Biography Hawaiʻi; Ruth Keʻelikolani; Interview with Kalena Silva 11/22/03 #2

No, let me. No, let me. Yeah, that's true. Uh-huh. Right. This is the Kallaka was. And her adopted son. The Leo Hoku. Yeah, he was one. Right. Yeah. The youngest little. You know, one of the little melons has something that he composed for. Ah. All right. And then we'll be interesting to you. Yeah. The one you could look at. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Okay. Ready? Ready. Okay. Ready? Yeah. So, the last question is, um, well, one of the last question is, what do you think her legacy to Hawaiian people is, um, why you, you know, they're kind of connected and why you, uh, why your center is named after her. Right. Well, I think Pritz is getting called only left several legacies. And one of them, probably the most tangible are her lands that she bequeathed to Princess Powahe and that formed the Bishop estate today

and that benefit thousands of Hawaiian children who go to come into her schools. And I think that's probably the most obvious legacy of Princess Kelly Colony. But I think, um, on an intangible, um, in another way, um, an intangible, what am I trying to say? Um, in an intangible sort of way, her legacy is to those of us who value traditional Hawaiian worldview, who value traditional Hawaiian culture, perspectives, beliefs, practices, our language, obviously, is very important. And those are the kinds of values that she embodied and that she pulled no bones about when she was living, even during a time when, increasingly, the emphasis placed on these values were becoming weaker, why she,

in many instances, went the other way and decided to go against the tide, so to speak. And that kind of respect for a traditional Hawaiian perspective of life and living, I think she had and gives those of us who live today, um, gives us hope for our own future as Hawaiian people and as people who, um, revere respect and have aloha for the ways of our own people and wish to see those continue into the future. So I think that is a really important legacy that she's left for us, this intangible, um, respect and aloha for the ways of our people. And for the desire to see these kinds of, these ways of thinking and being and feeling continue into the future. Um, we decided at Kahaka Uloke, Elicolani College of Hawaiian Language

at the University of Hawaii at Hilo to name our college after her because of these very values that she embodied and because of her own exemplary life, um, she, excuse me, it's the dialect I see, maybe. But she, um, I should maybe explain the name, the name of our college is Kahaka Uloke, Elicolani. And it actually comes from or is inspired by the old saying Kahaka Uloke, because Kahaka was the god of several things but sunlight and water being two important aspects of his physical manifestations in this world. And so Kahaka Uloke, E, refers poetically then to a rainbow, which obviously we see when there is light and water. And Kahaka Uloke means the red,

um, pathway of created by Kani, the red pathway created by Kani, which means then of course this refers to this, uh, to rainbows. And so Larry Kimura, whose, uh, a member of our faculty at Kahaka Uloke, Elicolani College, thought about this old saying that's, that gives Kani, um, responsibility that assigns to him the responsibility of rainbows. And, um, so took this old saying and then thought about the impact that Kahaka Uloke had during her time and that she continues to have upon those of us who are very much interested and desirous of seeing our language and our culture become strong again. And so he decided then to take the old saying and use Elicolani's name in place of Kani's. And so of course, um,

the meaning changes somewhat because instead of A Kani, we say all Kani, A refers to in Hawaiian, we have A in all forms of the possessive and A refers to something that is created by someone, whereas O refers to something that someone embodies. And so we felt that Kahaka Uloke, this, um, red pathway, really was a kind of venerable standard that perhaps she didn't create but that she embodied Kani Elicolani did. And so we decided then that we should call our college Kahaka Uloke Elicolani that is the venerable standard of Kani Elicolani because this is the standard that we aspire to in our own lives as we attempt to revitalize our language and culture and make it viable in today's world for our young people into the future. Can I get a follow on that?

We mentioned the business of she and some ways embodies certain traditional cultural values that we want to preserve in the store. You can just be a bit more specific about what those values would be. Sure. Sure. Oh, yeah. Okay. All right. You got to teach her. I know. This is not my class. Look at that. I am sorry. She's pretty the dad. Sorry. Sorry. That wasn't meant to be sexist. I'm sorry. You know, she's the blonde lady on Good Morning America. Okay. Okay. So what specifically then? That was the question. When you're talking about cultural traditional values, the she seemed to embody them. Could you just talk a little bit about what those values are? Right. Well, I think I've said some of them. I mean, I think some of the traditional values that Kani Elicolani embodied as an example.

