Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 39, Number 9, 1 September 2022 — Puna Students Connect to Their Culture and 'Āina Through Art [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Puna Students Connect to Their Culture and 'Āina Through Art

This gorgeous murol nt Keonepoko Elementary School in Puna depicts Pele's departure from Kahiki to Howoi'i. It wns painted by fifth and sixth grade students from the school os port of the Mele Murols Project. To owoken their vision for the murol the students spent o doy in Woo Kele o Puno, o lowlond roinforest reserve thot is port of OHA's legacy land holdings. - Photo: Kalena Blakemore

By Kalena Blakemore, OHA Legacy Land Agent - Moku o Keawe "Ke ha'a lā Puna i ka makani Haa ka ulu hala i Kea'au Ha'a Haena me Hōpoe Ha'a ka wahine 'Ami i kai o Nanahuki, lā Hula le'a wale I kai o Nanahuki." "Puna dances in the breeze Ihe hala groves ofKea'aujoin the dance Haena and Hōpoe are swaying The woman Sways down by the sea ofNanahuki A dance ofjoy Down by the sea ofNanahuki." - Ke Ha'a Lā Puna (traditional) According to the late Dorothy Kahananui, Hi'iaka learned this oli and hula from her best friend, Hōpoe. The friends spent mueh time together in Puna, a wahi pana beloved by Hi'iaka. Just as Hi'iaka was inspired by the dancing of her ffiends in the storied plaee of Puna, the fifth and sixth graders of Keonepoko Elementary School in Pāhoa on Hawai'i Island were similarly inspired when they visited Wao Kele o Puna last April. Wao Kele o Puna is the Office of Hawaiian Affairs' (OHA) largest legacy land holding. The 25,856-acre forest reserve was acquired in 2006 with grant funding from the Forest Legacy Program. The students' visit to Wao Kele o Puna was due to their selection to participate in the Estria Foundation Mele Murals Project. Launched in 2013 to support Hawai'i youth, the Mele Murals Project links appreciation

for the arts to higher education by promoting youth development, arts education, cultural preservation, and community-building through the creation of murals. The students were able to visit Wao Kele o Puna, whieh is a lowland rainforest located in their home district of Puna. The huaka'i was intended to awaken their vision for creation of a large-scale outdoor mural. Loeal Puna artist, Nainoa Rosehill, and his colleague, Sarah Farris, guided the haumāna of Keonepoko Elementary in the process of uncovering the theme for their own school mural. On the day of the huaka'i, four yellow school buses bumped and rumbled up the 3-mile-long dirt road to Wao Kele o Puna while majestic 'io (native hawks) soared above. Staff from Forest Solutions, OHA's forest management contractor, welcomed the haumāna and led them in their aloha aina work at the reserve. Students had prepared for and practiced biocultural protocols to enter and exit the forest and to heeome grounded in the natural environment of Wao Kele o Puna through kilo (observation) on the 2014 lava flows of Kīlauea. Ho'olauna at the site was provided by Puna cultural practitioner and science teacher, Leila Kealoha, who opened the gathering with oli and ho'okupu, led kilo aetivities, and shared mo'olelo of Wao Kele o Puna with the students such as, 'Ōhi'a Lehua and the Jealousy ofPele, 'Ailaau the Forest Eater, and Kāne and Pele. Using only their senses, the haumāna practiced receiving information about the ao (clouds), makani (wind), ua (rain), manu (birds), and mū (insects), and from the unique audible crunching of cooled pāhoehoe (smooth lava) underfoot. This served as a prelude for their engagement in aloha 'āina activities such as out-planting, seed collection and other preparations for cultivation of naSEE PUNA STUDENTS ON PAGE 15

PUNASTUDENTS Continued from page 14 tive tree and plant species. The haumāna contributed hand-paint-ed signs to be used for forest management and processed māmaki seeds (for future propagation). The students and their teachers also pulled invasive weeds and out-planted maile, māmaki and pāpala kēpau (a native tree species whose gum was used for bird catching) along the forest edge. Following their aloha aina, the haumāna gathered for a guided meditation and a reflection exercise to culminate their experience. Imagery of lava, stark rivers of rocks, heat, the edges of the forest and smoke from Pu'u 'Ō o were some of their musings. Ihen, with a mahalo and farewell, the students boarded the buses and headed back to school. They began working on their mural the following school day while their experiences at Wao Kele o

Puna were fresh in their minds. Two weeks later, in early May, the haumāna of Keonepoko held their Mele Mural unveiling. The haumāna proudly shared that the artistic theme for their mural was inspired by the oli about Pele's departure from Kahiki to Hawai'i. "The ieonie figure of Puna, Pele, as a traveler to this plaee, reflects Puna's longstanding function as a heaeon to travelers," explained Rosehill. "I hoped that it would inspire a sense of belonging no matter where the students eome from, or who they are." Through the Mele Murals Project students were able to connect education, art, culture, community, and aloha 'āina through their pilina with the wahi pana of Wao Kele o Puna. With the assistance of Forest Solutions, OHA is pleased to be able to provide Hawai'i keiki with a safe plaee to learn about their biocultural environment and mo'olelo Hawai'i, in the special wahi pana of Wao Kele o Puna for this generation and those to eome. ■