 |
 |
 |
|||||
|
Calendar:
“Our lunar month is organized into 30 lunar nights,” Hi‘ilei explains. “The day is determined by when the moon rises and when the moon sets, which could be by day, it could be by night. If it rises as Kūkahi, then Kūlua doesn’t start until Kūlua rises. So it’s not solar, it’s lunar, unlike the Gregorian calendar, which is about the sun. We use the sun for other things. Within a lunar month we have 30 nights. Those 30 moons tell us humans how we should be interacting with our environment. Basically it tells us what we should be doing and when we should be doing it—how we should be conducting ourselves. “Our 30 days, 30 nights are broken into three anahulu [the Hawaiian "week"]. An anahulu equates to 10 days. So the first anahulu is waxing. We call that anahulu ho‘onui [to get larger]. Our next anahulu is poepoe. Poepoe means round, so it’s when the moon is getting round. The last anahulu is anahulu hō‘emi which means that our moon is starting to diminish or waning.
“The lunar month starts with Hilo, Hoaka and then there’s four Kū moons, Kūkahi, Kūlua, Kūkolu, Kūpau. Kū moons are good for fishing, they’re also good for planting certain plants—Kū plants. A coconut is a Kū plant, for example, so that’s when you would plant your coconut trees. And then after Kū you have four ‘Ole moons. ‘Ole moons are good for nothing. I shouldn’t say they’re good for nothing. They’re called ‘Ole ["not"] because they’re not moons that are good for big projects. You wouldn’t want to have a meeting on an ‘Ole moon because it’s going to be really difficult. You’re going to be frustrated. You wouldn’t want to embark on building a structure on an ‘Ole moon because maybe you might get cut, maybe smash your finger, maybe you’re just going to get super frustrated and nothing’s going to happen. “You know you have days like that, so it’s kind of fun to look at that and see kind of how your behavior, how you feel in your personal self on the different moons. And it all has to with water—the moon’s gravitational pull, because it affects tides, it’s also pulling water through our bodies. It’s pulling water through all these plants that are around us. So that’s why certain moons are good for planting certain things. Other moons are good for planting other types of things: root crops versus lettuce, things like that. “‘Ole moons are good for maintenance. You sit down and you patch your net that has a hole in it. You go weed your garden. Things that don’t require too much, they’re just sort go through the motions. That’s all you got to do is go through the motions. Push a vacuum cleaner in your house, dust, things like that. ‘Ole moons are good for that.
“Then we have our full moons. These come after the ‘Ole moons. Full moons are typically good for planting, good for procreation. They’re very productive, like our Hua moon. Hua a means fruit, fruitful. So these are good days to have meetings if you want to have a good outcome, want to feel accomplished. A good day to plant fruit plants. It just has good connotation. Huna, Mōhalu, Hua, Akua, Hoku, Mahealani, those are all full moons. They’re all considered to be within the anahulu poepoe. Hua, Akua, Hoku, Mahealani are the four full moons. The fullest full moon is Hoku. "There’s ceremony throughout the month depending on what ceremony is right. It’s a prescription, so oftentimes certain practices, certain ceremonies will tell you what moon when you’re supposed to start your ceremony, what moon when you supposed to be done with your ceremony. “After the full moon is Kulu. Kulu means ‘to drip,’ so the moon’s starting to wane after Kulu. I like kulu moons for fishing. I have my own little observations that I make, like what moons are good for what type of fishing. Then you have your Lā‘au moons. Lā‘au, there’s three. At the front end of the month, everything is in four. So you have four Kū moons, four ‘Ole moons. After the full moons, everything’s in threes, just to be just to be super confusing. There’s three Lā‘au moons, three ‘Ole moons and three Kāloa moons. Lā‘au moons are good for fishing with lā‘au, so pole fishing. Lā‘au moons are also good for harvesting medicine, planting medicine, vegetative type of crops, lettuces, cabbages, because lā‘au means ‘leafy thing.’
“Then we have our ‘Ole. You have the three ‘ole. Now ‘Ole is, again, good for maintenance, not so good for big projects. Go and cut mangrove on an ‘Ole moon day is the worst ever. Pulling the chain saw, can’t get the chainsaw started, and then you look at the moon (after the fact) and you’re like, see? If we had just planned our week accordingly, we could have avoided this. Go clean the yard instead of cutting mangrove on that particular day. “Then we have Kāloa moons. Kāloa is short for Kanaloa, god of our deep Blue Ocean. And so on Kāloa moons, like clockwork, box jellyfish come in on Kāloa moons. Jellyfish is kinolau of Kanaloa. Kāloa is good for planting stretchy things, things that are viney: kabocha pumpkin, string beans, sweet potato. Things that are viney and crawl are planted during Kāloa moons. Kāloa is a god associated with like deep thinking, ancestral memory, dreams and so on Kāloa moons I have really intense dreams. It’s personal, you have to keep track of your own 30-day calendar and see how things pan out for you. “Kāne, Lono, Mauli, Muku, those are our last four moons during the waning period. Kāne are often referred to as pōkāne. Pō kāne is typically the night where night marchers would walk. So there are a lot of stories and a lot of families that talk about how you stay at home on this particular pō kāne, just best advice to stay home. I’m not be out gallivanting, partying up, you know be conscious of that. Lono, that’s a good moon to plant things. I always talk about like... ah shoot, if you miss your planting during the other moons, the catch-all is Lono, plant it on Lono. “Mauli talks about our own personal spirit, and so that’s a good moon to take care of yourself. Pamper yourself, to get a massage, just stay at home, relax, get a pedicure, kind of take care of yourself. “And Muku is the dark moon. Our family will go torch fishing on dark moons, just in general. And gathering certain kinds of shellfish and marine snails during Muku, when moon is in dark. If the moon’s out, the moon makes fish skittish.”
|
|
|||||
|
|||||
