Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 18, Number 12, 1 December 2001 — "How has Sept. 11 impacted Hawaiians and Hawaiian issues?" [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

"How has Sept. 11 impacted Hawaiians and Hawaiian issues?"

Obe Villamor, Wai'anae It's had a tremendous impact; the fact that so many people lost their jobs. Especially for Wai'anae residents, it was already bad, job-wise; now, it's worse. A lot of my friends who lost jobs had just purchased homes and now they're trying to figure how to pay their mortgage.

Mabel Tolentino, Waimea We can't present our issues in Congress, including our bills to help the sovereignty movement. And also Hawaiians, we're the lifter of spirits, we always go around with a smile and say aloha to everyone. Sept. 1 1 has brought a big challenge, keeping people in the hospitality industry afloat.

Kalani Ryder, Kāne'ohe The terrorist attacks affected us a lot. A lot of Hawaiians supporting families got laid off, have to collect unemployment. They're looking for jobs but no one's hiring And even with the discounts, we can't afford to travel. Sept. 1 1 gave us a scare, made us realize life is too short. Hawaiians felt the pain as hard as the rest of the world, and as Americans, whieh I'm proud to be.

Tony Ho, Kāne'ohe Prior to Sept. 1 1 we had a momentum toward resolving Hawaiian issues, but more American nationalism has surfaced and people's attention diverted from it. A lot of us kinda in the middle feel torn. We still want to fix problems that Hawaiians face, but take the Akaka Bill; how important will it be to the other senators now? There's this realization by some of us Hawaiians that we lost our ehanee with Sept. 11.

Ke'ala Jones, Ko'olauloa Economically, it's been devastating. Issue-wise, like with the sovereignty movement, we've taken a step backward and it's hard to move forward. People don't even want to hear or talk about it; they're being really cautious, really tense right now. Before the attack, a lot of us hoped the military would downsize in Hawai'i, but now with the war, there's no hope of regaining any land. So we want to support the U.S., but we have problems here too that shouldn't be ignored.

Mahealani Cypher, Honolulu As a human being, 1 was shocked and saddened by the deaths of so many innoeenl people. As a spiritual being and Hawaiian, I searched deeply to find the meaning behind some of this pilikia, and recognized a eommon hurt: that sacred sites were violated by those with military might. We need to work together non-violently to build respect for our temples and wahi pana that we native people have eommon concerns about.

On Nov. 9, Ka Wai Ola visited the convention of the Association of Hawaiian Civic Clubs in Waikīkī, where 500 Hawaiians from Hawai'i and the Continent gathered to discuss key issues of eoncern to Hawaiians.

Here is their mana'o on a question posed.

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