. As the tree grew bigger, it gave more and more little calabashes, every year. Easy horticulture production! The Hawaiians called this tree and its little gourd, laʻamia.
Instead of using small pebbles, Hawaiians discovered that if you use the matured seeds of the yellow canna (Canna indica) flower plant, the ¼” round seeds made great sound, AND, they werenʻt as heavy as the pebbles. This plant was introduced to Hawaiʻi shortly after Captain Cook arrived (late 1770s). I donʻt know why they specified “yellow” canna, because the red canna variety has the same seeds. The caveat here is that our modern borer bugs just love to eat these seeds. Soaking the seeds in sea-salt water (to mimic ocean water, just taste it!) before inserting them in the laʻamia would prevent this problem, and Hawaiians used such soaking methods to protect gourds and house timbers as well. [Add 1/3 the amount of sea salt in powdered borax if you want all the better bug protection.]
Today, we use brightly-colored goose feathers for the feathered tops of our instruments used for modern ʻauana hula. For kahiko (ancient) hula, it is more appropriate to use rattles without feathers, or more often with rooster feathers.
All this shows how adaptable the Hawaiians can be by using introduced plants and materials for the production of hula instruments in current times!
I was pleased to see that a group of us from LKNH had “attended” the virtual conference called “Ka Waiwai No Nā Kūpuna”, a Hawaiian-Based Cultural Education Conference For All, that was held on February 12. The topics were of interest to a wide group of people. Mahalo to Uncle Matt for sharing this information with the membership!
As with all conferences, they offered several topics per hour-sessions, and you have to choose only one, thereby missing the others. I was happy to know that they would video record all the sessions for posting later so that I didn’t feel like I had to miss. When and where these recordings would be posted were not mentioned. My thought was to peruse YouTube periodically, searching “Hawaiian Based Cultural Education” as a hunch that the recordings might appear there. By mid February, they were not there on YouTube, but I did find some other very interesting presentations! One that I want to note here was a Panel Discussion in the 2013 Culture-Based Education Conference & Hawaiian Education Summit on the topic “ʻAʻole pau ka ʻike i ka hālau hoʻokahi”. On that Panel was a former kumu of mine, Kumu Hula Coline Aiu (Hālau Hula o Maiki), along with other noted kumu hula Kimo Alama Keaulana, Nathan Nāpokā, and Hōkūlani Holt-Padilla. The 90-minute discussion was expertly moderated by Hauʻoli Akaka of Kamehameha Schools. I shared this link with all my Hālau students, for it is an important concept, and here I will share it with you.
For this monthʻs lesson, I want to present to you this particular ʻōlelo noʻeau. The word ʻōlelo means language or speech, as you know, and the word noʻeau means skillful or wise. The two words together, then, are what we call in English “proverbs”, for are not proverbs “wise sayings”? The late wellknown researcher and scholar of Hawaiian culture, Tūtū Kawena Pukuʻi, produced a book called ʻŌlelo Noʻeau –Hawaiian Proverbs and Poetical Sayings, which includes some 2942 sayings. Number 203 is the ʻōlelo noʻeau, “ʻAʻole pau ka ʻike i ka hālau hoʻokahi”, which is translated as “All knowledge is not taught in the same school”. It indicates that “one can learn from many sources”. And this is the premise of the above-mentioned Panel Discussion. The application of this proverb to the art of hula is that “your” hula school isn’t the only hula school. We learn much from each other, and we should be able to share this knowledge with each other.
In analyzing this ʻōlelo noʻeau, letʻs look at each individual word: ʻaʻole = no, not, negates something pau = finish or complete ka = the ʻike = knowledge i = in, at, on ka = the hālau = school hoʻokahi = one (ʻekahi means the number one)
Ah…February! Known as the month of Love and Romance. This is the month to be thankful for those you love, a time to say, “I love you with all my heart”. Now, how does that translate into ‘ōlelo Hawai’i?
Aloha means love. Wau means me or I, and ‘oe means you. “I love you”, then, translates to “aloha wau iā ʻoe”. But what about the “heart” part?
