Training for Culture and Community – Hawaii Business Magazine

A new series of workshops at the Lāna’i Culture and Heritage Center is bringing the community together, across generations.

In a small room in Lāna’i City, a group of 10 people, ranging in age from high school students to kūpuna, are gathered around a long table covered with colorful piles of flowers. of flowers—bougainvillea, hydrangeas, agapanthus, cup and saucer flowers, bachelor’s buttons, and front palapalai fern. They are all engrossed in picking flowers from the piles and weaving them into a kind of haku lei that is slowly growing, but the conversation is flowing.

Kumu (Lecturer) Diane Preza looks around the group and says, “The best thing about these workshops is not only the teaching, but the story telling. Because you will be talking and you will learn a lot. You learn a little about the Hawaiian language, the native plants, and then you learn from the kids about football and everything they do these days. I didn’t know.”

This is a lei-making workshop being held by the Lāna’i Culture and Heritage Center (CHC), part of a series of educational classes called Hana Ka Lima (meaning “handwork”) aimed at preserve and promote traditional knowledge. and knowledge within the Lāna’i community.

Since the program began in the fall of 2023, the Center has held workshops on pa’i’ai (taro) weaving, ulana niu (coconut leaf weaving), and making your own traditional textiles. The latter was a two-part study—students spent the first class learning about the hibiscus, or hibiscus tilaceus, plant and how to strip and soak its bark, then returned for two weeks. later they go to dry the fibers of the bark, and they twist and twist them into a thread. .

Shelly Kaiaokamalie, executive director of Lāna’i CHC, says, “I think sometimes people think that these kinds of practices happened in the past, but these are things that are part of a living tradition. . It was exciting to be able to strengthen that again here in Lāna’i.”

In a place like Lāna’i, with a population of over 3,300, where many young people leave the island to pursue education and better economic opportunities, strengthening intergenerational relationships and passing on cultural knowledge is important. a lot.

“The Culture and Heritage Center serves not only as a cultural resource, but as a link to this local community,” says Kaiaokamalie. “We are able to bring people together, learn with people who have this knowledge and have fun doing it. Telling a story, learning about other people’s families. It is a way to build relationships with the community, without improving the culture. ”

The Hana Ka Lima workshop series is sponsored by the Hawaii Tourism Council through its Kulu Ola: Living Hawaiian Culture Program, which supports Island programs that promote Hawaiian culture and society.

Kēhau Meyer of the Hawai’i Community Foundation, which is running the Kūnulu Ola program until July 2024, says, “There’s value in investing in indigenous traditions, and supporting traditional practitioners as key members. in our community. These programs put money back into the people and the place, two of the most important things that make Hawai’i.”

Kaiaokamalie says Lāna’i is one of those places you have to visit to understand. “Lāna’i is a unique community, with many rich stories and history and values,” he says. I think people in other places in Hawaii and other places can learn from Lāna’i.”

To learn how the Hawaii Community Foundation can help you achieve your philanthropic goals, visit hawaiicommunityfoundation.org