'Ike Hawai'i...

Today, I had so wanted to attend the Prince Lot Hula Festival at 'Iolani Palace. There were so many amazing hālau scheduled to perform, awesome honorees to be recognized and many treasured friends surely in attendance chanting, dancing, in craft booths or in the audience. My body however revolted today. I was able however to drive my son, Elliott, to his Saturday medical shadowing of a surgeon and internist, as part of his weekly schooling. 

After dropping him off, I had a couple of hours to run errands. I couldn't help but drive down to 'Iolani Palace to circle around and enjoy some of the opening ceremonies and hālau before having to depart back to pick up my son and go home. 

From afar, I had noticed some parking spaces across the street in the Honolulu Post Office parking lot which were filling up quickly. I drove over and lined up, and entered to find a perfect parking on the end, where I backed up into the stall and could see across the street into the palace grounds. 

I watched the other stalls fill up as people exited their cars and hurriedly walked across the street. 

As the program began, I listened from afar, and as the first hula hālau took the stage, I lamented not being across the street to see everything up close. I lamented even more not having my camera with me. I watched from afar as Hālau O Kekuhi performed the first hula of the day. 

I again realized however, that I am so often immersed in capturing events, that I never have the simple joy of just listening, watching and taking it all in. I always end up in an altered state, moving, looking, feeling, listening to my na'au, framing, snapping, thanking Spirit, and then repeating everything all over again, sometimes for five or six hours straight, until I am ready to collapse. It can take me days to recover fully. And that is when I am Healthy and in better shape than I am now too.

So I simply sat there, in my car, all windows open, savoring the sounds of the powerful chanting and drums, the resonating pahu. 

Then, something amazing and powerful happened.

Hālau O Kekuhi had began another hula. The pahu thundered in a galloping beat along as the rhythmic voices arose. I could see the movement of the dancers from afar. 

E Ku, e Uli, e Kama, lele wale...

O Kalani ke ali'i ka'ahea o Kaiwa...

Iwikauikaua haulili mai lalo...

Mai kumu kahiki ka honua ua kele...

As I sat there, the sound of the drumming echoed off of the gauntlet of tall buildings that surrounds the palace grounds, and it seemed to surround me in its amplification. 

As I stared through the traffic, fence, chairs, crowds, trees, at the stage from afar, everything slowly changed.

I no longer saw the white tents and the white plastic chairs. The traffic and parked cars disappeared along the street. The crowds of people disappeared. There was just the chanters and the dancers. 

'Iolani Palace arose and loomed in the background still. The Queen's room where Beautiful Lili'uokalani was imprisoned was there. I looked over and Pohukaina was there. The sacred mausoleum on the palace grounds. Where the sacred iwi, or bones, of many high-ranking chiefs still reside.

From Hale o Keawe on Hawai'i Island. From Pali Kapu o Keoua. The burial caves on the cliffs above Kealakekua Bay and Ka'awaloa. All the iwi, the bones, that remain at Pohukaina, that didn't make the procession up to Mauna 'Ala, the Royal Mausoleum, where so many of our Kings and Queens, our Chiefs and Chiefesses, are interred and cared for. 

I could see the white terns, the Manu o Kū, often in pairs, soaring all around the tree tops and skies. 

Lele mai ke kapu o ka moku...

The kapu of the island has flown...

I could see the Armory next to the palace. I glanced to my right and there was Ali'iolani Hale. There was Kamehameha Paiea standing in front. Focusing past, I could see a direct line of sight to the tomb of His Royal Highness Lunalilo. Past him, Kawaiaha'o Church.

Lele aku ke kapu iā Wākea...

The kapu has flown backwards to Wākea...

I looked back towards the palace grounds. I could see the flat pohaku, the threshold stone of Līloa upon which his son 'Umi stood in Waipi'o Valley.

Ua kapu ka moku iā Līloa...

Ua kapu kawao i Tahiti...

Līloa o 'Umi ke kapu i nahae...

Nahae na mana o ke kapu...

The island is kapued for Līloa...

The kapu had grown and flourished in Tahiti...

By Līloa of 'Umi was the kapu broken...

The powers of the kapu were divided...

I could see up Nu'uanu Valley, between the palace and the armory...

To where Mauna 'Ala  rested. The sacred ho'oma'ema'e grounds. The iwi of our Ali'i. 

It was as if the resounding pahu reverberating all around me was shaking the ground. I could sense our ancestors awaking. All the iwi our our beloved kūpuna arising. The sacred interconnectedness of everything around me, the interdependence, showed itself. Ancestors were descending upon the palace grounds from all directions.

It was such a powerful overwhelming akakū, or standing vision, that I burst forth in sobbing tears. I couldn't control the raw emotions of the experience. I sat in my car, wiping away tears, trying to hide them from people passing by. 

O Iwiaulana Iwikauikaua...

Lola kamahele i kikiwi...

I pipio i ke kapu o Iwikauikaua...

Na ka iwi e pani ke kapu o ka moku...

It is Iwiaulana Iwikauikaua...

A kamahele branch that is inclining downwards...

That is weighed down by the kapus of Iwikauikaua...

Let the bones pay for the kapus of the islands...

It was so overwhelming, that I decided to depart and head up Nu'uanu to retrieve my son who was just about finished with his morning internship. As I was leaving, a final message came through that caused me to break down again in uncontrollable tears. It tied all of the stories that I share together and the ones that I haven't shared yet. I am still processing the message. It was about Aloha...

By the time I picked up Elliott, I had composed myself. As we drove towards home, he shared with me about his morning and observing surgical procedures and follow up appointments. 

I then let him know that I stopped by the palace and parked across the street to watch and listen to the hula for awhile. How I regretted not having my camera or being in good shape right now to capture the dancers. 

Then I told him about how I had a profound experience. Then the tears started flowing again. I went silent trying to suppress my emotions. He put his hand on my arm and rubbed it quietly and gently.

I struggled to lift each word out of my Soul after that. Telling him of the experience, slowly, cracking voice. Long quiet pauses to suppress tears. 

 I shared what I saw and heard. What I felt. The lessons. 

When I shared the final message with him, I could barely utter the words. It was about Aloha. 

We parked the car at Foodland to get something to drink. I glanced over at him, and tears were flowing from his eyes as well. It was such a Beautiful, Healing and Powerful moment to share. A Father to the Son...