The Hawaiian dictionary translates “heart” as “puʻuwai”. But it also says that the “use of puʻuwai as a center of emotions (instead of naʻau, ʻōpū, or loko) is probably a Western concept, but was noted in a chant dated 1853”. (Note, though, that the missionaries arrived in Hawaiʻi in 1820.) That means this use of puʻuwai as “heart” is not an ancient Hawaiian concept.
More appropriately then, as the Pukui-Elbert indicate in the dictionary, the use of naʻau, ʻōpū, or loko might be more appropriate. Literally, the word “naʻau” means intestines, bowels, guts; but it also means mood, temper, feelings. Figuratively, it may mean “child”. The word combination of naʻau-aliʻi means kind, thoughtful, loving, benevolent, loving heart. Naʻau-aloha means filled with aloha, beneficent, benevolent (similar to meaning of aloha).
You have similar definitions for ʻōpū which again literally means “belly, stomach, abdomen, intestines”, but it also means “disposition”. “ʻŌpū-aliʻi” has the same loving meaning as “naʻau-aliʻi” (see paragraph above). But to the recipient not well-versed in ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi, hearing “I love you with my belly” may not come across the same as “I love you with my loving heart”! The word “loko” means “character, disposition, heart, feelings”. The word “lokomaikaʻi” (lit., inside goodness) means “good will, good disposition, generosity, grace; kind, humane, gracious, benevolent”.
In the end, I would stick with the word “naʻau”. It seems to be pretty common in today’s Hawaiʻi. So that when you say, “I speak from my naʻau”, you indicate that your words come from your most inner being or soul. “I love you with all my heart”, then, becomes “Aloha wau iā ʻoe me koʻu naʻaualoha”. Oh, that sounds so romantic!
On a side note, the definition of “heartʻs desire” is given as “ʻiʻini o ka naʻau” or “makakēhau”. ʻIʻini means “to desire or yearn for”, and naʻau you now know. “Makakēhau” means literally “dew eye” or “misty eyes”. Nāmakakēhau is my Hawaiian name.
E komo mai, e ka makahiki 2021! Hauʻoli makahiki hou! Welcome, 2021…Happy New Year! We all have great hopes that 2021 will be much better than 2020!
The word Hau’oli means “happy”, which is always a good word to remember. Happy Birthday, Hauʻoli Lā Hānau. Happy Thanksgiving, Hauʻoli Lā Hoʻomaikaʻi. Notice that it has an ʻokina in front of it. ʻOliʻoli means joyful. The word oli without the ʻokina is the word for “a chant that was not danced to”. Thus, the importance of a little backwards-curving apostrophe!
The word Hou has many meanings. It can mean “new or recent”, as in “New Year”. It can mean “again”, as in “Hana Hou” (our Hawaiian version of the shout “encore!” that we often say at the end of a music concert, pleading for just one more song!). It can also mean “sweat or perspiration”. It all depends on the context in which the word it occurs.
And finally....letʻs look at the word Makahiki which we take to mean “year or age”. When we ask “how old are you?”, it translates to ʻEhia ou makahiki? There is another meaning. In the Ancient Hawaiʻi culture, Makahiki was the name of a festival season dedicated to the god called Lono-i-ka-Makahiki. He brought prosperity to the land, and is associated with fertility, agriculture, rainfall, music, and peace. This festival started when the Pleiades (sometimes called Seven Sisters) rises over the horizon in Hawaiʻi at sunset. (The Pleiades is a star cluster of 800 stars associated with the constellation Taurus. It looks like a smaller version of the Big Dipper.) Its appearance on the horizon usually happens in late October or early November. The Makahiki season then lasted another four months. During this time, the Hawaiian people rested and took part in sports, dancing, feasting, and religious festivities. All warring stopped because it was kapu (forbidden), and it was a time for chiefs to collect offerings from the commoners (makaʻāinana). During the Hawaiian Renaissance in the 1970s-80s, there was a revival of this festive custom, and one can often see Makahiki celebrations today.
So let’s dance and be merry—Makahiki season is upon us!
Mele Kalikimaka! The Holidays are a time for family and feasting, but it looks like this year will be very different due to the pandemic. Imagine... “feasting” via Zoom or Skype with family and friends. What a new concept!
