The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

Well, it turns out we don't have TB after all. Who'd have thought? We're getting our shots now for the MMR; first one this week, second in a month to follow. We'll head out to KCC (Michael's school) this morning to turn in the health form and hopefully talk to an advisor about which classes he should start out with. I'll be registering for classes on Friday. I'm taking three. It's gonna be wicked-awesome.

In other exciting news, Michael and I have now touched the Pacific Ocean. Walked in it, in fact. Some people, when we told them we were coming to Hawai'i for school, said we'd need to be careful not to while away our time at the beach. But I think those people had forgotten who they were talking to. To be fair, I think most people would have made it to the beach within the first two weeks of living in Hawai'i. Michael and I didn't quite. But it is quite lovely. The water feels great and it's this amazing blue that I haven't seen since I was in Belize. I'll be going back. Sometime.

We went to the aquarium and I learned a lot about coral reefs and Hawaiian/Pacific fishes. And I'm struck again and again by how very damaging to the environment the tourist industry is. Who on earth thought it was a good idea? Oh, that's right. The Hiltons. And others who are making a killing selling paradise vacations to environments they're destroying. Don't get me wrong. In itself, I think travel is a good thing, and especially for us Americans and our cultural vacuum. As we sit here comfy at the top, we are for the most part wholly unaware of the world being squashed under our asscheeks. Sorry, that was crass. But travel, and even "tourism" in the form of touring around to learn of new cultures, is a good idea in principle.

It's just that the tourist industry is not about learning new things or exploring new environments or celebrating the world we live in. It's about luxury vacations and exploiting (and definitely not protecting) the lands we've seized from other people. And--as a nice synchronicity for me--I came back from the aquarium where I'd been thinking about this, and I read some more of Haunani Trask who began discussing the tourism industry in Hawai'i. And she said,

"Now, we Hawaiians have no control over the massive tourist industry, which imports more than six million foreigners into our tiny islands each year. Multinational corporations see our beauty; the world's rich buy it in two- and four-week packages. These foreigners, mostly haole and Japanese, think of our homeland as theirs, that is, as a place they have a claim to visit, pollute, and destroy by virtue of their wealth. Our role, as indigenous people, is to serve and wait upon these visitors, to illuminate and fulfill their dreams. Throughout the Pacific Basin, First World tourists play out this racist fantasy of an "island vacation," ruining our waters and lands, degrading our living cultures. When they leave, tourists have learned nothing of our people or our place. They have not listened to the land nor have they heard her singing."

Already I'm thinking of the people who will come here to visit us, and I try to figure out where I can take them and what I can show them that does not play into this industry of waste and exploitation. I've got some time, and already I've got some ideas. Will have to work on this. Also, as I was falling asleep last night, I had a sort of waking-dream of leading a walking tour of Honolulu called "The Haole Tour of Colonialism," and I walked white American tourists through the history of our people conquering a nation that posed no threat to us, but who lived in a beautiful and strategic location mid-way through the Pacific. Not to say I will do this, but it did make for interesting thoughts as I drifted off to sleep.

I've joined the Hawaiian Independence mailing list (http://hawaii-nation.org/index.html) and I plan on going by the UH (my school) Center for Hawaiian Studies because they have further information about Ka Lahui Hawai'i (http://hawaii-nation.org/turningthetide-6-4.html) and other Native Hawaiian and Hawaiian sovereignty information. Also, Haunani Trast is a professor there. I think it's likely, being in Hawai'i and all, that my research into racism, poverty, and marginalization will focus on what we have done/are doing to Native Hawaiians. But of course, I know from previous study into racism, and I have seen again and again as I look into Hawai'i's history, that one of the main problems that minorities have is white people coming in thinking they know the answer, that we know what is good for them. I don't want to be that white person. So if I'm going to do this, I need to make connections with Hawaiians and with Hawaiian groups who can tell me what I can do for them, how I can help, what they want, and what is good for them. I refuse to do it any other way.

Theirs is not my revolution. I cannot profess to say that I have always been an advocate of Hawaiian sovereignty, or that two weeks ago I was an advocate of Hawaiian sovereignty. That is their revolution. My revolution is anti-racism. My revolution is to stop discrimination against the poor. My revolution is to include people who we have pushed to the margins. I just hope they can use my revolution in their revolution. Because I do really respect their revolution, and I would love to help.