Stacking Stones



I looked down the shoreline of the beautiful Bay today and saw stones..

Stacked carefully one on top another, balanced, just a breeze away from tipping over.. my eyes scanned the beach.. Who built this?


Stacking stones are seen alot along the remote rocky coastlines of Oahu..built by fishermen as a way of showing respect to the ocean.


Its a beautiful tribute to an ocean that gives each of us much. The stones against the blue water was just so beautiful.

It was even more beautiful when i found the people who built this little monument of respect. They were kids, Hawaiian kids, at the beach for the day.. what a wonderful thing...



The sentence on the picture? it says "in this place that i love " in Hawaiian.



i am an island gal...

Comments

Cloudia said…
Glad I found your lovely blog!






Aloha from Waikiki,

Comfort Spiral
May 29, 2010 at 10:28 PM
Kalei's Best Friend said…
Nai, I had heard and read it had to also do w/marking your trail... love that stack of rocks... I came across several along our beaches.
May 30, 2010 at 5:43 AM
Laura Doyle said…
I wonder how the practice was started? Very beautiful and meaningful.
May 30, 2010 at 8:47 AM
Maui Don - Dolphin Dude said…
I love the carefully stacked rocks too, but...
A couple of years ago there was a big letter writing campaign to the newspaper complaining that stacking rocks was non-Hawaiian and was ruining the landscape and it must be stopped.
So now I don't know what to think. Is it fun or is it evil? I don't dare laugh at the absurdity of the situation because then I'm being insensitive to Native Hawaiians (according to the letter writers). Oh, it is all so complicated :-)
May 30, 2010 at 10:26 AM
Barry said…
Reminds me of our own Inuit Inukshuk in Canada's far north. Of course your stones are more gracefully rounded.
May 30, 2010 at 1:40 PM
Firefly the Travel Guy said…
For centuries people have stacked stones on top of each other, in circles, in rows, in pyramids and in any possible ways. Its great to find an imprompto monument like this. Specially when it was built by kids.
June 1, 2010 at 12:57 AM
Leilani Tresise said…
Hi Cloudia! Aloha!

yes Chrissy , i have heard that too.


I think and im not sure the stacking comes from the Heiaus..places of worship that ancient hawaiians built.

Don brings up a good point.. there is much division about all types of things within the Hawaiian culture. They even disagree on the language!

I was impressed that kids had built it..

I was taught by fishermen ... its used as a sign of respect, honor , love.

I think as in any culture we take what we like and use it.. =0D
June 3, 2010 at 10:57 PM
A human kind of human said…
What a wonderful practice.
June 13, 2010 at 11:33 AM
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