 Yeah, welcome back to Think Tech. This is Community Matters. We're talking about the Manoa Heritage Center this morning, and we're delighted to have them on the show. Their executive is Jessica Welch, and she joins us from Manoa. Am I right about that? You're right. I'm physically in Manoa at Manoa Heritage Center, and I'd like to introduce my colleagues. We have Jenny Engel, who is our director of education. Keala Wong, a cultural educator, and they are the team that engaged the public with what we talk about here at Manoa Heritage Center. Hey, very important. This is in the heart of Manoa. It's got a hey out there. They're quite remarkable and it exists even today in the 21st century and is preserved by the Cook family. It's really wonderful to have this treasure of island culture, kama'ina culture, if you will, going back into the early part of the 19th century, and you guys carry the torch. It's more than a cultural center. It's like a museum and cultural center right there in Manoa. It's well worth the visit, and today we're going to have a bit of a tour. We're going to have a virtual tour with Jessica and Jenny and Keala. So Jessica, why don't you tell us the history of the Manoa Heritage Center and how it got organized and what it is and why I should come to see it. So Manoa Heritage Center was founded in 1996 by Sam and Mary Cook, like you said, and the mission is to promote an understanding of Hawaii's cultural natural heritage. So Manoa really started long before then. Manoa is part of the Ahupua Waikiki, and so that goes Makiki all the way to Kulio'o, so it's a pretty big land division. And before Westerners arrived, Manoa was a bread basket for this entire land division and grew highly cultivated forms of kalo, wetland kalo. The Ali'i would come into Manoa to escape the dusty plains of Honolulu. And we believe that Kuka'o'o, the hei'o was an agricultural hei'o because of its location here in the heart of Manoa, kind of on a taller precipice overlooking what would have been Lo'ikalo. And it's a time marker. The hei'o is oriented diagonal north, which means that on the spring and fall equinox the sun rises directly over the eastern side. And we've done that. We've gotten up early in the morning to make sure that that's true and indeed it is. So after Western contact, Manoa became a site of dairy farms, vegetable farms, flower farms, Chinese families took over the Lo'i, Japanese families grew vegetables and flowers. And then of course you have UH and Punahoe and Miipak, and then it became the neighborhood that it is today. And then our story moves on to Monty Cook who was the grandson of the Cook mission, the missionaries who came here to teach at the Royal Children's School. So he was given this plot of land for a wedding present. And he built, he decided to build his home here. And then he was born, he was born at the frame house so you can go down to Hawaiian Mission Children's Society and that's where he was born. He was two and a half pounds when he was born. And a Hawaiian healer was brought, and so this would have been the late 1800s, like 1870s. And that would scare a parent even today. So he was brought, a Hawaiian healer was brought, Ka'aha'ina Naihe was brought to heal him, and she did. And they developed a friendship that went on through the duration of his life. Fast forward to the late 1800s, he's given this parcel as a wedding present. And what is now 33.5 acres was 30 acres. He built a house here, and kind of left the hail alone. He was brought to the 1970s. Sam and Mary Cook by the house from the family. And then in the 90s, they buy the land back from a developer and decide to take care of it. And they have. And they have. And then, so they made the decision to restore it they worked with a group of practitioners because they obviously had never done that before. And Billy Fields came and he is kind of the renowned dry stack stone Mason and he restored the hail based on the information that he had at the time. And they looked at each other, they replaced all of the plants surrounding the hail with native plants. And then they looked at each other and said, Now what, what are we going to do now now that we've done all this work and that's when they started my know heritage center. And they said, Well, we should share this with schools in particular. And so that's been our focus for the last 20 years is making sure school kids have access to this site. So it is comprised of course of the hail. By the way, what is an agricultural hail, as opposed to another kind of hail. Keala, do you want to answer that. Wait, first, you have to introduce them proper. Okay, I want to introduce my colleague Keala Wong, she's our cultural educator and she could answer that question for us. Hi everyone. So, I mean, all that we know from historians written records and also from people who have passed it down early. You know, the what the people of what you were very thick, everything was sacred to them right and everything that they did they would say prayers. I've heard from my cumul that they would pray 50 times a day. It was just normal. And so they would build places specific to certain needs and prayers and they would have certain deities that were raised at these sites. And so other hails that or not even everyone uses the word hails, but other temples that were common were like Pohakulakane or Pohakulakane, which would be more like the family kind of shine which would be one rock that was erected up. And then, of course, the Luakini which were the political kinds of hails so larger on demanded more attention and had bigger ceremonies than like an agricultural one like the one we believe is what we're taking care of here, which is a little bit smaller. Okay. And so, back to you for a minute, Jessica's aside from the hayow. I recall I was there a few years ago and I recall. There's a lot of walking paths around the heritage center, and a lot of a lot of plantings, you know, on those walking paths can you describe physically. What's in the center. So plants in the center so in the early 90s, Mary decided Mary cook that she wanted to plant native plants. And so she took out all of the rubber trees and the banyan