Huliau - The Return Voyage

Very few days pass, when ‘Iokepa and I are not asked to recommend books about Native Hawaiian history, spirituality, or culture.

‘Iokepa always answers:  “Inette has written the book, Grandmothers Whisper.  It’s circulating to publishers now.”  My husband refuses to see that as self-serving because, “It’s her memoir, not mine.”  Nevertheless…

When he and I get down to the brass tacks of recommending a written path into authentic Hawaiian history, it is not easy.  To date there have been only three major books written by native historians that refute the skewed take of the missionary accounts–that European, Fun House looking-glass.

Now there is a fourth.  ‘Iokepa was the first in our local library system to read it.  We renewed it; I was the second.  It is powerfully well written, flawlessly researched, and totally original.

Hawaiian Blood by J. Kehaulani Kauanui, published by Duke University Press tells a heartbreaking story of the arrival of racism, greed and unbelievable cruelty to these Islands.  Who–you will ask when you read it–were the “barbarians” here?

Kauanui is an Associate Professor of Anthropology and American Studies at Wesleyan University.  We do not know this woman.  But we do know this work.  ‘Iokepa cried, and felt his stomach grip at what he has already lived and known. Now we can read it.

This book is more than history.  Kauanui steps up and describes the racism that defines, infects, and impedes the Kanaka Maoli (aboriginal Hawaiian) struggle for freedom– right now.

Those of you who have followed this website know that ‘Iokepa acts always and only at the behest of his ancestors.  These Grandmothers–long gone–direct his footfalls and his word choice.

For ten years, he and I lived on the beaches of these Islands without any source of income, among his often homeless people, in the face of an oppression that the Native Hawaiians experienced from the moment the first Calvinist missionaries wrote laws that created ownership where none ever existed (with the undisguised intention that this fertile Hawaiian land become their cash crop)–an oppression that continues to this moment.

For those ten years–and in these past two, when we have traveled and spoken of the Native Hawaiians, of their transcendent cultural gifts, and of their extreme suffering–print journalists have asked ‘Iokepa for interviews highlighting his choices and his life.  The first to ask was Paul Curtis, here on  Kaua’i, five years ago.

At each request, the Grandmothers have told him:  “It is not the time.” ‘Iokepa  listened.

That changed a few weeks ago.  And on the day after Christmas (the first day of our thirteenth year together),  Paul Curtis’ interview of ‘Iokepa appeared in the Garden Island newspaper, here on Kaua’i.

It was long:  A forty inch story, with a fifteen inch sidebar.  Below are the links to both stories.  Enjoy.  Let us know what you think.

http://www.kauaiworld.com/articles/2009/12/26/news/kauai_news/doc4b35cab04757f660855711.txt

http://www.kauaiworld.com/articles/2009/12/26/news/kauai_news/doc4b35cbbead606976439963.txt

The Somewhat Distant Past:

For the first 46 years of his life, cars and driving played a central role in ‘Iokepa Hanalei ‘Imaikalani’s life.  When he relinquished, “Everything that I worked for all my life,” to answer to his ancestors’ call to return home to the Hawaiian Islands 13 years ago, and live a life of service to his people and his land, he owned, “Seven cars and a hot rod.”

Professionally:  He ran a business that featured heavy construction machinery–”Kenworth dump trucks, John Deere road graders, Barber-Greene paving machines, Komatsu excavators, Caterpillar loaders and bulldozers…”–a language, all its own.  Over his long career, he lay 108 inch water pipe for Seattle’s watershed; he paved freeways throughout the Northwest.  He ran forests of  of enormous machinery.  He was proud of his hand-eye dexterity, his physical skill, and his overwhelming organizational responsibility.

For fun:  He raced cars, motorcycles, and boats.  He had a pristine driving record of thirty years.

The Less Distant Past:

On January 30, 1997, ‘Iokepa experienced his epiphany.  His Grandmothers came, reminded him of his “Promises,” and required that he relinquish “Everything that I worked for all my life” to take this walk of faith on behalf of his people and his homeland.

