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Nainoa Thompson: Wayfinder for his people
By Diane Ako
The first day of winter arrives to find Nainoa Thompson at the helm of his boat, plodding through mildly choppy waters of Maunalua Bay in Hawaii Kai. The day is clear and sunny, but in the distance, towering cirrus clouds warn of an approaching storm.
“See that grey patch?” Nainoa points out. “The winds will blow the rain squall this way in about an hour.” He smiles. This is his favorite time of year: not any particular season itself, but rather, the changing of seasons.
Fifty-two year old Nainoa is a handsome mix of almost-half Hawaiian, the other half a blend of Chinese, English, French, and Tahitian. He is best known for his work as a navigator: first, literally, as a member of the Polynesian Voyaging Society that took the legendary Hokule'a canoe from Hawaii to Tahiti and back using only the stars for a map, the first modern Hawaiian to do that in centuries; then second, figuratively, as a trustee guiding a Kamehameha Schools in crisis.
But we are not here to talk about any of that today. If you want to know about that, there are some 11,800 Google hits about it.
This is a look at early influences on Nainoa: who made him the man he is today, and how does he plan to perpetuate the honored role as a teacher? It starts with his father, the late Myron “Pinky” Thompson.
“My dad was my greatest teacher,” he starts. “He was everything to me- my best friend, my wisdom, my strength, my clarity. I have powerful memories of him. He was the best dad in the world.” Emotion quietly chokes his voice. He takes a twenty second pause to catch his composure, before weaving a long, compelling story about his father's life.
It is not easy for him to open up to new people. Nainoa shares with me what I want to know, but still, I am a stranger. His body language speaks an interesting duality. It's clear he is setting up borders between us. Sometimes hunched, sometimes shifted away, and sometimes at the other end of the boat. Nainoa admits he's introverted and intensely private, allowing the spotlight insomuch as it affords him a means to his goals.
Nainoa tells me his father, as a child, learned to value community service. Myron grew up sharing a modest household with a steady stream of countless Hawaiian orphans. During World War Two, he suffered a major eye injury on the beach at Normandy on D-Day, and spent two years recovering in a New York hospital with bandages around his eyes.
During his blindness, he learned about the power of vision. When he recovered, he worked to make his vision of social equality come true, using politics and the power of education to better peoples' lives.
These are the formative lessons he passed along to his son. “I became him, and he became me,” reflects Nainoa.
One of Nainoa's strongest memories of his father is when PVS was at a crossroads. On March 16, 1978, the Hokule'a attempted to make its second voyage to Tahiti, but it was swamped 6 hours after takeoff in gale force winds in the Molokai Channel. World renowned big wave rider Eddie Aikau paddled away on his surfboard in an attempt to rescue the crew and save Hokule'a, never to be seen again. A passing Hawaiian Airlines plane happened to see the overturned canoe and rescued them.
“This was and still is one of the hardest times of my life,” states Nainoa, with characteristic intensity in his deep, soulful eyes. “Eddie comes from a proud Hawaiian family, a beloved son of Hawaii and a Hero to all. He deeply loved Hokule'a and clearly understood the importance of the pride the canoe symbolized for all of us in Hawaii. The voyaging family understood the need to sail Hokule'a to Tahiti to honor the vision and the purpose of Eddie Aikau. But at that very difficult time, among us there was no one who knew how, and no one who could take the lead. On top of all this, I had lost a friend, and the guilt was crushing. I ran away.”
For ten days, Nainoa sought refuge in the ocean by day, and under the stars by night. He wanted to be alone to mourn. “Finally, on the eleventh day, my dad stepped in. He knew better than to approach me head on. He came up from behind, put his hand on my shoulder and said, ‘If you really want to do this, Mom and I will be with you when you let go of the lines (that tether the canoe to the dock), and we will be with you when you arrive.”
Myron Thompson recognized the group needed direction, so he told his son to arrange PVS leaders in one room the following day- a task akin to herding cats because “we were not talking. We were broken with shame and guilt.”
Still, Nainoa did what he was told. Myron walked in. “In 15 minutes, he navigated a course of hope and strength for us. He told us to develop a vision and harness it, know where we are going, know the path to get there, and above all, be clear about who we're serving along the way.”