The word lūʻau is a term that is commonly used today for a “feast”. In reality, the word lūʻau primarily refers to the “young taro tops, especially as baked with coconut cream and chicken or octopus”. We know that dish as “squid lūʻau” (which really is a misnomer because itʻs “octopus” that we use, not “squid”)? [Still...yum!] The second meaning in the Pukui-Elbert dictionary is a “Hawaiian feast”. But they go on to say that “this is not an ancient name, but goes back at least to 1856, when so used by the Pacific Commercial Advertiser. Formerly, a feast was pāʻina or ʻahaʻaina.” These older terms are still used today. In fact, the luncheon at my hula ʻuniki (graduation) was called an ʻahaʻaina ʻuniki. Lūʻau is pronounced “LOO - ow” with a glottal stop in the middle. When people say “LOOwow”, it is incorrect and, such a word does not exist in the Hawaiian language.
Here is a recipe for the Holidays for “Lollipop Shrimp Lūʻau”, from a “Hawaii” magazine, July/August 2008:
“The word lūʻau is actually the name for the green leafy tops of the taro plant. A creamy coconut stew made with taro tops is part of any real lūʻau—in fact, itʻs such an important part that it has given its name to the whole feast.
“Because taro tops can be hard to find, weʻve substituted spinach. In Hawaiʻi, this dish is usually made with octopus. In case youʻre not surrounded by octopus lovers, weʻve substituted shrimp.
“Warning: This recipe is seriously good. When we made it, it disappeared in a flash. [Chef] DeAngelo invented this dish especially for this lūʻau guide, and itʻs tasty enough that itʻs going on his regular menu. Turning the shrimp into lollipops by pulling the tail through a hole in the middle is not strictly necessary. But it looks great and makes the shrimp easy to pickup without getting sauce on your fingers.”
It’s November, and the weather is starting to get chilly up here in Central Arizona. Soon it will be Thanksgiving!
One of my haumāna took a trip to Hawai’i a couple years ago over the Thanksgiving holiday. She said she wanted to see what Thanksgiving was like in Hawai’i. Well, I said, I can tell you that! While Thanksgiving is a favored holiday (as is Christmas), it doesn’t have the festive-ness like here on the Mainland. Yes, most of the time we do have turkey for dinner (with “two scoop rice, gravy all ovah”). And yes, we do have lots to eat. But today, as I look back on my youth, it was a time for the ‘ohana (family) to get together—aunties, uncles, cousins—and that’s what made it so special. We never had a formal Thanksgiving dinner (sit down, dress up, full place settings, fine china, etc.) In our family, it was mostly potluck, with “peppah plate and chopstick”. We ate when we were hungry, and kept eating until it was time to go home (which was usually late evening). The kids ate first. This is one of the cultural things in Hawai’i. You would think, you should have the kūpuna eat first, since you want to show respect for elders. But in the Hawaiian way of thinking, the keiki (children) are the next generation and we need to mālama (care for) them first.
How do you say “Happy Thanksgiving” in Hawaiian? Well, there was no such phrase before the Americans came to Hawai’i. (The British, French and other Europeans who came to Hawai’i do not have a Thanksgiving Day.) So, we made one up. “Hauʻoli Lā Hoʻomaikaʻi”. Hauʻoli means happy. Lā means day. Maikaʻi means good. And adding hoʻo- (the causative prefix) to maikaʻi means “to cause to be good”. (Notice that there is a glottal stop between the last “a” and “i”. If you pronounce “My-Ky”, that word does not exist in Hawaiian.) Taking that further, the Hawaiian dictionary says that “hoʻomaikaʻi” means “to thank, bless, render thanks, congratulate; gratified, thankful; to praise; to improve, perfect, correct” (which just about covers everything grateful). That’s a better phrase than to make up one just sounding like the English “Happy Thanksgiving”!
You could use “Hoʻomaikaʻi!” for “Congratulations!”. And you could end your letter writing with, “ ʻo wau no me ka hoʻomaikaʻi”, which means, “I am very gratefully yours”. Maikaʻi is a “good” word to remember!