Thirteen years ago he returned to the Hawaiian Islands with  a small Nike duffel in hand and $100 in his pocket–nothing else–no cars, no credit cards, no phone, no family photographs.  Within two weeks, he had given “Everything I worked for…” away (and sold nothing).

Central to the Grandmothers’ admonishments and guidance:  “You will carry no identification, and claim no identity other than your native Hawaiian one.” He dropped his hard-earned, 26 year old, flawless commercial driving license in the trashcan at the Kaua’i airport.  He tore up his social security card, and never again used that number.

He met me, on my brief vacation to Kaua’i from Portland–ten months into his walk of faith.  Six months after that meeting, my son and I joined lives with ‘Iokepa and his people.  I too relinquished a lifetime of possession–but somewhat more slowly.

In the year and a half since ‘Iokepa had arrived, Nike duffel in hand, he had walked at least ten miles daily.  It was his meditation.  If necessary, he hitchhiked.  When son Daniel and I arrived, we brought with us my 1991 Toyota Camry.  It was registered and insured in my name.  I have no Hawaiian grandmothers, I am not kanaka maoli and I do not pretend to be one.  I carry an American driver’s license.

‘Iokepa and I lived in that car for ten years (several of those with teenage Daniel).  It was our home.  It held almost all of our worldly possessions.  We camped in tents out of it–and we slept in it.

For those ten years ‘Iokepa drove this car.  (And continued to walk each of the Hawaiian Islands as part of his work.)  There has never been a scratch, nick, or fender bender.

Only Two Years Past:

Two years ago, the Grandmothers made clear that it was vital to, “Take all that you’ve lived these ten years on the Hawaiian Islands to the United States and speak of it.”   ‘Iokepa has driven in these two years, 50,000 car miles from Maine to Arizona, Florida to Minnesota, Louisiana to New York.   The car that he drives in these Return Voyage speaking tours is a 1998 Camry–on loan to Return Voyage from a friend.  It is insured and registered. There has never been a nick, scratch, or fender bender.  I gave away my 1991 Camry (then 16 years old) when we left the Islands for the first Return Voyage tour.

For thirteen years now, ‘Iokepa has flown on airplanes and driven the continent with no official federal or state government issued identification.  He carries a card that identifies him with a Hawaiian heiau that he clears and serves.  A friend printed the card on his computer.  It is laminated.  (See “Identity” on this blogsite:  March 7, 2009).

The Present:

Between the first and second Return Voyage tours, we came home to Kaua’i for just four months.  We had no car.  Some friends bought themselves a new car, and gave ‘Iokepa their old one:  a 1998 Subaru Legacy wagon.  It had an active registration through September, 2009.  We left the car and Island just after Christmas, 2008.

When we returned this September, the car’s registration and insurance had expired.

Let me make this as clear as possible:  For thirteen years, ‘Iokepa has identified himself solely and fully as a native Hawaiian.  He has lived and worked so as to restore that cultural heritage, and the freedom to practice that heritage to his people.

Without a U.S. driver’s license, it is impossible to buy car insurance.  Without car insurance, it is impossible to register an automobile.  So, on November 10, when ‘Iokepa was stopped and ticketed for:  Expired registration, no insurance, and no driver’s license–’Iokepa felt the time had come to speak his words on behalf of his nation and his people inside the courtroom.

Well-meaning, intelligent folks have challenged ‘Iokepa’s responsibility for driving uninsured, or have feared that the insurance issue poses a distraction from the more important issue at hand.  Because my husband lives a life for which “Responsibility” for one another and for every part of Creation is his heart’s blood, and because he agrees with respondents to my last Ever Changing page essay–this week, he has taken some actions to help keep all eyes on the ball here.

The car he was driving when he was ticketed is now insured and registered.  It is no longer ‘Iokepa’s.  He will continue to drive as needed, without a license that asks him to define himself by a nationality that he does not accept as his own.

He will appear in court on February 11 to state his case.

Again, I repeat:

He enters court, less to challenge American law, than to defend his people’s right to their cultural and spiritual identity.  He enters court to try to press past that fence that separates spectator and accused, to speak of a culture that, “Welcomed every guest here with open arms, open hands, and open heart.”  He enters court less to oppose, than to embrace.

“Justice and law are two different things,” ‘Iokepa said.

