Happy Thanksgiving

[oink]

I hope everyone has a happy thanksgiving. I'm thankful for my family and for a country that can have a peaceful change of government and for having a job. Thank you dear God for all of the good things in my life, including my PunaWeb friends.

Pua`a
S. FL
Big Islander to be.

[Devany]

Well said Oink. A wonderful wish for blessings to you all on this day of reflection and gratitude.

There is a tradition in Hawaiian culture that was also a celebration of harvest... Back since ancient times, hundreds of years before the Pilgrims even existed, there has been a Hawaiian custom of observing the Makahiki.

Makahiki means New Year (the Hawaiian greeting for Happy New Year is: Hau'oli Makahiki Hou) but it also signifies the period of time when the Hawaiians would put aside wars and work and celebrated the harvest and their blessing with cleansing, feasting, games and much more.

Unlike our own Thanksgiving, the Makahiki was not observed for just one day....it lasted between 4 to 5 months starting sometime between October and November and ending between February and March...it all depended on "The Pleiades", a cluster of stars that appears in the eastern sky close to sunset sometime in late October....the "Time of the Makahiki" lasted as long as you could see The Pleiades in the sky.

The Makahiki was observed as an homage to their god Lono who was the god of fertility and abundance and though details of the celebration varied slightly from island to island, they all featured Lono as the center of the feasting.

For further reading on this subject, here are a few links:

http://www.hawaii.gov/hidocs/makahiki.html
http://www.moolelo.com/ancient-celebration.html
http://www.kaahelehawaii.com/pages/culture_makahiki.htm


Aloha au i Hawai`i,
devany

Devany Vickery-Davidson
East Bay Potters
www.eastbaypotters.com

[Dennis]

I just love the stories from Hawaii! Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

[swys]

To all Punaweb friends, Happy Thanksgiving, Hau’oli La Ho’omakika’i, or should it be Hau’oli Makahiki Hou? Either way, warmest Aloha to all and to your families and friends. We all have tons for which to be thankful. I do rather like the months-long celebration concept.

Thank you Devany, for your reference to The Pleiades; I sighted them often while at sea in the Hawai'ian latitudes. Our navigator and shipmates skilled in celestial nav called them the 7 Sisters. If memory serves, it was during the months that I remember seeing them. Haley's Comet was another celestial sighting I was lucky to see during my sailing the Pacific. Good memories. Digresiing from the holiday greeting, but I find it interesting the correllation of stars important to Hawai'ian culture and navigation, as Hokule'a is aka Arcturus, the alpha star in the constllation Bootes.

Back on topic - be thankful for your blessings, and Happy Thanksgiving.

[Kelena]

To all my dear friends, virtual and actual on Punaweb:

We create families, make friends and build communities in new ways these days. I am grateful to Rob for providing this meeting place. And what a family we are: eccentrics, poets, guard dogs, community organizers, survivalists, spelunkers, naturists, earth mothers, lava daddies, experts on everything from what to do with an overflowing catchment to how to roast coffee, gays and lesbians who are nothing like their cohorts in gay ghettos on the mainland, Southerners who see something of the Old South in the North Pacific, dog lovers, cockfighters, gun-lovers, star watchers, locavores, barterers, givers (but not takers) and others who pursue their dreams braving lava, vog, thieves and frogs because they know it is worth it.

[rusty h]

Ill chime in and second to all. Im thankful to have found this site and for research and for the people on punaweb that share their life.
peace

[Liz]

I am very thankful for the new friends I've made through Punaweb, both online and in the real world.
I am truly grateful to those who have helped us learn all the little things about living here that one cannot possibly know until you're living here all the time.
I'm thankful for the SCUBA Sunday get-togethers where I got to first put faces with some of the names. :-)
I'm thankful for the opportunity to live on this beautiful, alive island, warts and all.

aloha, Liz

"The best things in life aren't things."

[kani-lehua]

happy birdie day everyone!

the bird's looking good. but, i bought the wrong cranberry sauce (has whole cranberries in it) and it was difficult to cut. my yams didn't turn out as good as last year. but, the potato salad and baked beasns are fantastic. oh, well, there's always next year--our first thanksgiving in puna.

"chaos reigns within.
reflect, repent and reboot.
order shall return."

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