Myron saved PVS that day. He also taught them to create a vision that the community can understand, because without that support, the fledgling operation would fail. Myron insisted the men write a plan and train hard to follow it, because “95 percent of success is in the preparation.” He advised the men to reevaluate their dream at the end of this training period to confirm that it was worth following.
“Then, he looked at me and said, ‘If it is, have the courage to let go.' I knew he meant that about me as well, because I might not come back,” remembers Nainoa, who went on to sail the Hokule'a into international fame since that conversation.
As of 2004, the Hokule'a has crossed 100,000 miles around the Pacific Ocean, equivalent to sailing the world four times. “Crisis is extraordinary for growth if dealt with the right way. It's a chance to realign yourself,” declares Nainoa.
Today, Nainoa tackles a different realignment- that of Kamehameha Schools. The school has been under siege lately, defending itself against a barrage of legal threats to its admissions policy which gives preference to Native Hawaiians. It's been in a state of healing for nearly a decade, a tumultuous time that began in 1997 when its previous slate of trustees was investigated for mismanagement, then publicly ousted by the courts. During his time of leadership, he's weathered one crisis after another at Kapalama Heights.
His attention is bifurcated. He still commands the helm at PVS, and reveals that the Hokule'a is undergoing a less urgent, but equally important, evolution. The voyaging canoe has met and exceeded its original goals. Now what? This summer, the PVS leadership got together to chart out a new vision for itself, one which looks at what's next and why.
“To maintain symbolism, we decided we must sail long, and sail every four years. When it's at home, we can use the canoe as a school,” he explains. To that end, PVS launched in June a new educational project called “Na Pua O Maunalua,” which has students cleaning Maunalua Bay and learning about it at the same time.
Over the summer, 72 students from Kaiser High School, 20 from Niu Valley Intermediate, and nine from the after-school program Hui Malama in Waimanalo participated in the inaugural program.
“It's so important to mentor children,” asserts Nainoa. “I want the youth to know that if they believe and work hard at something, they can achieve their goals. I want them to develop a personal relationship with nature, and learn to care about and for it.”
The 24-hour event brings students out on the Hokule'a to do a reef check, which includes counting fish and measuring the health of the coral. Then, the kids remove alien limu and replant native seaweed species. At sunset, they sail further out to take in the view of the island, learning about the boundaries of the ancient ahupua'a. At night, they learn about the stars, go diving, and sleep aboard the canoe.
“These are awesome kids,” smiles Nainoa. “They get to learn math and science principles in a fun environment, and we get to develop a scientific baseline for the marine life in this bay. The only baseline that exists is anecdotally. My memory of this bay as a child was a thriving place. It's upsetting that it's changed so much since then.”
For a man who loves children, he has none. Recently married to third wife Kathy Muneno (of KITV fame), he says the idea of parenthood is appealing, but he would want to bring a child into a healthier world.
We have arrived at a good diving spot, and I'm to see for myself what kind of shape the bay is in. Nainoa stops the boat and throws anchor. The seas are churning, and the small skiff is tipsy in the current. I struggle to get my dive gear together.
He helps me lift my BC onto my back so I can roll into the water. I am lumbering and awkward, but he is poetry in motion- a person clearly at home in the sea. Incidentally, I am surprised to learn his love of the ocean comes from family friend Yoshio Kawano. His mother fears the water, and his father was simply “not an ocean person.”
He hooks his air tank over the side and jumps overboard. In a flash he's rigged up. Down we go.
There is nothing to see at 40 feet. The ocean bottom is barren, save the occasional coral head with its satellite of fish around it. We poke at a few green worm tube things. Then Thompson sees the anchor dragging slowly across the floor in the strong current.
He tries to remedy that by driving the metal deep into the sand. The steel easily unearths itself and scrapes across more rocks, as it heads straight for a living coral head. He tries several more times and fails. Finally, he wedges the anchor under a piece of dead reef, taking the risk of breaking it off in an attempt to save it from destroying one of the few living coral heads left.
Fifteen minutes later, we're back on board. He returns us to the coast. Warm winds tousle his salt-and-pepper hair. I ask him how the visit makes him feel. “Sad,” he answers. “The bay is dying.”
His life's work is to show people how special Hawaii is, and encourage them to care for the land and nourish the culture. “My greatest honor is not as a navigator, but as a teacher,” affirms Nainoa, who once again is navigating a path using faith and vision as a guide.
To learn more about Nainoa's work with Hokule'a, go to http://www.pvs-hawaii.com/.