“American law is this wide.”  (He holds his hands inches apart.) ” It takes care of a few.  My culture is  larger than that; it takes responsibility for every soul, and every part of Creation.

“There remain laws that require that I carry identification with a nation that is not my own, that ask me to obey laws that remove me from my cultural practices and my identity.  I cannot.”

He enters court:  The living embodiment of God’s plan for the kanaka maoli–the Native Hawaiians.  He enters court asking nothing for himself, and everything for his people.

For the first time ever, ‘Iokepa Hanalei ‘Imaikalani walked into a United States courtroom in Hawai’i.

He was just another, “Traffic offender” among  dozens:  Violators of the mandated speed limits, folks who’d innocently let their car registration lapse, those who simply could not afford to pay car insurance premiums, and drunk drivers.

When his turn came:  ‘Iokepa walked through the gate that separated spectator from accused.  He stood with his back to the seats behind;  his shoulders squared;  his waist-length silver hair shining under the fluorescent lights; his light brown eyes riveted on the judge.  He articulated his full name clearly– because even in Hawai’i (especially in Hawai’i) Hawaiian names are most often mispronounced.

‘Iokepa said:  “I am not guilty of all charges,” and he asked for a jury trial.  He was denied one.  Instead, he will be tried on February 11, 2010, at ten in the morning, before this judge.  He will be permitted to, “Offer witnesses–and present evidence.”

Witnesses to what?  To his identity as a Native Hawaiian who carries his ancestors’ DNA in his blood, who embraces and lives his culture daily.

Evidence of what?  That for 13 years he has relinquished all claims to American identity, and every imaginable perk that goes with that, to fully live the authentic culture of his ancestors.

Let me step back a moment here, and set the stage

For 150 years–until 1972:  At the behest of the Calvinist missionaries and their sugar cane baron offspring, American-imposed law forbade the practice of the  13,000  year old aboriginal culture on any of these eight inhabited Hawaiian Islands.

For 150 years–until 1972:  Native Hawaiians were forbidden by Hawaiian territorial and state law from  naming their child a Hawaiian first name; it had to be Christian.  This wasn’t as purposeless as it seems:  Within Hawaiian culture, the child’s name (given by the ancestors, often in dreams) identified his or her destiny.

For 150 years–until 1972:  Native Hawaiians were forbidden by law from dancing the kahiko–the original hula.  Hula was prayer (never entertainment)–and if you were blessed, when the dancer transcended, she took the community with her.

For 150 years–until 1972:  Native Hawaiians were forbidden by law from using their traditional plants and herbs for healing.  Only in recent years, has the western world acknowledged the powers of the Hawaiian Noni plant, the Kalo plant, the Kawa root .

For 150 years–until 1972:  Native Hawaiians were forbidden by law from practicing their ancient way of life because it conflicted with the European missionary ideal of imposed Christianity, and because the assumption (solidified into a brutal legal system) assumed that the Hawaiian people, who lived their connection to every thread and breathe of Creation, were inferior.

For 150 years–until 1972:  Native Hawaiians were shamed and punished for speaking their own poetic, metaphoric language in public.

Since 1972, when these punitive, culturally genocidal laws were lifted, these sorely oppressed people have struggled to find their way home.   Return Voyage is the work of that return.  It is impossible for ‘Iokepa’s people to forget that which had been surgically removed by law.

‘Iokepa’s grandmothers insisted thirteen years ago that in order to fully claim the life that his ancestors bequeathed him, on the land that was his inheritance, he must never again carry identification that speaks to allegiance to any land other than his own.  Dutiful mo’opuna (grandchild) that he is, he has complied.

He enters court, less to challenge American law, than to defend his people’s right to their cultural and spiritual identity.  He enters court to try to press past that fence that separates spectator and accused, to speak of a culture that, “Welcomed every guest here with open arms, open hands, and open heart.”  He enters court less to oppose, than to embrace.

“Justice and law are two different things,” ‘Iokepa said.

“American law is this wide.”  (He holds his hands inches apart.) ” It takes care of a few.  My culture is  larger than that; it takes responsibility for every soul, and every part of Creation.