The example that she was for those of us living today include respect for tradition, aloha for our ancestors, knowledge of our ancestors, and our tradition, and the ability to view the world from the lens, so to speak, of our own people, which marks us as Hawaiian people, identifies us as Hawaiian people. I think those are the kinds of values that she embodied and that she, that were reflected in her everyday life, and that we take inspiration from today. I think another kind of value that Princess Elicolani embodied, a traditional Hawaiian value was, if you can call it that, was obstinacy, sort of, knowing inside herself very clearly, deep inside herself, which she valued,

and so not giving up on it. And, you know, the saying by Kamehmeha to his warriors, when they were about to charge the army there at Nupalia, here on Oahu, before Oahu was to fall to Kamehmeha, he said, which means, forward my younger brothers in war. Let us drink of the bitter waters. There's no return. So, I think that this kind of idea, that is, you know, you have to move forward with what you know as right, was one that Elicolani clung to very, very dearly, and we draw inspiration from that, because she was stubborn in her belief that Hawaiian culture and language and the perspective on the world was an important one,

and that it was valuable. Despite the incursions from foreigners into Hawaii, she clung to this idea, that we can learn about these other people, but basically we are in our own land, and we need to remember that. And so, it's important that we cling to these traditional perspectives that allow us to be who we are. Okay, it's not fair. We need the interviewer to cry. Yeah, or really? Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah. So, do you want to comment about the melee? Oh, right. All right. Yeah, sure. Okay. You know, Samuel Manaya Kalani Kamako wrote in the 1860s, prolifically about many, many different kinds of Hawaiian cultural activities

at the time and before, because I think he saw, as did Hawaiians at the time, that many of these were beginning to sort of fade away with the increasing foreign influence and presence in Hawaii. And in one very interesting article that he wrote, he listed some two dozen different kinds of functions or contexts of poetry in everyday Hawaiian life. And that particular article of his always struck me as being so insightful, because he lists all kinds of different kinds of, all kinds of poetic situations. melee out when you want to withhold something from someone, a melee knower when you want to honor someone, a melee mahala when you want to thank someone for something, a melee knower when you want to ask someone for something. And he goes on and lists some two dozen.

And at the end of this listing, he says, and there are many, many more. And so, you know, people say, and we hear this said, that Hawaiians were a very poetic people. We hear it said all the time that Hawaiians were very poetic people, but I really don't think it's an overstatement. And we see this in everyday Hawaiian life where there was barely a situation that didn't present a person, just like you and me, with an opportunity to express in poetic form some idea that would allow us to raise our thinking, a natural to, a level or two. Because I think that's why they did it. I mean, I think the Hawaiians, you know, in the old days, felt that in order to fully express something in a particular situation and to take it beyond the mundane, beyond the normal sort of everyday, why poetry was the way to do it.

And so, this occurred, of course, among the Makai Nana and among our alii. And we see this where the alii, like the Makai Nana, were very poetic, and were presented on an everyday basis with so many different kinds of contexts in which to use their poetic abilities. And so, we're blessed today to have so many thousands of these melee that have survived on paper. Can you imagine how many of these melee have not been written down but that were composed on an evening, or at whatever time in whatever context and that we don't know about now just because someone with a pen and paper wasn't there. I mean, it seems to me that it certainly isn't an overstatement to say that our people were a poetic people because every situation, every activity, every circumstance could present fodder,

good fodder, fertile fodder for poetic expression. This is a little off the subject, but it seems to me that in order for, in order for people to be so poetically productive at any level of society, that there must have been a general, I guess I want to use the word educational, or some kind of education on, you know, on every level about poetry, which we don't see today, in Western poetry in any way. The whole idea, I think, well, you know, a part of it is just thinking about what poetry is. I think perhaps in maybe Western societies, people tend to think of poetry being something separate from everyday sort of discourse and interaction, whereas Hawaiians felt that this kind of verbal expression

of ideas and thoughts enhanced in a really, really fundamental way relations with people, ideas about places. So I think that it was considered to be a much more integrated part of life in a way that we don't truly understand today, only because perhaps we've become more Westernized and to think that, you know, the Shakespeare's and the, you know, Stevenson's and Tennyson's and Poe's and other ones that can write literature or poetry and that, you know, everyday people can't. But traditionally Hawaiians had a very different view of poetic expression, and everybody was able to do something. Everybody was able to express through our language in a way that allowed us to touch someone's heart

or to elevate the thinking of people. It's going to be interesting when you stop to think that a society in general was in touch with its poetic soul. Oh, absolutely. Yes, absolutely. You know, and as a playwright and a poet yourself, I mean, you understand that completely, I'm sure. You know, except we can't separate it from yourself. It's a part of who you are. So is there anything else you want to tell us? I don't think so. I don't think so. You want to say about how that we did now? I just wish I had more to tell. No, there's nothing. Thank you. Thanks. That was great. Really great. Oh, no.