Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 16, Number 6, 1 June 1999 — Makaōala in Kohala [ARTICLE]

Makaōala in Kohala

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B y P a u,:l a D u r b I n KOHALA RESIDENT Mane Solomon keeps a watchful eye for things that don't seem pono, and what she has seen in Wai'āpuka has her worried. According to her, activities on an absentee landlord's property could be endangering tangible ties that connect 1 iawaiians to their last wanioi chief. "Wai'āpuka means water hole," she explained. "When we were children swimming in the pond, my grandmother would say, 'This is wheie Kamehameha would swim.' We always got stories from her so we knew about Kamehameha and how close he was to us then. As we were swimming, we were swimming with Kamehameha, the great man. It was very important to us growing up in KeW'eA "And I have always known about Kamehameha's Ditch. He wanted to put water in his taro patch. So he made his ala wai and it was hard work becau.se they had no tools, just use a stick they called 'ō'ō and their hands. Thcy dug a tunnel, nine pukas in all, and it took years to eomplele. "When my time eame, I did the same for my grandchildren. They would jump into the pond from lehua trees and I wouid tell them my grandmother's stories to show them all the pukas, the tunnels and how they were dug with only hands and a stick."

Kamehameha's taro patch disappeared when C'astle and Cooke developed Kohala as a plantation, but the ditch and pond were left in tact. Then. decades ago, Solomon ahd her neighbors wcre caught by surprise when a hui of other loeal residents bought a large tract of the Kohala land. "That was pretty underhanded," she said. "They resold some of the land to the Japane.se before the community even knew, and we were wor- _ _ . . ■ ned. So when the Japanese owner eame into our land, we went to him and said, 'Come walk with us to see our sites, our history, and how we feel about the land.' We wanted to protect it and he agreed! We got to like this new owner and the Japanese people learned." But the Kohala community has never met the Colorado resident who bought the parcel on whieh the pond and ditch are located. Solomon was among those disturbed to see equipmcnt engaged recently in "grubbing," or removing vegetation from the site. She immediately alerted Mark Smith of the Hilo office of the Department of Land and Natural Resources His-

toric Preservation Division. "I called the county and confirmed that no one had applied for a grubbing permit," said Smith. But according to county inspector Stanley Haraguchi, a permit might not have been neeessary since the land is considered pasture. "It falls in a gray area," he said. Solomon took it upon herself anyway to go to the site and tell the maehine operator to stop - whieh he did. There has been no more activity since then, but she is still concerned. "The trees that we used to jump from are all gone and they made a road right to the pond," she said. "How ean they do that? Now our petrogiyphs are exposed to the elements, to the cows, and I am afraid we will lose them. I'm worried ii i about the graves īn that area. "Who is clearing the land without asking our people? We as Hawaiians are responsible for our historieal places. We also have our Hawaiian hawk. We eall it the 'io and it nests in that area. lf they cut down all the trees, we lose the hawk. I would like all this to be protected. Especially when it comes to Kamehameha, we don't want to lose anything of his. 1 have great-grandchildren. If it's all ruined, what will we have for our descendants to eome?" The owner of the property could not be reached for confirmation or comment. ■

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