“There remain laws that require that I carry identification with a nation that is not my own, that ask me to obey laws that remove me from my cultural practices and my identity.  I cannot.”

He enters court:  The living embodiment of God’s plan for the kanaka maoli–the Native Hawaiians.  He enters court asking nothing for himself, and everything for his people.

Thanksgiving Day.  Ironic, at the very least.

Within a few short days of writing my most recent, Ever Changing Page essay:  “What Would You Do With Your Freedom?”–my husband, a Native Hawaiian spokesman for his indigenous people, is threatened with jail.

The Return Voyage, always and only moved by ancestral guidance, steps up a notch.

To all of you good folk who have attended Return Voyage gatherings during the past two years in Sarasota, Winona, Roanoke, Sedona,  Santa Fe, Baton Rouge, Milwaukee, Farmington, Los Angeles, New York City, and so many towns and cities between:  To each of you who asked, What can I do to help?  To each of you to whom ‘Iokepa Hanalei ‘Imaikalani answered:  “When you hear of the changes on the Hawaiian Islands, I ask  that you  offer a prayer for my people.”

Friends:  We now ask  that you step up a notch as well.

In the long, deep, ubiquitous story of freedom denied, of national identity obliterated, of oppression institutionalized:  There have been wars waged, anger and violence righteously uncorked against oppressors.

But there has always been yet another way.  The brave, singular acts of  civil disobedience of  Mahatma Gandhi, who ripped India’s freedom from the British stranglehold without fist or sword.  Nelson Mandela, who freed his South African indigenous people with his hands and feet in chains.  Martin Luther King staged sit-ins–those illegal acts of defiance–against the established laws of  his land.

Each of these men men disobeyed  unconscionable laws; each were imprisoned as a result.  Their actions spoke for them:  “I cannot recognize a law that enslaves my people”.

‘Iokepa Hanalei ‘Imaikalani honors their heroic example.

It has always seemed so small, the substance of the specific disobedience:  A seat in a Woolworth luncheonette; a swim in the local pool.  ‘Iokepa’s  lapse from adherence to the law of the land appears no grander.  The issue at hand is small; the significance of the freedom call is enormous.

For my husband, it is this.  For thirteen years, he has refused to carry any identification that ties him to the United States.  His Grandmothers instructed him:  His sole identity must be Native Hawaiian–a descendant of a 13,000 year lineage that binds him to his aboriginal roots.  His nation is Lahui–the authentic name of these Islands.

When you are Native Hawaiian and your Grandmothers (who died long before you were born) ask this of you, apparently you do not refuse.

Not refusing has meant this.  ‘Iokepa does not carry any official American document:  Driver’s license,  car registration,  car insurance, or social security number–each one of these concessions contingent on accepting the former one.  For thirteen years he has not.

Don’t make this mistake:  ‘Iokepa admires and supports the United States and yearns to see it live the fullness of its potential.  But his Hawaiian blood and  DNA  makes its prior claim.

Two weeks ago, ‘Iokepa was driving his unregistered, uninsured, clean-as-a -whistle, 1998 Subaru station wagon on the streets of Kaua’i–without a government issued driver’s license.  He was stopped (by the rare officer who didn’t know him), ticketed, and summoned to court.

On December 9, he will go, plead not guilty, and ask for a trial by jury.  ‘Iokepa, though faced with fines he cannot pay and with jail he does not seek, calls this,  “An opportunity to raise the consciousness and change the consensus.”

When my brother asked:  “What if he loses?”  I answered for both of us:  “He cannot lose.”

And by that I do not mean that he will not be jailed.  I do not mean that I want my husband shackled–or that my husband wants that for himself.  We are not masochists. We very much prefer sleeping curled together. We savor our freedom.

But when I met ‘Iokepa 12 years ago, he warned me:  “This is not about us.”  And it  is not.  This is about a captive land, an oppressed people–and their freedom.

This small act of civil disobedience is a clarion call from a mountain-top to every one of us.  Nobel Prize winning, author Toni Morrison once wrote:  “The function of freedom is to free someone else.”

