Center reclaims agricultural legacy in Wai'anae

By Vicki Viotti
Advertiser Staff Writer

Wai‘anae Intermediate School seventh-graders Colleen Jackson, Johnathan Popa, Waynette Nau and Bryce Gabanan plant kalo in a dry bed at Ka‘ala in Wai‘anae Valley. Deborah Booker • The Honolulu Advertiser

Kalo fields, or lo'i, tumble down the slope, glistening wet, in the embrace of the panoramic mountains encircling them. Laughter and chatter arise from figures huddled in the muck, pulling up young kalo (taro) corms for replanting later, helping to add vegetable matter to enrich the soil, rinsing off the dirt encrusting hands and feet.

In the ancient days, said Eric Enos, the lo'i would extend all the way from the foot of the mountains, and down much farther toward shore. This was the waokanaka, part of the Wai'anae mountain-to-sea ahupua'a land division open to cultivation and other human activities.

That was so, at least, until sugar plantations and private ranching displaced the local farmers, and military outposts took over valley lands along the coast, Enos said. In the Hawaiian cultural renaissance of the 1970s, Enos became painfully aware that the community had been "cut in half."

"I began to understand why we were left with a strip of land along the beach," he added. "Our land base in Wai'anae is off bounds, culturally. . . there's no sense of access to the mountains."

This is why, in 1978, Enos, whose creative outlets include painting as well as activism, helped to found the Cultural Learning Center at Ka'ala. This nonprofit organization, with the aid of various other community groups, has reclaimed a small portion of the agricultural legacy.

Enos now serves as program director for the center, which also administers aquacultural projects at its ocean-side office, and native plant restoration work at several locations along the coast.

An estimated 3,000 annual visitors, primarily youths, stream through the valley farm site, the center's core enterprise. There are archaeological projects involving Wai'anae High School students, the beginnings of a native-plant botanical garden and the construction of a traditional hale. Inside the first,

A-frame, thatched structure, a volunteer takes shelter from the sunshine and prepares poi from the steamed kalo. A second, four-sided hale to be thatched with native loulu palm is in the planning stages.

The focus of attention on a recent Tuesday, however, were the kalo lo'i, the work force consisting of students from Wai'anae Intermediate School. Ka'ala provides learning programs for schools, Enos said, partly because much of its financing comes from federal educational grants, as well as private foundations.

The primary challenge is finding the money to keep operations running, he said, so, although only about a tenth of the 97-acre farm site has been developed, expanding the lo'i downslope is not in the cards.

Just carving out the ones they have meant a lot of backbreaking labor for Ka'ala volunteers. The original terracing and stone walls were there, Enos said, but some of the stones had been moved to create cattle-ranch walls some distance away. They needed restoring, and the whole area was choked with kiawe and haole koa overgrowth.

Then there was the question of the water. Kanewai Stream, the original lo'i source, long ago had been diverted for sugar; then the water board sank wells for municipal use.

The Ka'ala team tried to get a conservation district use permit through conventional channels but were turned down. In 1978 they decided to move ahead anyway and laid about a mile of PVC pipe from the leakage out of the diversion point, bringing down water to flood the kalo fields.

By the end of the summer, Enos said, a complaint about the violation forced Ka'ala before the state land board, which finally agreed to allow the pipe to cross state lands.

Enos had presented the project's merits as providing an educational outlet for "throwaway kids": The learning center had its beginnings in the Wai'anae Rap Center, a program for alienated youth.

There remains a human reclamation aspect of the work here; a few years back, a work team from the O'ahu Community Correctional Center came here to learn the skills of the land. Estranged from their own children and families, the prisoners also learned to reconnect with keiki, working alongside groups from the Queen Lili'uokalani Children's Center.

Enos acknowledged that the agency has a target population of Native Hawaiians, but he emphasized that the learning is not reserved for people of any particular ethnicity.

"We're a cultural-based program serving the community," he said. "We're not a cultural-based program serving Hawaiians. We use the culture of the land to serve everyone."

The separation of the Hawaiian people from their land is a difficult issue, Enos said, beginning with the wealth and power of the sugar plantations but accomplished with the complicity of Hawaiian chiefs. What's important, he added, is cooperation in correcting the mistake.

"We really believe in basic human rights," he said, "and we believe we all have to be part of the solution."

Eric Hauge, Wai'anae Intermediate science teacher, is a believer, too.

"For our kids in particular, it's wonderful," he said. "First, it lets them learn by doing. And it sounds corny, but it lets them relate in a direct way to nature.

"It gives them the opportunity to look through the window to the past."

Cultural Learning Center at Ka'ala

FOUNDED: 1978

LOCATION: Wai'anae Valley; various other project sites along the coast

ORIGINS: Began as a project of the Wai'anae Rap Center, a program for alienated youth. Participants helped clear the ancient lo'i structure in the valley; now the area is used in educational cultivation programs involving students and youth in various schools and agencies, as well as adults.

STAFF: Lilette Subedi, executive director; Eric Enos, program director. Other staffers and teachers in cultural arts: Gail Hovey, D. Butch DeTroye, S. Mahina Pukahi, Cheryl Pukahi, Dalani Kauihou, Bruce Koebele, Vince Mahoney, Charlotte Kanamu, Diana Holquin, Jody Pihana

ASSOCIATES: cultural practitioners Haunani Bernardino, Vince Dodge and John Ka'imikaua; curriculum specialist Jacqueline Carroll; archaeologists Ross Cordy, Moana Lee and Aki Sinoto; horticulturalist Greg Koob

PARTNERS: include the Hawai'i Nature Conservancy, Hale Na'au Pono, Hoa 'Aina o Makaha, Honolulu Botanical Gardens, Ho'omau Ke Ola, Lyon Arboretum, Malama Nanakuli Ahupua'a, Moanalua Garden Foundation, Queen Lili'uokalani Children's Center, Wai'anae Coast Comprehensive Health Center, Wai'anae Coast Community Alternative Development Corp.

CONTACT: 696-4954

Vicki Viotti may be reached at 525-8053 or vviotti@honoluluadvertiser.com