trees. And back then they didn't have nurseries for native wine plants and so she likes to say that she had to beg borrow and steal to get seedlings. She got, you know, plants for the native tropical botanical garden and Amy Greenwell on the big island. And so today as you walk through Manoa heritage center you see different examples of what is native plants and these are important because they tell the story of what is culture and every plant had a lot of uses to it, you know, whether it be shelter food medicine hula. And so the more we know about these plants and their place in the culture, the more we understand about ourselves. And the interesting thing that you know you, you see, at least in recent times Manoa as a bedroom community for the university mostly. It's a, it's a regular residential neighborhood. And you can drive by Manoa heritage center 1000 times and never realize it's right there, 30 acres of land and you don't see it from the road. It is in the very heart of Manoa, it is the heart of Manoa, and somehow it keeps Manoa Manoa. Yeah, no, that's a, that's a great description. And it's it's three point it originally it was 30 acres and now it's 3.5 but we maximize every single amount of that space for the benefit of our community. Thank you to Jenny for a minute she's a she's an historian, and after all you know you guys as the people who conducted tours and and talk to visitors and all that you you bring it alive, because some of this to you. You can't show it's it's history is what it is. Can you talk to us about the history of, of this area. So interesting, Jade, that you've written bring that up about you can drive past this place hundreds of times. I actually grew up just half a mile away from here. And so I grew up right behind why only tea room. And actually, I really had no idea about the hey out until you know I came here for my interview four years ago. It's true and I in the four years that I've been here I've learned more about Manoa than you know my entire growing up and it's it really has been so rewarding. I think, not just because I grew up here but because I live on this island and I feel like the connection that can happen. Just when you ask questions when you're curious about place, especially in Hawaii because place has so much meaning, and all of the Mo'olelo all of the stories, you know that were passed down orally. I mean it really kind of opens up a whole nother perspective I think, and one that is really needed today I mean with all of the challenges that this year has brought. I feel like what we do is more important than ever you know sharing this place specifically Manoa to students, but like Jessica alluded to earlier you know with the hopes that visitors students will come learn about this place and then be inspired to go back to wherever they live and ask those questions about their own place whether that's in Hawaii or you know in another state or in another country. So yeah you give tours is that what happens. So if I come now and I and I want to see I want to appreciate it you'll take me around show me the hey I'll explain the history. Yes, and because that's a great point just because we're a small organization all of we do offer tours right now of course it's a little limited with the current restrictions. But in general because Coolie is still a private residence. You do need a reservation you can't just walk on well you might be able to walk on and give you a tour, but not anyone usually need a reservation in advance. Okay, yeah sure. Well COVID I'm sure COVID Jessica has changed things for you. And I like to know about that is very frustrating, but at the same time, it makes you innovate. And you find things perhaps that you wouldn't think of before. Can you talk about that. Absolutely. Yeah, COVID. So we typically have 75 kids here a day. Going through Munaway Heritage Center and doing hands on activities so our mornings are spent with groups of students but obviously starting in March week we haven't done that since March. So, which means that we had to innovate and way to stop doing that and then now built virtual resources so Jenny and Kayla have worked really hard to create virtual tours for teachers and they customize them based on the teacher's needs they have done curriculum based on what we call the water hood so examining how water flows in your space, you know from the mountain down to the ocean but what it does in between is really interesting or maybe what it should do and what it isn't doing. And so they've created videos and presentations that and we use Zoom or WebEx to engage students in that way. So that's been something those are things that we've always wanted to do but never had the time. And then we have the time to build those virtual resources. So we're taking this time to stop and reset and think about how we interpret this history, and wanting to have a more inclusive history. And so we're doing a lot of work to be of our community by our community and for our community that means that we bring the community in and they're reflected in our staff and our volunteers and work with them to reinterpret Munaway Heritage Center, rather than doing all this work for someone. So who comes? I mean is it tourists? Is it local people? A bunch of howlies? A bunch of local people? Who comes? Who can you give us a kind of demographic of who comes around for the tours? Well the nice thing about COVID is that we've had a lot of Kama'ina come and a lot of Manoa residents, you know people who walk past here all the time walking their dogs and they finally have the time to come and visit and see what is this place. And so we've had a lot of Manoa residents and that of course is a target audience for us because we want to make sure everybody in Manoa has access to this resource. And in terms of, you know, race, I would say it's all of the races that are reflected in Hawaii come to visit. Prior to COVID we did have quite a few tourists but we've always been focused on the local community first and making sure we have programs that engage them. Like for instance we would have workshops with practitioners on Saturday mornings and we'll probably start doing more