Aloha, my name is Ku’ulei, and we’re standing
in the salt patch in Hanapepe.
I personally have been making salt for about
30 years, my father has been making salt since
he was a baby.
During the summer is when the season starts.
Each family has their own section, there are
26 original families, each family has it’s
own well.
Water travels underground into the well.
We take the water from the well and transfer
it into a waiku.
A waiku is a holding bed.
This where the water heats before we move
it into the bed.
The bed is called the pune.
It starts the crystallization process.
The water forms different crystals and they
look like flakes.
The flakes start to get heavy and they form
different layers.
You have your bottom layer, your reddish layer.
We give that away to fisherman or people who
do blessings.
Then you have your middle layer, used for
barbecues and cooking, and the top layer is
the whitest layer, that’s what you use for
table salt.
Back in the old days Hawaiians believed that
when you fish or hunt, you only gather what
you can use.
There is no waste.
There was a lady named Kia, she was hanging
at the beach here a Pulolo point.
She caught way too much fish and she tried
to give it away to everyone on the beach.
She felt extremely bad.
She started to cry, started to weep.
This woman appeared from the bushes and said
please don’t cry, follow me.
She took her to this area and dug her a hole,
she said, here put your fish into this hole.
She did that, the fish dried, the fish was
able to be preserved.
So that’s how Hawaiian salt was created.
Salt is called paakai.
Paakai means to solidify the sea.
The reason this paakai is so unique is that
little brine shrimp live in the well, and
those brine shrimp help clean the well and
help keep the algae out of the well, but it
also gives the salt a sweeter taste.
If you taste this salt and compare it with
salt you get in the store, it’s a lot sweeter.
This is truly unique because I get to stand
in the exact same place my grandmother stood
and do the exact same thing, I get to teach
my kids that.
My kids are learning that you can work hard
for something that you love, your culture
and your history and you can create a product
and hand it to someone because you love them
and respect them.
It’s a unique gift that you get to give.
If you’re here during the summer months,
and you see me working in the salt patch,
come on in, I’ll gladly give you a tour,
my name is Ku’ulei like the drink Kool Aid,
without the d at the end.
The more we talk about it, the more we educate
people, the more we protect it, the more people
want to preserve it, the more people do their
part to make sure that this area stays the
way it was meant to be.
