Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 26, Number 12, 1 December 2009 — Aloha ʻoe, dear friend [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Aloha ʻoe, dear friend

Aloha kākou, Kaho'onei Panoke left us to enter another existence a few days after the Hawaiian Civic Club convention on Maui. He had done his part for the Civic Clubs for decades and will be remembered fondly for his contributions not only to them but also to Hawaiians and our culture. His presence and personality were comforting and convincing and he will be missed for a season. My sincere condolences go out to his family and close friends to whom he meant so mueh. His employment at the Office of Hawaiian Affairs was mueh appreciated and we wish him Godspeed to a better life and a reunion with his kūpuna. And as we reflect upon ancestors and their former presence on this land of aloha may we continue to learn from them today as we seek

their guidance in helping us to find who they were and how we ean benefit from their experiences and existence. Family history is something we should all consider and conunit to explore this coming year. It is not a dead subject but a hving and vibrant one that ean bring us both joy and regret. My wife, Maile, tells of being given only what information was printed on a 3-by-5 card about her great grandmother, Euniee Malaihi, of Waihe'e, Maui. This lady, however, during her lifetime was an important ali'i and married a German, Carl Frederick Scholtz, who was the first blacksmith on Maui. They owned mueh of Wailuku and traveled to Gennany but that's about all she knew for some time. So how mueh will your great grandchildren know about you? We ean perpetuate our family knowledge and history by recording it. Diaries are familiar to most and are also known as journals, whieh are recorded on a regular basis. Family histories, a suimnary of our lives or an autobiography, are also means by whieh we ean memorialize our lives for the benefit of others. And then, there is the genealogical research, whieh estabhshes our lineages, identifies our families, and locates us at the bottom of that long ancestral line from whieh we descend. With all of

this, before we expire perhaps we ean provide for our posterity a glimpse of what our lives were like as well as those of our kūpuna and inspire our keiki to aspire to the hen:® characteristics and values of us guys. So before your kūpuna leave this life you might want to sit with them and record their stories and memories and add them to yours. This Christmas season offers us the opportunity to visit kūpuna, converse with them, comfort them, and enjoy them one more time. Some ean be a bit ornery but be patient and you will appreciate the paths they have trodden and the challenges they have faced as you learn more about them. Family reunions are always being advertised in Ka Wai Ola and that is another opportunity to both meet and reunite with ohana and to learn more about yourselves and why you may be like that. The passing of Kaho'onei, and Malia Craver, and a sweet and humble friend, Roselle Soon, bring to light the transitory nature of our lives on earth and the need for us to live good lives and set good examples for those who follow and those who linger longer. Now is the time for us to prepare and in doing so we ean take steps to eontinue our legacies, as minimal as they might be, that our great grandchildren ean know about us and maybe learn from us rather than just read about us on a 3-by-5 card. Merry Christmas and God bless. ■

leo eleletrustBE mBSSSa8ES

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