of that in 2021. We'll resume, pick that up in 2021 on a small scale. And those are all Kama'ina. So our theory is if you focus on Kama'ina the tourists will also enjoy it rather than the other way around. Yeah absolutely. You want to remain as pure cultural as you possibly can. Speaking of which Keala, you know, it's like Hawaii had its grand day in the 19th century. That's when it was still a kingdom. That's when it was, you know, luxuriating in the pure Hawaiian culture. And so my question to you is, you know, as a researcher, as a cultural researcher, you have to be studying that period of time. What do you study? You know, to find all of what there is to find in Hawaii culture. Well, that is actually, that's actually, there's a lot. And so just to mention that we are currently just kind of trying to expand our perspective. And so for a long time the history of the 19th century was told through kind of a certain lens, right, the lens of the Westerner, because those are the resources available in English. And so there has been a big, I guess, need and want for other perspectives, especially the Hawaiian. And there's a lot of newspapers from that time that places are who is like of a via Lulu and of a Kono Hiki who are making the their online resources. And they're making these Hawaiian previously just in Hawaiian but now translated into English available to the wider public to get more perspective on that era. Personally, I, I'm more of a Makahana kaike so hands on kind of learning and so my interest in research is doing the practices. So I'll see something in a book or I'll see another practitioner on social media doing something, and then bring it here to work and let us let us experiment and I'm very blessed to mention it that all of my coworkers or I like to call them my, my co mates, because we're like, all mates, we're really good friends. We get to dive into these cultural activities together and it's really fun. So are you documenting your, your work. And are you documenting it in a way, perhaps on a website or virtually so that you know you, you know, Jessica and I were talking about how you have a little time now. You can do things you might not otherwise have had the time to do before. Are you taking this period to, you know, write, write anything new down or make it available to people. Jessica, what's the plan. We are, we apply it like kind of a citizen scientist approach and so there's a special drawer in Kayla's office that has all of the documentation of the different, for instance, experiments with kappa and die. We document what we do and then the next the challenge you know it's, it's kind of easy to take a video of something but then editing is where the time comes in and so that's what we need more help with is, is, is editing all the wonderful content that we have in packaging it. Well, you know, you're here for you. That's right. That's right. We could partner on that. Yeah, should be awesome. Speaking of multimedia why don't we take a look at your slides. Okay, help them, you know, give some three dimensional view of this okay let's put the slides on and, and you can describe what we see what is that. So this is one of our practitioners we, we, one of our favorite things to do is work with cultural practitioners and, and give them an opportunity to share their knowledge and then us an opportunity to learn from them. And this is Kumu Aloha Kikipi, and she is sharing how to weave using hollow, and this this student that is here is somebody who just came to one class once and then a year later. She actually wove her first hat. So it's, it's an example of, you know, a beginner not knowing anything but then being able to take it and now she sells sells woven hats. So this is Kuka Ohao. So this is similar to the view that's behind Keala. And there you can see the north orientation and the view of the back of the valley that you see when you're standing up there. Another view. We often have, of course rainbows in Manoa. And this is one of those days. That's true rainbows and rainbows in Manoa they go together don't they. Yeah. Yeah, it's a big part of our story. Yeah. What's what's this. So this is you'll need to sell the silver who is a who the, well, kappa practitioner rather. And so you can see here some of the samples of her work and all of the plants that she uses to die the kappa. The kappa is was used for clothing bedding. And here in the garden we have examples of the tree that you would have the volcano tree that you would have made kappa from so you can follow that process from start to finish as well in in our workshops. Okay, it was more. And so this is one of our volunteer docents we have a really dynamic volunteer docent program. We have people who love history love culture and then love sharing it. We have a lot of retired school teachers who are part of this group. And this is actually Leslie Turnbull. She is part of the mid pack Ohana, and she is telling the story of Manoa to a group of school kids. That's great. Five minutes away at mid back. And of course, oh, when it's a lot blooming. That's the last one. Thank you for that. So a couple of thoughts come to my mind I want to run them by you okay. Number one is the, the. There's a, there's a plant. I'm blocking on the name is a plant. Repository of plants. Up the hill. Say it again. Yeah, the line of a read them. Yeah. Yeah, the line of a read them to get plants from there because a lot of those plants are extinct. And they're native they're all native species I think that's what they have at the upper read them. You get plants from there because that would be a great source. Absolutely. We, I don't think we get plants from there but we what we do with lion is partner. And so we partner with their education team we have a NOAA grant right now. Or where we partner with NOAA, we started partner with line arboretum and wikiki aquarium to make sure to understand the watershed. And then we also tap into their they have incredible knowledge about plants and so if we have a question we call up at line but, and we've they've allowed us to go up there and harvest for our hula camp. Oh, that's a great connection. Yeah, yeah. The other free