Wiped Out - No More Native Hawaiians on the World Championship Tour of Surfing E-mail

No More Hawaiians on the World Championship Tour of Surfing


By Daniel Ikaika Ito

wct1.jpgIf there weren’t any Americans playing in Major League Baseball next season, the Entertainment Sports Programming Network (ESPN) would probably cover the incident as a national crisis. Stuart Scott would be on Sports Center citing the tragedy, asking how it’s possible that the inventors of America’s favorite past time are not competing at the highest level of the sport.

Die-hard baseball fans would rant and rave about how the game would be changed forever. Luckily, for Americans and baseball, that scenario is only fiction. But, for Native Hawaiians and professional surfing, it’s a reality.

This is the first time in modern surfing history that a Native Hawaiian isn’t competing for the ASP World Championship of Surfing. Translation in pidgin: “No mo Hawaiians on da ‘CT, bule.” It’s important to note that a Native Hawaiian is a descendant from the indigenous Polynesians who inhabited the Hawaiian Islands before Western contact.

That’s not saying that the World Championship Tour is void of aloha. On the contrary, the aloha spirit is still alive and well on the WCT with ambassadors Pancho Sullivan, Fred Patacchia, Jr., Roy Powers and the Irons bruddahs. This isn’t an issue of aloha. It’s about kanaka maoli (Native Hawaiians) not being represented at the highest level of competitive surfing. For many Native Hawaiians, surfing isn’t just recreation or a life style, it’s a cultural practice. A way for Hawai‘i’s aboriginal descendants to tap into the lines of their na- kupuna (ancestors). The missing indigenous Hawaiians on the WCT has great cultural implications for the Native Hawaiian community.

wct2.jpgWhen 29-year-old Maikalani Kaiolohia Robb (a.k.a. Kalani Robb) and 36-year-old Vincent Sennen Garcia (a.k.a. Sunny Garcia) retired from the World Championship Tour last year, they became the last Native Hawaiians to compete on the coveted World Championship Tour. Aside from 2000 WCT World Champion Sunny G, the only other Native Hawaiian to win an ASP Championship title was 1993 World Champ Derek Ho, the first kanaka maoli to win an ASP World Championship. The absence of Hawai‘i’s indigenous people in pro surfing only concerns professional shortboarders. Native Longboard World Champs Rusty Keaulana, Bonga Perkins and Dino Miranda have brought the longboard world title back to the Islands a combined five times. Mahalo bruddahs. So, why are kanaka maoli extinct on the “Dream Tour?” Like most things in life, the absence of Native Hawaiians on the WCT boils down to a lack of money and opportunity.

According to the US census bureau, Native Hawaiians lead the 50th state in poverty and prison populations. In fact, most of the homeless people camping out on the beaches on the Leeward side of O‘ahu are Native Hawaiians. As a result, the kama‘aina (children of the land) growing up in the tents on the beach spend a lot of time in the water and develop surfing skills quickly. Unfortunately, those Native Hawaiian youths will, most likely, never be able to take their ocean prowess to the amateur surf contest scene due to a lack of funds. “Surfing is an expensive sport to pick up,” says Kamehameha Schools graduate and WQS warrior Jason Shibata. According to Shibata, who competed in the NSSA and HASA as a young boy, many Hawaiian parents don’t have $300 dollars laying around to buy their keiki a surfboard. Let alone extra cash to drive their grom to different beaches to hone their skills. Grom parents also need to invest a thousand-something a year in surf contest entry and membership fees. Then there’s a thousand more dollars needed for travel funds to the neighbor islands and California to compete in the NSSA. And this is all so the keiki can surf in front of industry heads to get a sponsorship. Do the math. Basically, to get a child sponsored, parents need to shell out roughly $3,000 a year. And if you’re a poor kanaka living on the beach at Ma‘ili, an extra $3,000 for surfing is harder to find than cheap rent on the North Shore. In pidgin, a mom might tell her boy, “If no mo money, no can, honey.”

Although Native Hawaiians live in a “free country” that doesn’t inhibit one’s aspirations for greatness, the lack of opportunities in competitive surfing is directly related to having the funding for those aspirations. “In order for certain opportunities to be there, you need to have economic and social independence,” says President and Headmaster of the Kamehameha Schools Dr. Michael Chun. “And, you look at the Hawaiians, you see in every social and economic indicator, Hawaiians win all the negative ones and lose all the positive ones.”

wct3.jpgAside from the socio-economic causes, another potential reason that there aren’t more Native Hawaiians on the ‘CT is the paradox of paradise. Hawai‘i’s epic waves, sub-tropical climate, beautiful people and the Vans Triple Crown of Surfing make it hard for anyone to leave the Islands, especially surfers. Why go on the grueling World Qualifying Series, spend choke money and surf ankle-biter, mush burgers in a foreign land, when you can post up at home, be comfortable and surf world-class waves?

