Noah Solomon’s Efforts to Connect the Pasifik
08/15/08
The areas surrounding Waikiki and Le’ahi (Diamond Head) were famous for their fertility. Even up to the 20th century, lo’i kalo – taro patches – were abundant, and many families depended on these high-yielding croplands for food and sustenance.
Nowadays, as Waikiki’s hotel towers and shopping meccas dominate the shoreline, those days seem like worlds away. However the ho’okipa of days past may not be as bygone as it appears. Pasifika Foundation Hawai’i, a non-profit group involved in supporting and facilitating the self-determined efforts of the Pacific’s Native peoples, is exploring a re-vision of Hawaii’s current tourism model.
Its current effort, the Community-Based Host Visitor Project (CBHV), seeks to provide Native Hawaiian communities with new, community-based ways to participate in Hawaii’s visitor industry. Noah Solomon, data specialist at Pasifika Foundation Hawaii (PFH), explains that they seek to redefine the existing tourism paradigm in a way that puts the focus on native Hawaiian communities and puts the host culture back into the host-visitor equation. “We are exploring ways in which to manage this, because we want the main focus to be on the hosts and what they want to and are willing to offer,” Solomon explains. “The host communities will be the ones to decide how they may or may not want to engage with visitors.”
Noah has been collecting information about Hawaiian cultural practitioners who possess cultural knowledge and are willing to host and educate visitors, and is locating areas on the islands where there are many of these potential participants. “I like to meet people willing to share stories – those who have a regard for the progression of humankind, who are making a difference in the world by sharing their gifts with others.” In his interaction with some cultural practitioners, Solomon says that they’ve encountered some hesitation from those who’ve seen how in many ways tourism has misrepresented and exploited Hawaiian culture.
PFH’s ideal outcome would create a community-focused effort that pulls a community together to provide a rewarding host and visitor experience with the potential to provide sustainability to the community. He explains that other Pacific island groups such as Samoa and Tonga still welcome visitors as a community and that 50 years ago their work in Hawaii would have been much easier. “We as Hawaiians have suffered a lapse of cultural knowledge and teachings, so their passage to succeeding generations has declined. That’s why we are taking extra care in preserving what we still have.”
The next phase of PFH’s CHBV project will involve the creation of a pilot web-based interface that serves to connect visitors and host communities. If the pilot interface proves successful, it will be ready for wider implementation and marketing in 2-3 years.
While final plans may not be realized for awhile, Solomon states that if 20 tourists a day opt to travel outside of Waikiki for a hosted experience, rather than, say, visiting Pearl Harbor, then it would be a good day. Visitors may still be able to discover the old Hawaii that still thrives outside of history books and b&w postcards.
Solomon is also an undergrad Hawaiian Studies major at UH Manoa and host of a Hawaiian-language music radio show broadcast Sunday afternoons on KTUH.
from Hawaii RED Magazine
story by: Lynn Koch
photos by: Olivier Koning