DON'T do THIS in Hawaii!!! Angry local confronts tourists
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- Опубликовано: 6 сен 2024
- An unintentional gaffe 😮 while visiting Hawaii led to an aggressive confrontation with a local who got upset😲 over what he judged to be a disrespectful act on our part.
After much debate, we've decided to share our story with the hopes that it may help other travelers not make the same mistake we did. 🤔
We realize now that this man was right in the fact that we should not have touched the wall. We apologize for our unintentional disrespect. However, we believe violence is never the way to deal with these kinds of things. ⚖️
Thanks for watching, and we wish you all safe, happy travels!♥️
Next time Hawaiian, stand ova dea and protect yo wall! That couple wasn't disrespectful. No need to threaten. Calm down. Pump ur brake and educate.
Thank you. We really did mean no disrespect!
So sorry. He should have educated instead of threatened you both and there should have been a sign. You did the right thing by apologizing and leaving instead of responding with the same anger, so thank you for being the bigger person. I hope the majority of your memories from this trip was positive and this was the only negative incident. Usually most locals are much more understanding and will teach. Clearly, this guy had had enough of tourists and was having a bad day! Again, I am so sorry that you both had to experience this kind of hostility.
Thank you so much! Yes, the rest of the trip was great. This was the only bad experience we had. The other locals we meet were awesome.
There is a possibility that rock wall is part of a heiau. "Na heiau" are ancient temples made by the time of Kamehameha Nui (or even older) and are considered sacred. There are tons of it scattered all over the islands, but I think most of them are in Big Island. The largest one still exists in Pu'ukohola. Those with significant historic past are often marked with signs to show respect and "kapu". The smaller ones (like the one you encountered) are usually left as is. I am quite sure that was a heiau given where the location is (overlooking the pali and the ocean). That guy who threatened you was definitely "hewa" in his approach but as a rule of thumb these rock structures or formations usually carry a certain level of religious intention that a lot of locals still have reverence for. My tutu kane was born in Hilo and though a Christian, he still shows massive regard towards these "mo'omeheu kahiko" (ancient traditions).
Braddah man could've approached in a different way. Not everyone going know our ways of life here on the islands.
Braddah just wanted to pump his chest cos was one tourist. But if was another braddah, he would've just observed from one distance or shoot the shaka lol..
Teach them with Aloha and no be one prick🤡
Thank you so much! We genuinely appreciate how many native Hawaiians have reached out to tell us this. A big part of the reason that we delayed putting this video out for almost 2 years is that we felt ashamed of what happened. We really didn't know any better and meant no disrespect. We would have gladly learned from him had he been civil. If our mistake can help others not make the same error, we're happy to share our story. Mahalo.
Im happy people like him are being priced out of Hawaii, probably 0% native to hawaii and metheads tbh.
The problem is, your the wrong shade. This Happens every day on every island. For that reason.
I'm sorry you had to go through that. Aloha
Thank you
when your a haole , thats all it takes no matter how respectful you are , it happend more than once to me , chips on shoulders
Usually there are signs warning you, "KAPU" or stay away but once you see what a HEi' AU looks like, they look all the same. Kindly looks like an ancient rock wall and you said it yourself, Early HAWAIIAN SETTLEMENT. You guys have been travelling a lot to know what to look for or what to watch out for right, You guys kinda research where you guys going which is the southernmost tip of U.S. called "Ka Lea." using google. You can put 2 and 2 easily together and should have been more aware.
Braddah should been a tad nice but usually this is what tourist do, you allow one to put a camera on it and soon a choke of people be climbing and doing tiktok on that thing. Glad you stay lucky there was not a lot of them at that moment.
Yes, now that we know what they look like, we can tell what they are. However, as we explained in the video, it was not so obvious to us, at the time. Rest assured, we won't make the same mistake, again. We genuinely meant no disrespect.
We knew to leave, in no small part because one of us grew up in a rural area where locals were known to gang up on outsiders over some small reason or tiny perceived slight. If you're implying what I think you are... I'll just say I judge that behavior is completely uncalled for and we believe vigilante justice is not justice at all, no matter where in the world it is found.
While he should have approached the situation with aloha and sincerely educated you, the reality is that we frequently have to address instances of people disrespecting our heiʻau. Some of us have the patience to continue the burden of explaining our culture, and some (like this braddah) is just tired of it. It might seem that placing a sign to explain its significance is a simple solution, but with all due respect, that responsibility falls on you. It's not the state's responsibility, nor is it solely ours as kanaka. Me ke aloha 🤙🏽🤙🏽
We appreciate your well articulated response. Thank you for your viewpoint. We would like to apologize again for our blunder. We meant no disrespect.
We can empathize with his anger and frustration. We also sometimes get sick of the impact of tourism in our own home area. We too live in a beautiful area on the coast. We see how tourists leave their garbage on the beaches every weekend. We don't have ancient sacred structures to safeguard, but we still see them cause damage to our natural resources. About 2 years ago, for example, an out of town couple had their wedding on a local beach and decided to carve their names in huge letters on the cliff face overlooking the beach. This absolutely outaged the local community.
We also understand and empathize with the history of colonization. One of us, being the descendant of a holocaust survivor, can 100% relate to the pain of having a culture, land and a family stolen from them in a horrific way.
All that is to say we can understand where he was coming from.
You're correct in that it is a tourists responsibility to research a culture before visiting it. HOWEVER, one can never learn all there is to know about a culture before visiting. It takes years of immersion to fully get a culture. If that were the standard for tourists, no one would ever travel.
We did research Hawaiian culture. This particular detail was missed or overlooked unintentionally. However, that is no excuse for physical intimidation! We didn't show or mention it, but he followed us almost all the way back to our car, yelling at and threatening us the whole time.
In a way, we're doing our part to spread awareness about this site by making and sharing this video. Over 2000 people have seen it in just a few days. That's the best we can do, not being locals or natives. A sign would help even more and serve to educate every single tourist who visits there, thus removing the burden from the shoulders of fed up locals. It's a simple and effective solution that would make this point mute and help eliminate future visitors from making the same mistake we did, for which we are genuinely sorry.
I would like to add a final thought... when traveling around the world, one encounters many ancient and sacred sites, many of which include rock walls. A few prominent examples that come to mind include the Coliseum, the Great Wall of China, and the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem. The latter is arguably just as sacred as the hei'au are. None of these examples come with the caveat that you can not touch them. Damage them, of course not, but there is no taboo about touching them. In our experience, when a sacred or ancient site is not to be touched, it is usually roped off, off limits or there is a sign telling you not to touch it. This is true around the world because there is not a universal standard that touching ancient walls is wrong. This is a unique to Hawaii viewpoint. I read that there were ancient sites in Hawaii and that they should be treated with respect. I never saw something that said do not touch them, which we did not view to be a disrespectful act at the time. I judge that could be why this detail sometimes gets overlooked by tourists.
He was way out of line with his approach & threats. I could totally see anyone going off the wall (pun intended) had you been climbing the rock wall or worse removing/damaging the rocks. But setting a gimbal on for a photo? He was on some power trip loaded with ignorance. SMH 🤦🏻♀️
Thank you so much for your support. We completely agree!
you do not understand, sorry