Friends, supporters:  Let your imagination be your guide;  please share this small act; retell this oldest of stories–the freedom of a people to live their own culture, to steward their own land, and to speak their own language to the ears of their Creator.

Let the Native Hawaiians teach the rest of us what is meant by Aloha.

“What would you do with your freedom?”

This is the insistent (not often kindly spoken) challenge that ‘Iokepa Hanalei ‘Imaikalani is issued whenever he dares to speak of the future of the Native Hawaiian people–or of their nation. The implied criticism is:  These people would not know what to do with their sovereignty.  The implied solution: Deny them that choice.

‘Iokepa answers the question in a larger way.

He begins here:  Reminding me of a single moment last May.  We sat–just the two of us–snug inside our Toyota Camry at a bed and breakfast parking lot in Rehobeth Beach, Delaware.  We were six months into our second Return Voyage tour, with perhaps three more to go.

We had $100 in our pockets (our access closed, to a Bank of Hawai’i checking account that had been raided with our stolen debit card).  In that single moment we asked one another and the universe:  “Where to next?”

‘Iokepa focuses on that moment of possible anguish and uncertainty to make his point:  “In that parking lot in Delaware, we were free.  There were absolutely no demands made of us. We could go anywhere we wanted to go.”

In that parking lot moment, I chose to go to Maine.  We’d never before been to New England; we knew not a single soul; it simply felt right.  I could not have offered a rationale that would have satisfied anyone–except ‘Iokepa, who like me:  Asks out loud, and then listens. We honor the answer we hear in our heads, our hearts, our guts.

From my impromptu decision to drive onto the Interstate and head for the northernmost state on the Eastern seaboard, with just the barest possibility of gas money, and none for lodging–life delivered abundance.

Oh, the stories I could tell of Maine and beyond:  The out-of-the-blue  cell phone call from Hawai’i–”Maine, my biological family lives there–let me call them”; the dentist who repaired my broken tooth, gratis;  the clarity of purpose that unfolded from this freely-made choice; the satisfaction in fulfilling that transparent purpose.

‘Iokepa says:  “People don’t believe that kind of freedom is possible. They  can’t imagine it for themselves. They can’t fathom that anyone can live a life without external demands limiting their choices. They don’t believe it’s a reality.”

But it is real–for every one of us.  The only demand that matters is the one that comes from deep inside of us.  Every choice is our own–it’s our human default setting.

We are free unless, and until, we agree to hand it over.  We are enslaved only when we give up that freedom on someone else’s say so.   Nelson Mandela may well have been the free-est man who ever breathed–in prison for half  a lifetime.  Alternatively, most of us walk the streets unchained:  We answer phones, take vacations,  and never breathe a free moment in our lives.

The challenge remains:  For the Native Hawaiians, sure–but no less, for every one of us who walk this good earth:  “What will we do with our freedom?”

We live in a noisy world.

We have coming at us in any given moment:  Telephones that no longer sit quietly next to our bed or on our office desks (Now they follow our every step into movie theaters, church, and romantic dinners with our lover); Mail that no longer comes once a day on the eagerly awaited footsteps of our postman (Now it beeps its electronic announcement night, day, and every moment between); News that no longer slaps at our doorstep at dawn, or arrives from Walter Cronkite’s lips at dusk (Now it comes at us 24/7, from so many contrary and irritating voices that it’s hard to know whom to trust).

Yes, we can turn off the cell phone, the computer, and cable TV.  But they remain a demanding, addictive call to arms.  We are sorely afraid that we will miss something.

There was a time when we missed nearly everything, and never felt the loss.  Never gave it a thought:  So fully preoccupied were we with our immediate human relationships and the unavoidable life in our faces.

I can almost hear my twenty-nine year old son laughing his head off at these thoughts, some 6,000 miles away.  He is mocking my words–calling them nostalgia, accusing me of being an old geezer.

But permit me to clarify (for son Sam, and for the rest):  Mine is neither a judgment nor indictment of the abundant gifts of technology, the miracle of instant communication, the  demanding world we’ve created.  That is not my intent at all.

Rather, it is this.  How can we discern?  How do we decide, among the Google of accessible information:  What holds water?

