HAWAIIAN STYLE
Call of 'ohana brings advocate for natives home to Islands
For Robin Puanani Danner, coming home meant really never having left. It meant caring for other native populations before she could give back to her own. It meant bringing mama back home — only after it was too late.
Born on Kaua'i, the fifth of six hapa children, her father was German Amish Mennonite from Nebraska and her mom Hawaiian. A "determined German," she says, and a "passionate Hawaiian." Pure haole, purely Hawaiian. Pure magic, she says.
Teachers who met in college on the Mainland, her parents raised her on Navajo, Hopi and Apache reservations in Arizona, where they taught at the Native American public school. She moved at a young age to Alaska, living 25 years with the Inupiat Eskimos at a time when their kids were sent to Indian schools in the Lower 48.
Her dad set out to help change that: to give the native population a chance to stay with their people, amid their culture, on their land, concepts she'd someday know as 'aina, 'ohana, kupuna.
Her dad coached sports and taught biology. Her mom taught the secondary grades. They dedicated their lives to the education of native children. Recently, at age 40 Danner thanked her dad, now 73, "for his generosity, willingness: I was always struck by how open he was (in his 20s) to accept other ideas and cultures. The courage it took as 'the outsider' ... every day having to prove himself," Danner said.
Their interracial marriage was illegal in Nebraska, so they went to California. Every day he embraced other cultures: Native American, then native Alaskan.
Only economics prevented the Danners from raising their kids where they wanted: Hawai'i. And her mom never lost the dream of herself returning. Her daughter would become that key. Almost.
Being raised "in both cultures," gave Danner "a very critical knowledge base," she said — not only of those who "adopted" her as one of their own, but of her own culture. "It was remarkable: I had never lived in a non-native community, never lived in a city," she said. But her parents "chose native communities with similar values," and Danner "grew up with the appropriate mindset to comfortably (one day) take my place in Hawai'i."
To prepare for that eventuality, every year, her parents "put us on a plane, to spend summers" at Wai'anae or on Kaua'i. "Two and a half glorious months," she remembers, basking in a people similar to those among whom she grew up — but this time, her own. "When I think of my mother, I think now of a bridge" — a bridge back home.
And Mom, part nostalgic, part homesick, would marvel at Danner's success helping the native peoples: "Why don't you do that for Hawaiians?!" her mom would chide. "Hello? We live in Alaska," Danner would say.
In 1999, she could no longer ignore the calling of her own land, of her own people — and that "other voice," her mom's urging her to "go home."
As head of the Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement, she soon adapted her experience to serving a people she already loved.
Today, as she works for better education, healthcare, housing, employment, and yes, Native Hawaiian recognition, she hears her mother's voice of encouragement.
"Everything I do here is standing on her shoulders. There are not words for that," Danner said. Of her advocacy of native peoples, one element was always missing, she said: "I didn't have the emotion. That personal connection. I was (always) one step removed, from the land, from the ancestors."
Here, each small success reminds her of battles fought, of victories achieved, among her adopted people on the Mainland. "It's like watching a movie you've seen before."
"I have shed tears, of joy and sadness, in the four years I've been home. But, I've never been as touched," she said.
But one voice was missing: that of the mother who was to follow her daughter home. A few months after Danner moved to Hawai'i, her mother died in a traffic accident in Alaska, "four months before she was to come home to her birthplace," Danner said.
Danner brought Mom home as promised, and put her in the beloved 'aina of her homeland. Now, from Lihu'e Cemetery, she said, "I still hear her voice."
The Advertiser's Wade Kilohana Shirkey is kumu of Na Hoaloha O Ka Roselani No'eau at Kawaiaha'o Church. He writes on Island life.