association point I want to ask you about is it's the mission houses museum. And has a thing it's a cemetery at the Wahoo cemetery. Yeah, yeah, yeah, where they have it's really it's really chicken skin. They have actors who who tell you who who take on the role of people who lived in in the 19th century. And they sort of arise from the grave. And they tell you the life story. It's very easy because there are a half a dozen of them in the tour so you go to one, you go to one gravestone and he tells you oh yeah that guy Smith's over there I really didn't like him at all. And then you go down the other side of the cemetery and there's Smith, and he's telling you he didn't like Jones at all, and they had a little business dispute they suit each other what have you. And it's very very interesting to see these. So do you ever have that kind of experience. I mean do you ever try to do play acting with with people with actual personalities. The kind of them. Some former staff members did a little bit of that they had some some they call it living history when you pick some actors and do a lot of research or pick some historical characters rather and do a lot of research. And some people love it. We haven't done that ourselves yet. The personality at the center. It may not be the same as other Hawaiian cultural organizations. But Keala you mentioned your kumu, and my wife has a kumu and kumus are important, you know to pass down wisdom and culture points and is there is what does it mean to you and what does it mean to Manoa heritage center about the hula. I am new to hula. I'm just a little over a year and I met my kumu hula local Olu Quintero. Actually, when he came with the Kukuna program for the DOE, they came to visit. I was connected here at MHC and he was so willing to share his knowledge with us and you know that was really kind and amazing and offered hula for me. And since then I've learned hula and oli with him and kumu ihi la nichu and it's just, it really expanded my, my Hawaiian experience with myself and with the Aina. And I think he actually kind of is all of our kumus because he really does help all of us and if we ever have questions or need some guidance, you know, he's, he's both of them are right there. It's great. It's great to have a kumu. It really is for sure. Oh, there's a question we have. Oh, how is Manoa a heritage center funded, Jessica. Oh, good question. Good question. We have an operating budget of about $600,000 a year. Dicks are on this place and the bulk of that is funded by donations from individuals. So there are people in the community who support Manoa Heritage Center and also grants. So we cover our budget that way. We also at the same time raise money to grow an endowment so that we don't have to raise our entire budget every single year. Mary cook Mary salmon Mary cook have been extremely generous and setting up that endowment and so that we can have some security in the future. Some people think that Mary writes a check every year but that's not the case, which of course they did donate the land and everything. So, I guess the thing is your are you. Are you able to continue I mean, what I mean is what's the future for Manoa Heritage Center how do you see it unfolding over the years to come. Mary's dream Mary when she passes away she wants to give her house to Manoa Heritage Center. And so that would be part of become part of our campus. And so we would then have a historic home to be able to share with the community. And so we're actually doing an vision and exercise right now to dream and you know how could this 3.5 acre space in Manoa best serve the community and we have lots of ideas. One thing that we're doing now is making the garden more community based so schools come and take care of specific sections of the garden. And once a week and take care of it and then are able to harvest the plants and that's great. That's great practicing, practicing ancient agriculture. That's lovely. We want to do more of that and get, you know, just provide a space where people can get their hands dirty and also talk about heart, you know, some of the parts of history are hard to talk about and they're painful and we want to make this space as a healing space so that we can dive in and build bridges. Very, very valuable, noble even. So Jenny you get the last word. Okay, and, and my question for the last word is, why do you do this. And why do you think Kayla and Jessica do this. I mean, you're, you're dedicated. I'm sure it's hard to, you know, to keep on trucking and especially in the time of COVID. And what does it look like for you personally and as a career. I think this is one of those kind of serendipitous organizations and teams, our work, Ohana, you know, I think that because we are all kind of on the same page in terms of working here at Manoa Heritage Center sort of fulfilling salmon history's vision. It's one of those situations where I really feel so grateful to be able to come here every day to work with these ladies and Kevin is the one gentleman on our team and just do this work I think also because we're a smaller organization. I think we're able to, as long as we know that we have to put in the time to get it done. I mean, there's very few obstacles I think to what dreaming and making something come come to life. So that's really nice and then I know from, you know, my past experience has been in a bigger organization and so I know that, you know, that's not always the case. So, if I if I asked you for one word that describes your perception of the Manoa Heritage Center that you would like to leave without viewers. What would that word be. That's a hard question. I have to think about that one for a second. Okay, we're going to come back to you. Okay. Yeah, I'll let you have a word. Peace. What is it. Peace. Peace. What a lovely word. A lovely word. Jessica, have you got a word that you'd like to leave without viewers. Grace. Grace. All right, does that help you Jenny can you come up with a word. I guess my owner have to be Aloha. Aloha. Aloha, peace and grace. Thank you very much. Jenny, Jessica and Keala. Thank you so much for joining us today. Aloha. Aloha. You're welcome. Aloha.