In my experience, I find that there are a couple of concepts in ‘Ōlelo Hawai’i that are somewhat difficult for the Western mind to comprehend. One is the concept of O-class and A-Class when using possessive pronouns, such as “my”, “your”, “theirs”. (This is usually where I get a groan from my ʻōlelo students!) Determining which “class” or category that your noun falls into will determine whether you use the letter “a” or letter “o” in the article that precedes it. For example, generally the word for the possessive word “my” is “ko’u”. If you wanted to say “my mother”, you would say “ko’u makuahine”. If, on the other hand, you wanted to say “my dog (as a pet)”, you would say “ka’u ‘īlio”. So what determines whether you use “ko’u” or “ka’u”?
It is based on a whole set of “rules”—one that has you determining whether the word you are speaking of (mother or dog) is your BIRTHRIGHT (O-class), or whether it is something that is ACQUIRED (A-class). [The “A” doesn’t stand for Acquired, but this is a nice rule for remembering.] O-class is used for words that the speaker has no control over, such as his birth or his given name; his God, his universe; his country, land, and home; ancestors, parents; his thoughts, emotions; his human body and its parts; his house, clothing; anything that transports his body (train, plane, car).
A-class is used for what the speaker produces or controls. It includes spouses, children, descendants, music compositions, tools, equipment, small objects (toys, books), and animals that are not used for transport.
Non-native speakers always have to “think” before deciding whether to use ko’u or ka’u. It makes the “flow” of thinking in Hawaiian difficult. But there is an “out”, if just with the use of the word “my”. The word “ku’u” also means “my” and can be used in place of either ka’u or ko’u. Hence, the words for “my sweetheart” is usually heard as “ku’u ipo”, and “my friend” as “ku’u hoa”. Kuʻu tends to be used in a poetic sense and occurs in many songs, as in those first two lines of “Hawaiʻi Aloha”: “Ē Hawaiʻi, ē kuʻu one hānau ē; kuʻu home kulāiwi nei ” (O Hawaiʻi, my birth sands, my native home).
This month I want to introduce you to a book called “The Kumulipo—A Hawaiian Creation Chant”, translated and edited with commentary by Martha Warren Beckwith, published by the University of Chicago Press, 1951, ISBN 0-8248-0771-5. You can find this book on amazon, ebay, or booksellers like abebooks and alibris. My bookcover is teal-colored with a picture of a nebula. It is reasonably priced.
The Kumulipo is considered the Genesis or Origin of the Hawaiian people. The entire chant has 2102 lines. When Captain Cook came to the Hawai’i, two priests recited the whole Kumulipo to him, because they thought that he was the reincarnation of the divine god Lono. Since then, it has only been recited, it’s said, only two other times. The chant was given to King David Kalākaua and he wrote and published it in 1889. It was later translated into English by the then-imprisoned Queen Lili’uokalani, and published in 1897. It says from the darkness was born Kumulipo, a male, and was born Po’ele, a female. After that came all the creatures of importance—coral polyps, grubs, earthworm, starfish, sea cucumber, sea urchin, barnacle, mother-of-pearl, mussel, limpet, cowry, etc. (At least these are all things of importance to the Hawaiian people.) Eventually, the chant leads up to the people whom the Kalākaua family claim as ancestors (moʻokūʻauhau or genealogy).
So let’s look at the first four lines:
‘O ke au i ka huli wela ka honua (At the time when the earth became hot)
‘O ke au i ka huli lole ka lani (At the time when the heavens turned about)
‘O ke au i kūka’i aka ka lā (At the time when the sun was darkened)
E ho’omālamalama i ka malama (To cause the moon to shine)
With a good Hawaiian dictionary, you wouldnʻt have to rely on the English translation given. Au means period of time or epoch. Huli means to turn or change. Wela means hot or warm. Honua is earth. Lole means to turn inside out. Lani means heavens. Kūkaʻi means to appear. Aka means shadow. Lā means sun. Hoʻomālamalama means to illuminate. Finally, malama is the word for light, month, or moon. (This is different from mālama, which means to take care of.) I tell my students that if you just translate the “big” words, you can usually have a good idea of what the Hawaiian means.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmWSLzORS7I In this youtube presentation, you can hear the first eight lines of the Kumulipo (sung, hymnal-style) in the first 52 seconds as an introduction to the chant, “E Pua ana Ka Makani”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_CzHSx_GhM In this youtube presentation, you can view and hear a production by the Senior Class 2019 at Kamehameha Schools Hawaiʻi Campus of the first chanted 28 lines. With graphics, they illustrate the creatures mentioned in the second paragraph that man is connected to and respects.
