Koa

Aloha nō kākou,

6 weeks and counting until the first regatta, and things are definitely starting to take shape. Kai `Opua Canoe Club is now officially in training as a club, and every Tuesday and Thursday at 5:15pm, about 50 men in various age-groups are gathering to practice stroke technique, crew composition, strategy and physical ability in anticipation of the first race on May 19^th. Saturdays and Sundays are currently reserved for long-distance training, with training sessions lasting anywhere from two to three hours, and anyone who has an additional day available goes out on an OC-1 for a training run. I am starting to get back into the groove and feel like I am starting to contribute in the canoe (something that takes a while to get used to again). While my body feels tired after a big practice and needs time to recover, I look forward to every new day and practice as it allows me to try new things, change my stroke just a bit and see if it makes a difference in how I can apply power from the very beginning of the stroke to the very end.

Our Head Coach, Eddie Hayward, whom I have only met this past week, is a young, well-spoken man of Hawaiian decent who, as far as I can gather (I have not asked him about it yet), works as a teacher at a Hawaiian Immersion School where the entire curriculum is taught in the Hawaiian language. I very much like his style – he is firm and knows what he wants in a team, but not overbearing, realizing that for most of us, paddling is a passion and diversion, not a profession.

What I really like about Eddie and the club in general is their respect for Hawaiian culture and their sense of responsibility (kuleana) to perpetuate our culture. At the beginning of each training session, before we climb into the canoes, a few words of Hawaiian wisdom and thoughts about the spirit (mana) within the canoe are shared. When practice is done (pau), everyone helps get the canoes back out of the water, and then the entire group gathers around in a circle, and Kahu Mark, a priest who is also a very talented paddler, performs a prayer (pule) in Hawaiian, line by line, with the entire club repeating after him. Someone else may offer a Hawaiian word of the day and anyone else who wants to contribute anything cultural is welcome to do so. It is a great atmosphere and adds a wonderful element to the physicality of the club.

This week’s kokua was to meet at the club’s canoe halau (storage structure for canoes and equipment) after practice on Saturday morning to work on the two koa canoes that belong to Kai `Opua.

Koa is the name of the largest native tree in Hawai`i, with a light-gray bark, crescent-shaped leaves and white flowers in small, round heads. Koa has been used for canoes and surfboards, but today is commonly used as a very high-end wood for expensive furniture. In the Hawaiian language, koa also means brave, bold, fearless, with bravery and courage, and is also used as a word for soldier, warrior, fighter and hero. Every canoe club in the state aspires to own a koa canoe, but not all of them can afford to have one, as the wood and the art of carving a canoe comes at a very high monetary price.

When you drive around any of the Hawaiian Islands, you can spot canoes on the beaches and sites of one of the over 50 canoe clubs, but all of those canoes are made out of fiberglass. The advantage of fiberglass is the relatively affordable cost and the strength and resilience of the hull. It is also easy to fix any damage to the canoe by fiber glassing over it, and scratches can easily be repainted. The cost of fiberglass canoes is about $15,000, but they last for many, many years and provide its owner much use and excitement.

A koa canoe on the other hand is much more delicate and has to be treated with much more care. For any paddler, the main difference is that a koa canoe comes from a living organism, the koa tree, compared to the synthetic nature of fiberglass. The process of selecting the right tree, longer than 40 feet, with the correct girth, is a very important and also very spiritual one. Those who are chosen to go and select such a tree carry the burden of wisdom and honor with them to climb up into the mountains, sometimes as high as 7,000 feet, to find a tree that has all of the right attributes to make a great canoe. Once a selection is made, cultural protocol dictates how the tree is taken down, often roughed-out on site and then transported down to the ocean where a master canoe builder (kalai wa`a) starts to shape the canoe. This process is a long and arduous one, as the canoe not only has to look great, but also  perform well while racing under all types of conditions. There are few men in our state today who are master canoe builders, even though I believe the number is increasing once again as individuals want to learn and perpetuate this art.  Needless to say, koa canoes are much more expensive (over $100,000 to be exact).

The Fairmont Orchid has a koa canoe named Pauoa.  Pauoa is a beautiful koa canoe built by master kalai wa`a, Manny Veincent. When the hotel opened in 1990, Manny was asked to work with the employees to select a koa tree and build a canoe. After months of vigorous protocols, planning, designing and finally working on the koa log, Manny presented the hotel with Pauoa. Hawaiians believe that canoes have a life, as they were once a living being as a tree. Each has a distinct and separate personality in the ocean that must be cared for and respected. The canoe is part of the crew whether fishing, surfing or racing, and carries all paddlers safely into the ocean and home again.  We are taught that all paddlers are to treat canoes with respect and never take them for granted or treat them discourteously.

Once a canoe club has a koa canoe, it is the club’s great responsibility to take care of the vessel. Typically, the canoe is referred to as “she”, just like a family member, and we treat the canoe just like someone who is part of our `ohana. Kai `Opua owns two canoes, the Kamakahonu and the Hualalai.

As you can see, great pride goes into making such a canoe, with many beautiful details making this more of an artwork than an ocean-going boat. Most canoes are made from one solid log, but over time, small holes in the hull require patches to be inserted, which give the canoe additional character and interesting detail.

This weekend, the task at hand was to sand the two canoes down with fine-grit sandpaper so that they can be re-varnished and readied for another season of racing. Groups of 10 paddlers, sand-paper in hand, gathered around each canoe and small section by small section, over a three hour period, both canoes were sanded down very carefully, just enough to take out all unevenness, but not too much as to damage or weaken the structure.

After the dusty job of sanding, the canoes were wiped down, awaiting the next step in the process to regain their former beauty and strength to carry us through a full season of racing.

On some of the islands, koa canoes are only used on special occasions and during the state championships, the final regatta race of the season, but here on Hawai`i Island, all regattas are paddled in koas. It is a great honor to do so, but also a big responsibility as you don’t want to damage to canoe by sitting on the top (gunnel), by slamming the paddle into the side, or worse by touching another canoe in a turn during the race.

But for now, back into the fiberglass canoes for another week of training in Kailua-Kona.

A hui hou, mālama pono.

Chris