Twelve years ago, the Hawaiian Grandmothers told ‘Iokepa Hanalei ‘Imaikalani:  “When you’ve heard all the lies, you will know the truth.”  Daily, in these twelve years he has been strenuously tested.

So much knowledge;  so little wisdom.  In every niche of the Internet, we find voices  of ignorance that will affirm our own.  There is no longer a need to be alone in our nightmares, fantasies, conspiracies, or falsehood.  Everywhere there is a chat room or a website to keep us from feeling the occasional, well-deserved loneliness.

In the early days of cell phones, when it still felt outrageously intrusive to have the person standing in front of you at Starbucks answering classified ads, or in the toilet stall next to yours arguing with a boyfriend–there was still the remaining hope of an agreed upon civility.

‘Iokepa used to laugh and say of that ubiquitous cell phone usage:  “Yes, we know you are not alone.  We know you have someone who will actually speak with you.”   And it did, at times, sound like the point of  it all.

So there is Rachel Maddow and there is Bill O’Reilly.  There is Wikipedia and there is Amazon.  Newspapers disappear but there is no escaping Google.  Publishers and bookstores fold; Netflix flourishes.  Choose your weapon.

We fill ourselves with endless trivia.  We have no protective sensory screen.  Infomercials pours into our ears and eyes, and then undigested, out of our mouths.  It is a terrifying national version of the childhood game of Telephone: So many distortions in the repetition.

We repeat what we hear.  But have no ability to explain what we repeated.   We are marionettes, and someone–many many someones–are pulling the strings.  We pass as literate when we are puppets.  We spout opinions that won’t hold up to challenge.  We heard it, we read it, it sounded true.  The plethora of source smothers any likelihood of  independent observation or idea.  How do we know,  What holds water?

Without exception,  my authentic thoughts and feelings (mine, not Keith Olbermann’s) emerge from complete silence:   In my walks along a beach, down a country lane, or in an urban forest–those places where my gut drowns out the stuff my mouth spouts reflexively.  My answers matter, it seems, only if they’ve traveled the full length of my looping intestine.

Yet I realize that even a walk in the park demands a certain confidence–and its corollary courage.  We must fully believe that we are capable of independent thought–and then we must exorcise the noise that passes for consensus and conventional wisdom, in favor of our quiet knowing.  ‘Iokepa says:  “We owe it to our soul.”

If it holds up alone on top of the mountain,  it will, very likely, hold water.

I’ve been a writer my entire life, a professional writer since I left college at twenty-two, and an author since I was forty.  In that time, I have naturally watched my writing evolve.

From eighteen years of salaried newspaper and magazine journalism to the less financially predictable, but ultimately more emotionally satisfying occupation of writing books.

Sometimes those books have been well-published, turned into feature films, sold around the globe in translation; sometimes not.  Writing for myself on occasion meant writing only for myself.  But that was the nature of the beast.

I took the gamble when I traded writing on a weekly paycheck, for the greater freedom of writing longer, more creatively, and with greater authenticity.

In those many years, I wrote daily:  From the moment my sons climbed onto their school bus at 7:30 in the morning, to the moment they disembarked at 3:30 in the afternoon.  I was a single mom.  I wrote to support my family and I turned out a book-length manuscript approximately every two years.  The discipline was no different than when I wrote for an employer–the office space, however, was home.  In the evenings and  on the weekends, I taught a writers’ workshop.

Then, twelve years ago, I met ‘Iokepa, and six months later, we joined lives.

So many things changed with that meeting; it becomes impossible to single out a  preeminent one.  But for the purpose of this story:  One of the most earth-shaking changes was around my identity and occupation as a writer.  Those tremors still quake under my feet.  Those who knew me well know the truth of this.

I never stopped writing in those twelve years.  But I no longer called myself a “Writer.”

I never stopped writing, but my tools shifted:  My computer gave way to a yellow legal pad and pen.  I never stopped writing, but I no longer sat at a roll-top desk in a silent office; I wrote now in public on a folding beach chair next to a tent.  I never stopped writing, but I had no end product in mind; all those words on all those legal pads for all those years, for what purpose?

I wrote, as I used to tell my workshop students, “To understand my world and the world around me.”  Perhaps, it was (freed from any career aspiration) the purest writing of my life.  But it was not literature.

