Page 2 - MidWeek - June 16, 2021

2 MIDWEEK JUNE 16, 2021
our tongues firmly in cheek, jump ahead a couple of years, and look back at some terms that have morphed in meaning, as it’s never too early to smile:
At one time the lowly kāhuli tree snail, sitting qui- etly under a leaf in the sacred upland forests, was seen for the unique and special being it is. It was woven into grand epics, in chants, and songs. These kāhuli tree snails were said to sing in a high-pitched voice. Their songs guided lovers together, or marked the location of hidden chief- ly persons.
• Antibodies — They were what we all wanted to help fight off a stealthy invader, but now they simply define people we just don’t want as homies.
tected sanctuaries.
When a batch of snails
didn’t want to simply dump them there. I knew this was yet another place where the wisdom of one practice could join with another.
• Cluster — A place to avoid in the COVID era. Now it can be seen daily at Leonard’s as malasada-craving tourists have re-appeared.
was being prepared for re- turn to the wild, the snail conservation team asked me to join them, high in the Koʻolau Mountains, to of- fer blessings on them, and I jumped at the honor. It was a long hike to the summit of Poamoho where the special snail enclosure had been built. These snails are not ac- tive by day, and when we got to the release site, in the cold drizzle of the sacred uplands, they were inert and unmov- ing. The conservation team
KELLEY
• Community spread — That was when someone got COVID some place that couldn’t be easily identified. Now it’s just another AYSO soccer potluck on Saturday.
I began a chant of awak- ening that is offered to the ʻaumākua, our ancestral guardians:
• Convalescent plasma — An antibody donation made by community heroes who’d beaten the disease. Now it’s that 77- inch, $4,000, 4K, OLED TV you can’t possibly afford, unless you saved your government stimulus check. Yeah, right.
Due to factors from mod- ern life, these tree snails are nearing extinction. Thankful- ly, heroic efforts are under-
E ala, ua ao, ua mālamala- ma, ua hele kānaka aia i luna ... it began. “Arise, it is day, it is growing light, beings are moving about above ...”
• False positive result — This was when you didn’t have COVID but thought you did. Now it’s what you say when you don’t like a presidential election result, despite facts.
way to rescue them from their predators and allow them to grow in special habitats, then release them back into pro-
By the end of the chant, all of the snails had emerged from their shells and were moving about on their leaves,
• Herd immunity — What we wanted so badly as a species that we bribed people to get vaccinated. Now it’s just a term for a bunch of mad cow disease-free cattle in Kamuela.
New Century Schoolbook bold (scaled H 73.6)
• Long-hauler — In 2022, this was one of the many millions still suffering COVID after-effects. Now it’s just Bob, the guy trucking your Tesla to Long Beach for shipping here.
Hearing The Songs Of Snails
“I ka wa¯ ma mua, kani na¯ pu¯pu¯ no ma¯kou, i ke¯ia wa¯ e kani ma¯kou no la¯kou. In the past, the snails sang for us, now let us sing for their sake.”
Kāhuli tree snails are a good reminder that when we pay attention to the world around us, we can see the beauty it holds. DAVID SISCHO PHOTO
WNew, Old Terms
the sacred was found in every living thing, in every boulder in a stream, and each cloud in the sky. As such, consid- ering something sacred went hand in hand with knowing it intimately, like the attention to detail given by scientists.
hile we certainly can’t chuckle about the “bad old days” of COVID-19 yet, we can see a light at the end of the prolonged, dark tunnel. So let’s plant
like moving rainbow-hued jewels, which made it so much easier to transfer them to the foliage of their new homes! It seemed a little miracle, But miracle or not, it was a hopeful sign that when we pay intimate attention to the living sacred presence, the results can be wonderful indeed.
Sam ‘Ohu Gon is the se- nior scientist and cultural adviser for The Nature Con- servancy of Hawaiʻi. He was designated a Living Trea- sure of Hawaiʻi in 2014 for his biocultural knowledge, philosophy and approach to conservation.
Chasing The Light is pro- duced by Lynne Johnson and Robin Stephens Rohr.
am a Hawaiian cultural practitioner and a scien- tist. In ancient Hawaiʻi,
• PPE — The vital equipment that hospital first responders couldn’t get enough of during dire times. Now it’s Twitter shorthand for a renowned North Shore surfing spot.
• mRNA — The single strand, molecular magical mean- derer that helped fight off the dastardly pandemic, courtesy of Pfizer/Moderna vaccines. Now it’s the miracle medical break- through in our fight against cancer, HIV, sickle cell anemia, Ebola, Zika, influenza, etc. No joke here.
• Social distancing — What we did to keep the virus away. Now it just refers to the mandated, awkward rule during slow dances at Junior’s eighth-grade social.
• Super-spreader — Formerly a human to avoid, su- per-spreader. But now, it merely indicates a benign, but wide, butter knife.
• Zoom — A human zoo inside transparent boxes where we all used to congregate to be seen far too often. Now, it’s what we all aspire to see our lives do, post-COVID-19.
Think about it ...
john@thinkaboutithawaii.com
CHASING THE LIGHT
with
Sam ‘Ohu Gon