Nap Gardiner 

” Love Your Land.” 

It was a trip to Hawaii where Nap Gardiner learned an important lesson that he passes on in this program. When he arrived, there was a huge globe at the airport in Honolulu, where the Hawaiian Islands were featured prominently. He was immediately intrigued about how the native Hawaiians found their way around these small islands in the vast Pacific Ocean and from where they originally came.

In his obsession to learn, he found a book by Canadian anthropologist, Wade Davis, called ‘The Wayfinders’, where a chapter on the ‘navigators’ provided the answers.The knowledge of navigation by the original people was quite astounding. They could travel long distances on the ocean to other places by ancient wisdom, including observing the different weather, clouds, waters, moon, sky and knowing the islands positions from teachings and stories told by the navigators. 

The intent of his lesson is to get across to the younger people that there is a lot of wisdom that resides in their own people and is passed down in their DNA.  He advises that by learning to love the land, than can figure out these forgotten knowledge.

He says that the European anthropologists of 30 plus years ago, who studied past societies, wanted to prove the theory that the Hawaiians came from South American in reed rafts. The ‘Kon-Tiki’ expedition was attempted in 1947, but ended in tragedy and failure. An Academy Award winning movie was made about the expedition in 1951. 

In the early 1970’s, the Polynesian Voyaging Society - Hokule’a was created to show and educate the people of how they were taught to navigate around the world. They challenged themselves to go 3,000 miles from Hawaii to Tahiti in 1976 and test their ancient skills and knowledge and were successful. He says that the indigenous ways of knowing are strong, and the connection to our homelands awakens the sacred relationship with the earth towards a sustainable future. 

What knowledge can I bring home to help us survive on our own in these modern times? He ponders the memories of our ancestors with thoughts of what they were doing and thinking, as they travelled on these waterways with their families. He suggests to the youth, reflect on your ancestor’s journeys and aspirations, but most importantly…love your land.