A month ago I went to Sand Island to meet Nainoa Thompson. There, I joined G10, the current cohort of the Asia Pacific Leadership Program at the East-West Center.
Nainoa is the Executive Director of the Polynesian Voyage Society (PVS) and, as the main navigator of the legendary Hokule’a, he became the first Hawaiian since the 14th century to practice the art of wayfinding on long distance ocean voyages.
Hokule’a is a double-hulled voyaging canoe that the Oceanic people had used to explore the vast Pacific. In a trip to Tahiti in 1978, Eddie Aikau, the brave lifeguard, big-wave surfer, and Hokule’a’s crew member, disappeared after the canoe capsized and he paddled towards shore to look for help.
Nainoa and PVS are now preparing Hokule’a and training its crew for a worldwide voyage. The main goal of this 8-year-circumnavigation sailing venture is to raise awareness to culture revitalization and sustainable lifestyles.
Hawai’i’s people and habitat are extremely sensitive to any minor environmental change. Hokule’a's crew will explain to next generations why Hawaiians and the world population need one another to continue living together.
Children are the main target of this modern saga. This is the right strategy. I heard once from an important city planner that every policy that he had implemented and encouraged children to take ownership, social outcomes resonated profoundly among communities and turned out being perennial.
Kids from all over are expected to get on board. They will be able not only to follow the voyage through conventional media channels but also to actively interact with the crew through social media. In every harbor that Hokule’a docks, the canoe will turn into an exciting laboratory of cultural experiences, simple lifestyles, and sustainable practices.
Hokule’a’s voyage will inspire children outside classrooms and beyond computer screens. The hands-on-experience they are expected to acquire will certainly have lifelong impacts and greatly shift the way that the Digital Generation defines itself and addresses contemporary challenges.
Finding balance between virtual and real contexts, consumerism and simplicity, modernity and tradition are, therefore, the main messages that PVS, Hokule’a, and its crew will bring to every harbor and instill into the heart of every smiling face and curious eyes.
http://www.hokuleawwv.org/
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