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The Story of Lata is Being Told Again!

22 February, 1997 Mimi George, Ph.D.Principal Investigator, Vaka Taumako Project On 2 January the people of Taumako felled a 75 meter tamanu log and began to carve it into a 13 meter voyaging canoe. The entire community worked on that felled log for five more days. On the sixth workday the rough cut canoe was dragged down to the reef and moored. Each day when the workers were ready to go home to their village to rest, they placed some of the wood chips on the manu (the bird image at the bow of the canoe). This was done to remind the Goddess Sina not to put the tree back together again that night. When Lata had built the very first voyaging canoe (vaka or te puke), permission had not been granted ahead of time by the owner of the land, who was Sina. So night after night Sina kept reconstructing the tree from all it's chips until Lata realized he must ask her permission. The present day builders of the Vaka Taumakoplaced the chips on the manu as a sign that they had learned from Lata how to correctly go about building a te puke. During February through August this year the people of Taumako will make all the other parts of the Vaka Taumako lash them together with sennit cordage. Women are making the rope and men are carving the pieces. Every piece has a name and the lashings for each must be perfect so that the whole canoe is seaworthy. The lauhala mat panels will be woven and sewn together to form a crab claw sail. The sail weaving, plan, and design is the special art of a few old women. During the first two weeks the tools of over 160 people "ate" the wood of the tree with their axes and adzes. Those who were not chopping and adzing were doing the equally important work of eating the feast foods that were abundant at the work site and down in the village as well. It was critical, Taumakoans said, for the people to eat well so that the adzes and axes would eat well. Everything and everybody ate so well that on the fifth workday the main hull was entirely rough cut. A hole was made in one of the manu(front ends) and a bark rope attached. On the sixth workday the canoe was dragged down to the reef where work will continue until September, 1997, when supporters of the Vaka Taumako Project are invited to come celebrate the launching. One of the Vaka Taumako Project team members from Hawaii, Meph Wyeth, took the two video cameras (her own and the loaner from National Geographic Society) and trained five Taumakoans to use them. Meph returned to Kaua’i with 10 hours of footage documenting the activities of mid-December through mid-January. This very good archival footage is being rough edited now, and the Taumakoan videographers continue to shoot aided by Meph’s solar battery recharger. Because of the generous donation of over $25,000. Solomon Bank Dollars by dozens of people from Hawaii, Alaska, the mainland USA, New Zealand, and Australia, the Vaka Taumako is now being built. But, for the Vaka Taumako Project to succeed in meeting all it's aims, your support is needed now. The video documentation of the process of building and sailing the voyaging canoe cannot be done without more funds. Since the Vaka Taumako Projectbegan in June, 1996, much has been accomplished toward the building and sailing of a traditional Polynesian voyaging canoe. Several hundred meters of sennit cordage has been made. The lauhala for the crab claw sails has been tended. The stories and songs have been practised. The gardens were planted and the tools have been sharpened so that the community could get to work actually building the Vaka Taumako. Your Help Is Needed Now! Who will learn from the Vaka Taumako Project besides the young people right there on Taumako if this work is not recorded? The Taumako people want to share their knowledge with others. It is their firm desire that the Vaka Taumako Project be a primarily educational project. The elders of this community are apparently the last generation of Polynesians to have actually voyaged in a completely traditional manner with no lapses between generations until today - the only Polynesians who are now able to build a completely authentic voyaging canoe from all natural materials that are still available on their island, and then to sail it with completely traditional Polynesian non-instrument navigation methods. They want others to appreciate what they know from experience about traditional Polynesian voyaging. They want to teach others the traditional values and navigational techniques and traditional vaka-building skills that they are perhaps the last guardians of. That is why they have asked for our help. The archival and educational aims of the project cannot be met unless we can raise another $25,000. Solomon Bank Dollars now. In order to finish the job that has been started we must make an archival record of the process of building and learning to sail this traditional Polynesian voyaging canoe. From this archival record we can make an educational video. But to do this requires more video equipment and use of a professional studio for editing. Please contribute generously to these costs now. Your tax-deductible donation (in the USA) will be used to pay for equipment and logistical expenses. Make out your check to the Vaka Taumako Project and mail it to P.O.Box 2224, Lihue, HI 96766. You will be receipted from our 501c3, non-profit corporation, the Pacific Traditions Society. You will also receive an invitation to the launching, a full report on the project results, and copies of the final archival/educational videotape will be made available to you at production cost. Donors of over $5,000. may receive a model voyaging canoe of museum quality. Donors of $100. or more may receive sennit cordage bracelet or another authentic  craft item from Taumako . The final reports and archival and educational video production tapes will be completed by January 30, 1998.