Aloha (Love, Compassion)
Haʻahaʻa (Humility)
Lokomaikaʻi (Generosity)
Hoʻokipa (Hospitality)
Hoʻomana (Spirituality)
Wiwo (Obedience)
Laulima (Cooperativeness)
Maʻemaʻe (Cleanliness)
‘Oluʻolu (Graciousness)
Paʻahana (Diligence)
Hoʻomanawanui (Patience)
Leʻaleʻa (Playfulness)
Hoʻokūkū (Competitiveness)
Hoʻohiki (Keeping Promises)
Huikala (Forgiveness)
Naʻauao (Intelligence)
Kūhaʻo (Self-reliance)
Kela (Excellence)
Koa (Courage)
Kōkua (Helpfulness)
Lōkahi (Harmony, Unity)
Hanohano (Dignity)
Alakaʻi (Leadership)
Kū i ka Nuʻu (Achievement)
Kūpono (Honesty)
[Answers: This is a bird. This is a red flower. That is a big house.]
Now it’s time to learn how to make sentences in Hawaiian. Just like in English, there are several types of sentences to convey different thoughts. Let’s start with the simplest of Hawaiian sentences, and that is one we call “He-sentence” pattern. The Hawaiian word “he” means “a” or “an” in English. This sentence pattern looks like this in English: “This is a book”, or “That is a house” or “This is a flower”. What they all have in common is the English word “a”. Therefore, we start off this sentence with the Hawaiian word “he”. Remember a few lessons back? We learned the words for “this” (kēia), “that (kēlā), “these” (kēia mau), and “those” (kēlā mau). We need these words to make this sentence pattern. For an example, let’s use the sentence, “This is a flower.” We need to rearrange the words first to “A flower this”. Notice that there is no translation for the English word “is”, as there is no need for it. Therefore, “A flower this” translates as “He pua kēia.” Let’s practice:
This is a book. A book this. (He puke kēia.)
That is a house. A house that. (He hale kēlā.)
This is a car. A car this. (He ka’a kēia.)
And by using the lesson in last month’s lesson, we can add some adjectives:
This is a new book. A book new this. (He puke hou kēia.)
That is a big house. A house big that. (He hale nui kēlā.)
From this sentence pattern, those of you who were raised in Hawai’i, with our Hawaiian Pidgin English, can see the Pidgin pattern when we say, “One dog dis”, or “One flower dat”. Have you heard that before? This is that pattern. We are actually “speaking” Hawaiian when we speak Pidgin!
In previous lessons, we have learned how to mark any given noun with an article like “the, this, that, a, an”. Now we’ll learn how to describe nouns with adjectives. You can get descriptive by not only saying that it’s “the flower” (ka pua), but also saying it’s “the pretty flower” or “the red flower” or even “the small flower”. In Hawaiian, the adjective (descriptive word) always follows the noun. So, you need to think “the flower pretty” or “the flower red” or “the flower small”. (On this issue, it’s very similar to Spanish.) Here are some descriptive words:
red ‘ula big nui
pretty nani small li’ili’i
new hou old kahiko
good maika’i angry huhū
“The pretty flower”, then, is translated as “ka pua nani”.
“This red house” is translated as “kēia hale ‘ula”.
“That good friend” is translated as “kēlā hoa maika’i”.
Now, you try it, before looking at the answers at the end of this lesson. Translate “the big love”. “this good man”. “that angry child”.
Of interest, some words in English don’t have an equivalent in Hawaiian because the concept is not known in Old Hawai’i. For example, the word for “school” is “kula”—it’s a “Hawaiianization” of the English word. The word for “computer”? We had to find something that sounds like it…kamapiula. (Close enough!)