“I reckon it is harder for Hawaiian kids to go on the road because the vast majority of places they travel to do not remotely compare to home. These other venues just don’t measure up,” says 1978 World Champion of Surfing and ASP President Wayne “Rabbit” Bartholomew. “This makes it bloody hard. They get homesick and may be distracted.”

Six-time Triple Crown Champion Sunny Garcia is living proof that Hawaiians can overcome homesickness and rise to the top of pro surfing. According to the 2000 World Champ, all it takes is a warrior’s determination. “Hawai‘i puts out the best surfers bar none, but if you want that glory then you got to fight for it,” says Uncle Sunny. “Because if you sit in Hawai‘i and wait for something to fall in your lap, the only thing that’s gonna fall is rain.” Although Garcia and the local surf community encourage up-and-coming Hawaiian surfers to pursue professional careers, the Hawaiian community’s support of competitive surfing is as scarce as O‘o birds (Hawaiian honey suckers).

Neighborhoods rally around the hometown hero regularly in Hawai‘i, just look at the Little League teams from Hilo and ‘Ewa Beach the past two years. But the Native Hawaiian community is not nearly as supportive of pro surfing. Native Hawaiian organizations like the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and the Kamehameha Schools have not taken an interest or active role in professional surfing. This lack of support has had an impact on Hawaiian surfers because those organizations, which were established to help Natives, don’t recognize surfing as a lucrative career. These organizations provide scholarships for Hawaiians to pursue their academic and sports careers in college, but have never helped a Hawaiian ripper get to NSSA Nationals or any other surf contest. This is ironic when you consider that surfing is the most prominent contribution by ancient Hawaiians to the world. Hawai‘i is the modern birthplace of surfing.

For many Native Hawaiians, surfing isn’t just a recreation or a lifestyle; it’s a cultural practice, like fishing and hula. It’s a way to tap into the lines of wave riding ancestors. For Native Hawaiians to not be represented on the WCT is as degrading for the ancient Hawaiians as drilling a hole into the Ko‘olau Mountains for an “interstate freeway” (it’s impossible to drive between states in Hawai‘i.)

The entire blame does not lie within Native Hawaiian organizations’ ignorance in the sport of surfing. “I don’t’ think surfing is viewed as a sport by [Native Hawaiian organizations], it’s more viewed as a lifestyle or hobby,” says Shibata. “I think if those organizations were more educated about surfing history, it would totally change their outlook and there would be a lot more opportunity for Native Hawaiian surfers.”

As of press time, the Kamehameha Schools is currently reviewing a proposal to start a surf team this school year, with Shibata and Dr. Chun giving the thumbs up. This year, Native Hawaiian grom-phenom Ezekiel Lau is attending Kamehameha’s Kapalama campus in the seventh grade and is amping at the possible opportunity to compete in the interscholastic NSSA division.

The freshest crop of homegrown Hawaiian teens like 2006 NSSA Open Men’s champ Kekoa Cazimero and Hizson Lin-Kee are representing for the natives in the amateur ranks, and developing their wave riding skills for the arduous ‘QS.

Currently, 2005 World Junior Champ Kekoa Bacalso, Makua Rothman, Jason Shibata, TJ Barron and Mason Ho are the only Native Hawaiians surfing on the WQS who are actively pursuing qualification to the elite WCT. Not only are kanaka maoli the minority in their homeland of Hawai‘i, but they’re also the minority in their sport of surfing. The most feasible solution to this problem is to increase the amount of education and exposure of pro surfing to the Hawaiian community and organizations. “The more education you promote in this sport will only give it more legitimacy later,” states Shibata. Hopefully, this will instill pride and support within non-surfing Hawaiians, as well as create more funding and opportunity for Native Hawaiian surfers. In ancient Hawai‘i, when a problem arose, the people would solve the predicament as an ‘ohana (family). Now, it’s time for the surf and Hawaiian ‘ohana to come together and solve this calamity.

As the surf industry reconvenes on the North Shore of O‘ahu for the winter season and the Vans Triple Crown of Surfing, it’s doubtful that there will be any protests or mainstream media coverage of the missing natives on the WCT. Just because there is no public outcry doesn’t mean the issue isn’t important. Surf culture is a direct descendant of Hawaiian culture. Localism, environmentalism and ocean prowess are shared values of surf and ancient Hawaiian communities. To remedy kanaka maoli missing from the WCT is a crisis for all of us to resolve for the good of our entire wave riding culture. [PAU]
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