Like so many others, flooding hit our family’s land in Lāʻie and changed everything overnight. Our ʻohana are kuleana landowners in Laiemaloo, dating back for over 200 years, on this āina. There are so few kuleana families left, and this land is more than property; it is our connection to generations before us.
On our five acres, multiple generations live together, my dad, uncles, auntie, and our grandmother. Four adults and one kupuna call this land home.
There were no sirens. No warning. No emergency alerts. Around 1:00am Friday morning my uncle woke up to water soaking through his mattress, his dog barking as he stood stranded in the kitchen. He ran to wake my dad. Had he not, we don’t know how much worse this could have been. Outside, our road had already turned into a river over 200 feet wide and nearly three feet high. There was no option to leave, they all just waited hours for the water to stop flowing and watched as parts of their livelihoods washed away.
When the flood came through the property, it sent 4 feet of water rushing through their home like a tidal wave. What it left behind is a devastating 20-foot wall of mud and debris that now sits along our riverbed, with cars lodged and tangled into the trees. Parts of the property are still unsafe to even walk through.
My grandmother’s shipping container home is completely overtaken by mold/mildew and no one has been able to safely enter it since the first storm hit 3 weeks ago. The main home is still standing for now, but it will likely need to be torn down and rebuilt.
This isn’t just cleanup. It’s starting over.
The scale of the damage is more than our family can handle alone. We are asking for help through donations or, if you are on Oʻahu, coming out in person to help us clear brush and pull trash from the riverbed. We are doing everything we can to restore this ʻāina so it can continue to carry our family forward for another six generations.
He aliʻi ka ʻāina, he kauwā ke kanaka. The land is the chief, and man is its servant. We serve this land because it has always taken care of us, and now we are trying to take care of it.
Mahalo for any support, whether it’s a donation, or your time.
Me ke aloha,
The Kapu ʻOhana