Search Results for “May Day ” | Page 178

Margaret Aiu’s Hula Studio

May 28, 2017 2 Comments

She was born Margaret Maiki Souza on May 28, 1925 in Honolulu, the daughter of Peter Charles Souza and Cecilia Pai‘ohe Gilman Souza. Hānai (adopted) to her maternal grandaunt Cecilia Rose Mahoe and John William Kealoha, she grew up in Palolo Valley (she considered them her grandparents.) She turned to hula at about the age of 14 or 15. “Hula of the day of the kings was just a memory to some of the old timers. The old hula lived only in the talent of a few masters. Fortunately, these were training a small number in spite of the odds against their every putting their learning to good use.” She was trained in a full range of the ancient and traditional hula. In 1943, at the age of 18, she graduated (‘uniki) as an ‘olapa (dancer.)

A devout Christian, her Tutu helped her reconcile the Christian and Hawaiian beliefs and practices and was able to find peace with ancient practices and her own Christianity. She later married Boniface Aiu. She formed Margaret Aiu’s Hula Studio. Her students learned Hawaiian genealogies, culture, mannerisms, legends, poetry and the ‘beauties of our own Hawai‘i.’ In 1952, she received permission from her teachers to change the name of her dance studio to Hālau Hula O Maiki. (However a sign painter reversed some of the wording to read ‘Hula Hālau O Maiki.’) She later married Haywood Kahauanu Lake, a noted singer, arranger and song-writer, with whom she performed.

Nootka Sound

May 21, 2017 No Comments

Spain claimed the Pacific as its exclusive territory by right of the Treaty of Tordesillas (1494). Britain argued that navigation was open to any nation, and territorial claims had to be backed by effective occupation. British and Spanish claims to the Pacific Northwest had overlapped since the 16th century. In July 1789 Esteban Martínez, Spanish commandant at Nootka Sound, seized several British merchant ships. Britain demanded compensation and threatened war, but Spain declined to pay compensation and prepared for war, hoping its long-standing Bourbon ally, France, would provide assistance.

The resulting crisis brought the two nations close to war, but the Spanish backed off after realizing that without the help of France – distracted by the Revolution – they could not hope to match British naval power. They settled with the Nootka Convention (signed October 28, 1790), in which the Spanish acknowledged the British right to maintain outposts in Nootka Sound and engage in whaling outside a “Ten-League Line” off the Northwest coast. Peace in the Pacific allowed for commerce to the Hawaiian Islands to expand, as well as expand the roles of a new player, the US.

Pele and the Missionaries

May 20, 2017 No Comments

“Is she (Pele) dead? Does she sleep? or has she only closed her adamantine doors, and with Pluto and Vulcan descended to the fiery bowels of the earth to prepare with deeper secrecy her magazines of wrath which shall one day burst forth with more desolating terror? To us it is a lonely idea that the volcano should become extinct; for we confess that her mutterings, her thunderings, her flashings, the smoke of her nostrils and the shaking of her rocky ribs are music, beauty, sublimity and grandeur to us. They seem so like the voice of Almighty God, so like the footsteps of Deity.” (Lydia Bingham Coan)

“A mighty current instantly overflowed, and they ran for their lives before the molten flood, and ascended from the surface of the abyss to the lofty rim with heartfelt thanksgiving to their great Deliverer. This proves the real danger of meddling with Pele’s palace and trifling with her power. Had this occurred in the days of unbroken superstition, it would doubtless have been ascribed to the anger of that false deity, and multiplied her worshippers. But now such a deliverance was justly ascribed to the care and power of Jehovah, the knowledge of whose attributes displayed in the works of creation, providence, and grace, has introduced the Hawaiian race into a new life.” (Hiram Bingham)

Environmental Zones

May 19, 2017 No Comments

Traditionally in Hawai‘i, environmental zones were perceived and determined by various natural features and resource criteria. Along shore is termed ko kaha kai (place (land) by the sea). Next above were the plains or sloping lands (kula,) those to seaward being termed ko kula kai and those toward the mountains ko kula uka (uka, inland or upland.) In terms of use, from the Hawaiian planter’s point of view was the kahawai (the place (having) fresh water – as in a valley).

Wao means the wild – a place distant and not often penetrated by man. The Hawaiians recognized and named many divisions or aspects of the wao: first, the wao kanaka, the reaches most accessible, and most valuable, to man (kanaka;) and above that, denser and at higher elevations, the wao akua, forest of the gods, remote, awesome, seldom penetrated, source of supernatural influences, both evil and beneficent. The term for mountain or mountain range – a mountainous region – is kuahiwi (backbone). (All here is from Handy.)

Entourage

May 6, 2017 No Comments

On November 27, 1823, L’Aigle, an English whaling ship, took Kamehameha II (Liholiho), Kamāmalu and their entourage to England to gain firsthand experience in European ways. The king and his chiefs agreed that Liholiho needed a competent interpreter to travel with him and Frenchman John Rives went as interpreter.

Liholiho’s chosen party were Governor Boki and his wife, Liliha, Kapihe, Chief Kekuanaoa, steward Manuia, Naukana (Noukana), Kauluhaimalama, servant Na‘aiweuweu, and James Kanehoa Young. In London, Liholiho and Kamāmalu became ill; Kamāmalu (aged 22) died on July 8, 1824, Kamehameha II (age 27) died six days later, on July 14, 1824. The British Government dispatched HMS Blonde to return them back to Honolulu; they arrived on May 6, 1825.