And yet, literature has happened from that, “Purest writing of my life.”  There were weeks, and occasionally months, when I was unexpectedly gifted access to one or another lovely, silent house, and to the familiar technology of our computer age.

My mounting stack of legal pads:  Those scraps of feeling, snatches of insight, and moments of wisdom solidified–jelled–into a form.  First the concept, then later, the reality:  Revision after revision, stolen moment after stolen moment, year after year, this singular writing of my life began to look like a book–and then, like the most mature, important and serious book of my life.

Out of these twelve years–during which time I have been hungry, exhausted and at times faithless, yet always writing–I have given birth.  Grandmothers Whisper is that newborn.

All that ‘Iokepa Hanalei ‘Imaikalani and I have lived in these years; much of what the Native Hawaiian people have lived in the last two hundred; and all of what the Hawaiian ancestors have shared is part of this story.  It is cultural.  It is spiritual.  It is a deeply personal account of one Jewish woman’s rite of passage into a stranger’s aboriginal culture.  It is, of course, a love story.

A powerful New York  literary agent has seized the Grandmothers Whisper manuscript with enthusiasm.  He is circulating it to publishers as I write.  I ask  that you–our Return Voyage friends and supporters–offer up a prayer, the power of your good wishes.

Please ask that Grandmothers Whisper finds its launching pad, its publishing home, and its way into your hands, imminently. The Grandmothers say:  The time is now.

We have just finished observing the Jewish New Year–those contemplative days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur–the holiest on the Hebrew calendar.  ‘Iokepa, as always, joined me in celebrating with the Kaua’i Jewish Community.

My thoughts go back a month, to a night in Oregon.

We had been invited to a Friday evening, Shabbat dinner at the loving home of a Portland Jewish family.

We lit the candles and said the familiar and traditional blessing in Hebrew.  This accomplished professional  woman, who is the mother of three, held her hands over the heads of her teenage sons, and prayed that they grow to be men in the manner of their forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.   Together we offered gratitude for the loaf of  hand-twisted, ritual challah before we ate.  In all ways it was the Sabbath of my childhood, and ‘Iokepa and I were grateful for the invitation, the company, and the home-cooked meal.

Somewhere in the middle of the Sabbath meal on that spotless white tablecloth this sweet-natured father, who owns a micro-brewery and is a trained chef, confessed:  “I don’t believe in organized religion.”

These are words that ‘Iokepa and I  have heard with remarkable frequency.

They come, across-the-board, from men and women reared within  Roman Catholic, Protestant, Hindu, Islam and Jewish traditions.  Typically, these  words are a plea for understanding, a means of demarcation, a way to distinguish between the “Organized religion” in which they’d been reared, and the “Spirituality” that now nurtures them.

These are not people without belief in the unseen; they are not atheists.

They want ‘Iokepa, and they want me too, to know  (with our two viable, culturally-based “Religions”) that they are not us. Here’s what, I think, that they are saying.

They are distancing themselves–not so much  from from the religion of their birth as–from the shortfall of their religious traditions to practice that which they preach.  From the lapses.

It isn’t the “Organized Religion” they are rejecting (though those are certainly the words they use) , it is the failure of its adherents to adhere to the fundamental teachings of those religions.  It is the  compromises of the practitioners that insult, embarrass, and ultimately shame our friends.  In sum, it is the hypocrisy.

So, to my ears, “I don’t believe in organized religion” means:  I am sickened by trips to the Torah that are bought by the biggest financial donors to the synagogue; I am horrified by the church covering up child molestation; I reject ministers who live like sultans; I refuse the distortions of Jesus’ and Mohamed’s words to justify war.

Theirs is an absolutely credible reaction to the false prophets, to the racists who call themselves Christians,  to the crooks who secure aliyahs.  Where there has been falsehood, hypocrisy and outright blasphemy–it has, at times, been difficult to remember the truth.

And yet ‘Iokepa’s ancestors remind us, “You haven’t gone back far enough.”   Our ancestors, the indigenous peoples from around the world had to embrace community responsibility and compassion to survive.