[Here are the answers: “ke aloha nui”, “kēia kanaka maika’i”, “kēlā keiki huhū”.]
He-sentence pattern
https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?sts=t&cm_sp=SearchF-_-home-_-Results&an=&tn=instant+hawaiian&kn=&isbn=
Last month we learned that each noun must be preceded by an article—the, a/an, this, that, etc. The Hawaiian words for these English words, respectively, are: ka or ke, he, kēia, kēlā. In English, we can use the same “the” for singular or plural. “The flower” and “the flowers” use the same word “the”. The Hawaiian word for a single flower is “ka pua” (the flower). If you have lots of flowers, can you still use “ka”? The answer is no. In Hawaiian, the word for more than one flower is “nā pua” (the flowers).
The plural for “a flower” is “flowers”—just flowers in general, no specific flowers. Singular, in Hawaiian, is “he pua”. Plural, in Hawaiian, is “he mau pua”. All you have to do is add the word “mau” (which means “lots”) to the word “he”. Easy, huh?
In the case of “this” (kēia) and “that” (kēlā), you use the same rule. “This flower” (kēia pua) converts to “these flowers” (kēia mau pua). “That flower” (kēlā pua) converts to “those flowers” (kēlā mau pua).
The Hawaiian cultural story I have to tell that relates to this lesson has to do with he kupuna (an elder) that was welcoming me into the dinner meal. He merely looked at me, pointed at the stack of plates (pā) on the meal table, and said, “He mau pā.” And that was all he needed to say to me to make me feel welcome and okay to partake in the meal! He didn’t have to say, “Good to see you! Please help yourself to some food.” Three words in Hawaiian were equivalent to ten words in English! “He mau pā.” (“Lot of plates!”)
One of the comments that I usually get from people visiting Hawai’i is, “I can never remember how to say the street names. They all start with K!” Well, they don’t all start with K, but a good majority of them do, with good reason. Every noun in Hawaiian can not be spoken by itself. It must be preceded by an article of some kind. Most people know what a “noun” is (person, place, or thing). An “article” simply is a word like “a, an, the, this, that, these, those”. So, in Hawaiian, you can’t just say the word “hale” (house), you must say “the house” (ka hale) or “a house” (he hale) or “this house” (kēia hale), or “that house” (kēlā hale), etc. Hence, the word “Ka-mehameha” means “the lonely one”, and the word “Ka-lā-kaua” means “the war day”. In some ways, it’s not too much different than Spanish (la casa) or French (la maison), but unlike these languages, Hawaiian does not designate a “feminine” or “masculine” noun. (There are just other kinds of Hawaiian grammar rules.)
There is one exception regarding “ka”, though. And it is dependent on the first alphabet of the noun that follows “the”. If the word starts with a “K”, “E”, “A”, or “O”, the “ka” changes to “ke”. For example, the word for child is “keiki”. To say “the child”, you say “ke keiki” (not “ka keiki”). To say, “the life”, you say, “ke ola” (not “ka ola”). The word for “cloud” is “ao”. To say “the cloud”, you say “ke ao”. This rule then is sometimes referred to as “The Cloud” (Ke Ao), because, generally (and there are always exceptions), a word that starts with “K, E, A, or O” has a “ke” that preceeds it instead of a “ka”. Ke kanaka. Ke aloha. One caution: the ‘okina counts as a consonant. If there is an ‘okina in front of a word, even if the next letter is a K-E-A-O, you use “ka”. The word for land is “ka ‘āina”.
Having a Consonant-Vowel combination is easy to pronounce, like “maka” (eye). But what if you have a lot of vowels together, that all have to be pronounced? This usually stumps most English speakers, but today we have help for that. Earlier I mentioned getting your hands on the Hawaiian Dictionary, the one with the red cover. It’s only in this version that Kawena Pukui uses the period mark (.) to help us learn where the division of a word is. For example, the word for “sad” is “kaumaha”. When you look the word up in either the hard cover version or the online version, the dictionary lists it as “kau.maha”. That period tells you that, instead of saying “ka-uma-ha” (which is incorrect), you know to say “kau-MA-ha”. Let’s look at another example in the word “laukanaka”, which means densely populated, or many people. The dictionary lists it as “lau.kanaka”. So, you say, “Lau-ka-NA-ka”. Remember—stress/accent is on the second to the last syllable which in this case is the syllable “na”. (Note: this is not the word for our Club’s name, which is Lau Kanaka. “Lau” meaning many or numerous, and “Kanaka” meaning person, man, or individual. “no” meaning for, concerning, on behalf of. And of course, “Hawai’i” is….Hawai’i!)
