The "Holo Moana: Generations of Voyaging" exhibit features some of the
makana (gifts) presented to the 245 rotating crewmembers of Hōkūle‘a on the vessel’s near-completed three-year Mālama Honua Worldwide Voyage.
The exhibit coincides with Hōkūle‘a’s Lei Ka‘apuni Honua grand homecoming ceremony and celebration at Ala Moana Beach Park’s Magic Island, last June 17, 2017.
The display, which also includes items collected by the Polynesian Voyaging Society from Hōkūle‘a’s four-decade voyaging history, as well as related photographs, maps and lithographs from the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum, is a preview of a larger Holo Moana exhibit set to debut at the O‘ahu museum in November. The Hawai‘i Convention Center display, which will be housed on the third level for two years, is a collaborative project of the convention center, Bishop Museum and the Polynesian Voyaging Society.
Hōkūle‘a items in the center’s Holo Moana display are divided into three educational sections related to the canoe: its 2014-17 Mālama Honua worldwide voyage; the traditional wayfinding knowledge taught, learned and practiced by crewmembers on Hōkūle‘a’s voyages; and the work of the nonprofit research- and education-focused Polynesian Voyaging Society, which conceived Hōkūle‘a’s construction, mission and voyages. In addition to the makana above – which represents a mere fraction of the many gifts presented to crew on Hōkūle‘a’s Mālama Honua dockings at more than 151 ports in 23 nations on five continents – the display also includes a wood boomerang gifted on a summer 2015 Australian port of call and a Mālama Honua-themed Tutudesk lap desk (part of a desks-for-students initiative named in honor of social rights activist Archbishop Desmond Tutu) designed for school children in South Africa.
Items in the display illustrating the use of traditional wayfinding techniques on Hōkūle‘a voyages include a Marshallese wood, shell and fiber-constructed stick chart representing the patterns of prominent ocean swells and ways in which islands and atolls disrupted those patterns; and a star compass created by Hōkūle‘a master navigator Nainoa Thompson to help apprentice navigators memorize and understand the skill of wayfinding by stars. Items from the Polynesian Voyaging Society straight out of Hōkūle‘a’s voyaging history include one of the canoe’s life preservers and a paddle from its 1976 maiden voyage to Tahiti, an ‘ukulele played by crew members on the canoe’s Pacific Ocean voyages, and a substantial, intricately-woven strand of kaula (cordage) crafted by Hōkūle‘a’s first master navigator Pius “Mau” Piailug.