Native Stories

Recorded at @waiwaicollective on December 13th 2019, a collaboration between Nā Wai Chamber Choir @nawaichamberchoir and the University of Hawaiʻi Music Department’s Hawaiian Music Program—Nā Leo o Tuahine, who will come together in a concert featuring the legacy of musical resistance in Hawaiʻi. Led by Dr. Jace Kaholokula Saplan @katsuandcurry, this concert lecture will survey the #mele and #choral works throughout the history of our #lāhui that have created a platform of sonic mana on which to stand on—and will feature the mele of #Queen #Liliʻuokalani, #Liko #Martin, #Israel #Kamakawiwoʻole, and many more.

Available now on our mobile app, and Google Play, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, PocketCasts, Podcast Addict, Player FM, iHeartRadio, and many other outlets! 🔌 .Learn more at www.nativestories.org!Search: “Native Stories” #nativestories on all podcast outlets! . You can download us on your mobile phones! 📲(Both android + iPhone)

Panel discussion on the issues surrounding the historic practices and management of the Hanapēpē Salt Ponds and current conflict over the area's different uses, including Maverick Helicopter's recent request for a zoning permit.

Panelists include Malia Nobrega-Olivera (President, Hui Hana Paʻakai o Hanapēpē), Kuʻulei Santos (Vice President, Hui Hana Paʻakai o Hanapēpē), Alan Murakami (Attorney, Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation).

PC https://www.civilbeat.org/2018/02/brittany-lyte-the-imperiled-legacy-of-the-hanapepe-salt-flats/

Joseph “Nappy” Napoleon (Born 1941) is well known for his participation in waʻa canoe racing in Hawaiʻi. Uncle Nappy paddled in his first Moloka'i Hoe, the annual long-distance open ocean canoe race from Moloka'i to O'ahu, at the age of 17 in 1958.

PC https://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/story/7139021/legendary-island-paddler-ready-to-make-new-mark-at-molokai-hoe/

The most dangerous time for our people... is institutional racism, which is when an institution, organization, or government has policies, practices, procedures or laws, that give or afford unearned privilege to one group or another, and that is exactly what is happening up on this mauna.

See how powerful the people of Hawaii can be, and we wield a real serious force, that we can push in whatever direction we want, and I really hope that we are not just looking back in history to this beautiful time when we all came together and then it stopped, but really look back and see "oh that was another beginning to how we got right here right now in whatever issue we were fighting then."

From Keanu Sai's blog https://hawaiiankingdom.org/blog/

In the summer of 1842, Kamehameha III moved forward to secure the position of the Hawaiian Kingdom as a recognized independent state under international law. He sought the formal recognition of Hawaiian independence from the three naval powers of the world at the time—Great Britain, France, and the United States. To accomplish this, Kamehameha III commissioned three envoys, Timoteo Ha‘alilio, William Richards, who at the time was still an American Citizen, and Sir George Simpson, a British subject. Of all three powers, it was the British that had a legal claim over the Hawaiian Islands through cession by Kamehameha I, but for political reasons the British could not openly exert its claim over the other two naval powers. Due to the islands prime economic and strategic location in the middle of the north Pacific, the political interest of all three powers was to ensure that none would have a greater interest than the other. This caused Kamehameha III “considerable embarrassment in managing his foreign relations, and…awakened the very strong desire that his Kingdom shall be formally acknowledged by the civilized nations of the world as a sovereign and independent State.”

While the envoys were on their diplomatic mission, a British Naval ship, HBMS Carysfort, under the command of Lord Paulet, entered Honolulu harbor on February 10, 1843, making outrageous demands on the Hawaiian government. Basing his actions on complaints made to him in letters from the British Consul, Richard Charlton, who was absent from the kingdom at the time, Paulet eventually seized control of the Hawaiian government on February 25, 1843, after threatening to level Honolulu with cannon fire. Kamehameha III was forced to surrender the kingdom, but did so under written protest and pending the outcome of the mission of his diplomats in Europe. News of Paulet’s action reached Admiral Richard Thomas of the British Admiralty, and he sailed from the Chilean port of Valparaiso and arrived in the islands on July 25, 1843. After a meeting with Kamehameha III, Admiral Thomas determined that Charlton’s complaints did not warrant a British takeover and ordered the restoration of the Hawaiian government, which took place in a grand ceremony on July 31, 1843. At a thanksgiving service after the ceremony, Kamehameha III proclaimed before a large crowd, ua mau ke ea o ka ‘aina i ka pono (the life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness). The King’s statement became the national motto.

The envoys eventually succeeded in getting formal international recognition of the Hawaiian Islands “as a sovereign and independent State.” Great Britain and France formally recognized Hawaiian sovereignty on November 28, 1843 by joint proclamation at the Court of London, and the United States followed on July 6, 1844 by a letter of Secretary of State John C. Calhoun. The Hawaiian Islands became the first Polynesian nation to be recognized as an independent and sovereign State.

The ceremony that took place on July 31 occurred at a place we know today as “Thomas Square” park, which honors Admiral Thomas, and the roads that run along Thomas Square today are “Beretania,” which is Hawaiian for “Britain,” and “Victoria,” in honor of Queen Victoria who was the reigning British Monarch at the time the restoration of the government and recognition of Hawaiian independence took place.

About Keanu Sai found here: https://www2.hawaii.edu/~anu/

Keanu has a Ph.D. in Political Science specializing in Hawaiian Constitutionalism and International Relations, and a founding member of the Hawaiian Society of Law & Politics. I served as lead Agent for the Hawaiian Kingdom in arbitration proceedings before the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague, Netherlands, from November 1999-February 2001. I also served as Agent in a Complaint against the United States of America concerning the prolonged occupation of the Hawaiian Kingdom, which was filed with the United Nations Security Council on July 5, 2001. Articles on the status of the Hawaiian Kingdom as an independent state, the arbitration case and the complaint filed with the United Nations Security Council have been published in the following journals: American Journal of International Law, vol. 95 (2001); Chinese Journal of International Law, vol. 2, issue 1, (2002), and the Hawaiian Journal of Law & Politics, vol. 1 (2004).

My manaʻolana for all of this is that people gain a sense of identity and they are able to be proud of who they are, where they come from..."

Our intention is to create a nurturing space, a space of empowerment...a brave space for people to feel comfortable truth telling. One of the things we’ve noticed on the Mauna is there’s a lot of historical/cultural trauma going on. I hope that our wahine space is one of those spaces where wahine, māhū, kāne, everyone feels comfortable to come into a nurturing space where they can truth tell, share their own moolelo for how they got here.

From 2015 until now I’ve been continuing to organize students, train them on how to approach creating actions on campus, how to confront the university, how to confront President Lassner.

Struggling in the hood, figuring out that I’d rather have the ʻāina back then eat spam and have EBT, hip hop solved my problems by expressing it, so I figured I might as well teach youth this craft that helped me learn discipline and bless me with a better outlook on life and help me navigate through struggle.