I have a funny story about a person going to school in New York learning from his teacher about the King that ruled the Hawaiian Islands. “His name was Kammy-HAMmy-haw,” she told the class. She didn’t have the periods in Pukui’s dictionary to help her know where the syllable delineation was: Ka.meha.meha. Accent on the last “me”.
Now that we have a general rule for where the accent is with Hawaiian words, there is always an exception. That exception comes in the form of a macron, or “mekona” or “kahakō”. That horizontal line over a vowel tells us that the sound of that vowel is prolonged slightly and stressed. The word “kahakō” then is pronounced “ka-ha-KO”. Unlike the ‘okina, the kahakō is not a requirement for the written Hawaiian language, and is just a means of helping us non-natives learn to say the words correctly. But like the ‘okina, not acknowledging the kahakō’s presence can change the meaning of a word. There are many examples for this, but let’s just look at this one: kananā (ka-na-NA) means an early growth stage of the ‘ahi fish; kānana (KA-na-na) means a strainer. What a difference a little horizontal line makes!
In my opinion, the two most mispronounced Hawaiian words by non-Hawaiian speakers are “Aloha” and “Hawai’i”. I know you find that hard to believe, but it’s true. In order to teach you to say these two words correctly, we have to talk about diphthongs, that is, a sound formed by the combination of two vowels in a single syllable. Examples, are the English word “coin” and “loud”. Notice how your mouth glides from the “o” to the “i” in the word “coin”. This is very common in English, but not so in Hawaiian if there is a single vowel. Each Hawaiian vowel has only one sound. Let’s look at the word “no”, which means “for or concerning” in Hawaiian. You say it as “noh”, not “noh-oo”. (Are you starting to notice how one unconsciously says diphthongs???) I hear the word “aloha” mispronounced as “ah-LOH-OO-ha”. So let’s practice saying it correctly: “ah-LOH-ha”. (Do you hear the difference?)
With the word “Hawai’i”, the mispronunciation problem is just the opposite. The word can be divided into three parts: Ha-wai-‘i. That’s “Hah-VY-(glottal stop)-ee”. It is mispronounced many times over, commonly, as “Hah-VAH-ee”. In this word, there IS a diphthong appearing as “wai”, and people usually just say “wa”. There are two “i”s, and each one must be pronounced.
Lastly, the general rule for which syllable gets the stress or accent is this: the accent is on the second to the last syllable. This is more easily seen with consonant-vowel combinations, a little more difficult with consonant-vowel-vowel-vowel combos. So, let’s stay simple for now. A-LO-ha. Ma-KA-na. Ka-ni-ka-PI-la. A macron or kahakō changes everything, and we’ll talk about that next time.
Last month I stated that all the consonants (h, k, l, m, n, p, w, ‘) have the same sounds as they have in English, EXCEPT the “w”. Sometimes it’s pronounced like a “w”, sometimes like a “v”. There is a rule for this, and Mary Kawena Pukui writes it in the Hawaiian Dictionary, page xxvii, this way: “after ‘i’ and ‘e’ usually a lax ‘v’; after ‘u’ and ‘o’ usually like ‘w’; after ‘a’ or initially, like ‘w’ or ‘v’.” Now, if you can remember all that, I’ll be impressed. As always, there are exceptions to any rule. In addition, I have come to notice that it’s perhaps dialectical too. On Kaua’i, sometimes they “vai” for the word for “fresh water”, and on O’ahu they may say “wai”. Either way is not wrong, so you won’t be embarrassed if you can’t remember the rule. Remember again, that all the alphabets are sounded (or glottal-stopped, in the case of the ‘okina). Do not apply the Spanish “silent H” rule to Hawaiian!