The problem is not with the organization of religion–or its authentic origins and teachings.  The problem is with the human shortfall.  The problem is us–humans who attempt, and fail, to practice what the originators perfected.

To my eyes, that makes it all the more imperative for us, who’ve been reared within powerful religious traditions, to seize the reins.  It’s up to us to steer our congregations, our communities, by our example.

Culturally, we don’t condone abandoning a  difficult child.  We don’t believe it wise to run away from our aging parents.  Turning our back has seldom healed a wound.

Our lives–the way we live them, far more than the words we speak–are the light for others.  The very example of how we place our feet along our singular path is what inspires.  We are the beacons for change, the lantern in the dark, the way to the fulfillment of the ideas and the ideals of our traditions and our ancestors.

We are the realization of our “Organized Religions” highest aspirations.  It is truly selfish to leave the rest of our family alone in their struggle.

Amen.

‘Iokepa and I have returned to our Islands of Hawai’i.

For eight months and 25,000 car miles, we drove the freeways of the  American continent. But we spoke out, always and only, on behalf of this place and these people.

We return now to swim in the ocean; eat our  ration of mango, papaya, bananas, and coconut.  We return to watch the sun set and the moon rise over the Pacific horizon;  star-gaze without intrusive city lights;  follow the ubiquitous rainbows–in sum, to drink from Source.  We  come home to be still, and to listen.

We return to listen, but the people of these Islands ask us to fill them (ears and hearts) with what transpired in our long absence.  They yearn  for accounts of how the aboriginal cultural message was received outside of Hawai’i.  They count on ‘Iokepa Hanalei ‘Imaikalani to be an instrument of change; they expect it.  It is a weighty expectation.  But it rests easily on ‘Iokepa’s shoulders; he hands it off to his ancestors.  He is simply, he knows, the conduit for their words and wishes.

Since 1972, when the 150 year old, culturally repressive laws were wiped off the books, Native Hawaiians have pleaded and fought for their freedom, have struggled, too,  for the resurrection of their battered land.  From the moment that they were ungagged, they have spoken:  Softly with hula hands, in their  mellifluous language, and in prayer; Loudly through the political Sovereignty Movement to the World Court, the United Nations, and the U.S. Congress.

Opponents of freedom for the Native Hawaiians  mock the Hawaiian Sovereignty Movement as, “Hopelessly divided.”  Where ‘Iokepa sees:  “Passion,” they see “Rage.”  Where ‘Iokepa sees: “Excitement,” they see “Threat.”  Where ‘Iokepa enthuses:  “When it all comes together…!”  they labor to make sure that it never does.  Land developers, hotel magnates, and politicians have a lot vested in keeping the Native Hawaiians hopeless.

For 37 years, the strength of the political Sovereignty Movement, like the brilliant Hawaiian moon, has waxed and waned.   Tortured recurrently with dashed hopes, deferred dreams, and disillusionment–there has risen a tidal wave of despair.

Anger, ‘Iokepa reminds his people (and ours), is the antithesis of what his original culture is about–what it has to teach the world.  ‘Iokepa comes to the table with something else.  “We began Return Voyage, and we continue it, with the things we can agree on.  We can agree that love is stronger than fear, or hate.”

The existing Hawaiian sovereignty movement has failed, in any significant number, to win the hearts of  its people.  To a people, who’ve seen their homeland  stolen and trashed, their culture kidnapped and commercialized–the sovereignty groups ask that their people give something more–this time to a political cause:  Sign up,  attend meetings, trust us...

But, ‘Iokepa sees it through a different–apolitical lens–pure culture, pure spirit.  The change  that his people yearn for comes because he brings something to them. He gives them back what has been taken away:  Their self confidence, cultural validation, authentic  heritage–and the  absolute certainty that what they uniquely possess, the entire earth has been waiting to hear.

Accordingly, The Return Voyage website, our  Home Page, will change.  Now:

“For 12,300 years, the indigenous people of our Islands embraced a culture that refused the possibility of  war.

Return Voyage awakens that ancient wisdom–ritual and practices that dissipate anger, prevent violence, foster harmony–and shares its profound implications for the 21st century.

We invite all people to join the conversation.”