It’s pretty simple. Take care of farmers, grow food, feed people. —Uncle Bobby Pahia
I.
Uncle Bobby drives me in his big truck down rows upon dusty rows at his farm, 300 acres where people from all cultures grow food and medicine. His goal is to feed people, but also to bring folks together, and support local farmers. You can see his drive, care, and aloha in every interaction, whether he’s talking to his farmers, talking about kalo, or taking care of his mango trees. Increasingly, these things feel like a radical act in a Hawai‘i where many of us struggle to survive.
Uncle Bobby and his wife have their home upcountry but prefer to stay down at the farm, and have built themselves a temporary but comfortable hale where they are surrounded by mango trees and look up to Haleakalā in the distance. Uncle reminds me of what coming to the middle feels like. “I believe in the democratic system,” he says. “But we have to participate.” These days growing food to feed people isn’t easy. Uncle is a distributor, driving out to Keanae to buy poi and then taking it all the way to Lahaina. On his 300 acres he mentors farmers from all over, and grows many varieties of kalo. What would it take to orient our society around a paradigm of taking care of farmers, growing food, and ending hunger for our people?
II.
I follow some aunties I don’t know up to a secure gate and wait to be let in. It’s clear they know the deal, and I don’t. Feeling shy, I follow them and try to figure out how this works. Suddenly, I see someone I know. Stacey!!! She has on a sunhat and glasses and is pulling weeds with her grandson. Up top at the house I see other aunties busy working and assembling. I’ve come to a farm up in Kula that has community work days.
I first met one of the owners, Marata, through Stacey, who helped to organize a Maui cohort of Building the Beloved Community during the pandemic. However, Marata wasn’t able to join the cohort. I met her for the first time in person recently at a conference on O‘ahu, and she invited me to her farm. Of course Stacey was there! It was so cool to see the vision of Marata and Minoaka on 6 acres of land that Minoaka’s family has held for 40 years.
There, up on the side of Haleakalā across from Uncle Bobbyʻs farm, we helped to put down weed mat in and around a gorgeous new greenhouse. Then Marata took us on a ride and showed us their bees, trees, and ice cream beans, then had us eating handfuls of jaboticaba in the back of the 4×4. After, we had a treasure hunt to pull the darkest purple sweet potatoes you’ve ever seen from the ground, and all had lunch together made by the aunties. It reminded me of my time working Kalihi Valley, helping to do community work days and feed people.
After lunch, we were led down under the house to see Marata’s magnificent and humble carving shop where she makes the most amazing carved art and objects out of bone and stone, giving them ea through the expression of her ‘ike kūpuna. Gorgeous. At the other end underneath the hale was a small but mighty commercial kitchen where one aunty makes delicious herb and spice mixes, and they all make and store their jams and jellies for sale. Delicious. Jaboticaba jam, coffee jelly, pineapple li hing, liliko‘i, fig, waiwī, guava, and so much more. Such jams! It was really a joy to experience the community they’ve build there.
An uncle came to pick up proteas for his floral shop in Lahaina and brought food. Marata took us up to a high point where we could see the whole property and she told us of the pā they are building to be used by community. Such an exciting and beautiful vision. Such community, such thick connections and aloha.
III.
Nicki unfolds a map of whale migration on which she’s drawn lines crisscrossing the globe to show how the Spanish galleon trade brought medicinal plants all over the globe. “We have guayaba, guava, and kakao in the Philippines because of the Spanish,” she shares. After the end of the workshop, participants crowd the table to make their own tea blend. Jasmine flowers (sampaguita, pīkake), rose petals, gotu kola (pohe kula), lemongrass, pandan, and more, all dried and laid out so we can make our own blends. Nicki shares recipes for some of her popular blends and shares their medicinal functions.
“No one is doing this, no one is connecting Hawaiian and Filipino medicine,” one aunty tells me. Another aunty who came with her daughter reminisces of small kid time and shares her knowledge of different medicinal plants. Afterwards, Noelani talks to Nicki about coming to volunteer at the Maui Medic Healers Hui free clinic in Lahaina, that serves wildfire survivors. Nicki has been my co-worker for 10 years, and I knew she was studying more of her ancestral ways and medicine. However, it was my first time seeing her do a workshop in the community, and I felt so proud. It was packed, and the audience stuck around for a long time to talk story. Many of the folks were from the Lahaina community, and drove all the way to botanical garden for the workshop.
IV.
These are just a few of vignettes that I experienced on my trip to Maui last week. In addition, I met and reconnected with my friend Nick, who rolled up to the coffee shop with a car full of native plants from Uncle Bobby to plant on his land. Nick is remarkable for his community groundedness and innovative mind. He’s such an enthusiastic problem solver with deep expertise and authenticity. In a crisis he knows how to galvanize, organize, get to work, and act, which has been and will continue to be a gift to the Maui community.
I also saw my friend Gretchen who runs the first composting organization on Maui, and is deeply involved in the community. I sat in my friend Kinaʻs “bread shed” and gabbed about the vagaries of non-profit finance beneath a wide an arching rainbow. Meeting and talking to these folks and more, swimming in their rivers, hearing their struggles and also their successes was a great big dose of Maui, the currents and undercurrents of this beautiful and complex place, where folks give the best of themselves for community but also at times struggle to maintain their quality of life, housing, and hope amidst the economic crisis and how quickly things are always changing.
Many folks told me that these are the biggest things affecting local families—the economy, the cost of living, housing, food. It reminds me of what Uncle Bobby shared, that we need to get involved, get together, and take action if we want things to change. This week, many folks testified at the Maui County Council hearing regarding the proposed termination short term vacation rentals. The truth is that they are contributing to the massive housing shortage and the high price of the housing that’s left.
And I ponder, who has rights in a place? Is everything just a free-for-all? Can anyone come into an ecosystem and invest, and receive benefits from their investment unfettered, meanwhile this adversely affects folks who have been part of that ecosystem for generations? Increasingly, Maui and other places are saying NO. And what are those poor people missing, those investors, missing the chance for such genuine and authentic life and exchange? Not by extraction through profit from tourists passing, but through the work, exchange, struggle and mutuality it takes to truly build beloved community against all odds?
We are on the brink of war in ways big and small, and so I wonder for each of us what it is we are willing to stand for. What capacity can we give ourselves and prepare for, how must we reorganize to realize the vision of communities that take care of our farmers, grow our own food, and feed our people? What steps will we take today to realize our common humanity?
Mahalo,
Dawn
Photo taken 6/22/25 at Uncle Bobbyʻs Farm, or actually, in the back of my car of the bambucha-est mangoes and eggplant you ever did see.