And speaking of resources, the “bible” for any student in Hawaiian Culture or Language is the Pukui/Elbert Hawaiian Dictionary. If you are serious about learning anything in Hawaiian, you need to have this “red” 1986 hardcover edition (not the pocket version, or the older blue hardcover). You can get it on any booksellers website (alibris, abebooks, etc.) for about $25, and it’s worth any money as a reference book. The ISBN number is 0-8248-0703-0. There are many times that I open the dictionary to any page and start reading the words and their definitions. You can learn so much just by doing that. If obtaining this dictionary is not in your plans, the dictionary is available in digital form at wehewehe.org
One of the first things I like to cover in my ‘olelo (language) course is Geography. I think it’s important for my haumana (students) to understand Oceania, and how we are all related. The Oceania Region is divided into three parts: Polynesia (means “many islands”), Micronesia (“small islands”), and Melanesia (“dark islands”). When you look at the physical features of the people of these groups, there are distinctions. Do an internet search for pictures of the peoples of these islands and you’ll see. Examples of Polynesian islands are Hawaii, New Zealand, Easter Island, Samoa, & Tonga. Examples of Micronesia islands are Guam, Saipan, Marshall Islands, Pohnpei, and Belau. Examples of Melanesia islands are New Guinea, Fiji, New Caledonia, and Australia aboriginal people.
All this leads to this month’s lesson on consonants in Hawaiian Language. There are 8 consonants: h, k, l, m, n, p, w, ‘ (which is called an ‘okina). All those are pretty straight forward in sound, with the small exception of the “w”, which can be pronounced “w” or “v” depending on what follows it (more on that later). Remember that the Hawaiians didn’t have a written language until the first American missionaries gave them one in 1820. This written language, therefore, uses the English sounds as its base.
What I want to focus on now is the little-known ‘okina, which is a backwards-facing apostrophe. It’s identified in linguistics as a glottal stop, stopping the air coming out of the mouth before proceeding, exactly like the way we say, “Oh-oh”. Though it looks unassuming, it’s important and you cannot ignore or change it. If you do, it can alter the definition of a word dramatically. It means that there was once a consonant there, and over the centuries, we have dropped it, replacing it with the glottal stop. A perfect example is the word for “you”, which is ‘oe. The word for “you” in the Rarotongan language (Cook Islands, our Polynesian cousin) is “koe”. In our ‘olelo Hawai’i evolution, we have dropped the “k”. When you say ‘oe, stop the breath before you start to pronounce the word. You can better hear it when it is preceded by another word, like the phrase, “Aloha ‘oe”.
He Ha’awina Iki
(A Short Lesson)
I’ve been teaching ‘Olelo Hawai’i here in Cottonwood for over ten years now, and one of the things that I notice is the hardest for English speakers is trying to pronounce the Hawaiian words. “So many vowels!”, they say. Actually, there are only 5 vowels—the same 5 vowels that we have in English. Unlike English, though—and much simpler than English—,each vowel has only one way it sounds. Let’s look at this English sentence: “the able cat saw an armadillo”. The sound of each of the “a”s in this sentence are all different! So, I say to my classes, English will mess you up; don’t use it as a reference to learn another language.
There are 5 vowels in ka ‘Olelo Hawai’i (the Hawaiian language). A, E, I, O, U. If you know how to speak a little Spanish, Japanese, or Dutch (and probably some other languages), the sounds of these vowels are the same. Each vowel is pronounced; there are no silent vowels. Ah, Eh, Ee, Oh, Oo. “A” like the “a” in above. “E” like the “e” in “bet”. “I” like the “y” in “city”. “O” like the “o” in “sole”. “U” like “oo” in “moon”. (Reference: Pukui/Elbert, Hawaiian Dictionary, page xvii.) There are 8 consonants: h, k, l, m, n, p, w, and the ‘okina (more on this later). All the consonants are sounded. Practice these words: aloha, ‘ikena, kahili, limu, pahele. See? Easy when you have one consonant and one vowel!
Stay tuned for more ‘olelo lessons in the next newsletter!
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