Paul's write-up for my blog

Aloha, - I thought many of you might be interested in hearing a bit of Paul's experience especially since it's so rich in Hawaiian culture via his job here. Enjoy below per Paul!





State motto on this gate at Iolani Palace.



Original Kamehameha Schools Building



Feather cape and helmet from late 1700s



Kawaiaha'o Church



Princess Pauahi Chapel on Kapalama Campus



Cultural center on Kapalama Campus



Ke Ali'i Pauahi

When I first started to look for a job in Hawaii, I was pretty much willing to accept any reasonable position with any company who would give me the opportunity to move to Hawaii.  I worked with a recruitment specialist and she gave me a list of places I would most likely have the best luck. 

As it turned out, I ended up getting exactly the type of position I wanted with an organization called Kamehameha Schools (KS).  This was exciting because I was looking for someone to give me the opportunity to start working as a database administrator (DBA).  In the last few years, I have studied on my own time to get certified as a DBA but was working as a data warehouse architect for IHA and really wanted to make the leap over to being a DBA.  Needless to say, I was very pleased when KS not only was willing to hire a Canadian but also as a DBA.

Ill briefly explain the history of KS.  The first king that unified and controlled all the Hawaiian Islands was Kamehameha I in 1810.  I’ll spare you all the details of the events that took place after that but Kamehameha’s great granddaughter, Bernice Pauahi Bishop ended up being the last surviving heir of Kamehameha I. 

Ke Ali’I (Princess) Pauahi and her husband did not have any children.  As the last heir of the Kamehameha dynasty, she had inherited all of the royal lands.  When she didn’t have anyone to pass it on to she put in her will that she wanted to bequeath her vast land holdings to a perpetuity trust in order to  :erect and maintain in the Hawaiian Islands two schools, each for boarding and day scholars, one for boys and one for girls, to be known as, and called the Kamehameha Schools.

Princess Pauahi has witnessed the decimation of her people by disease and poverty.  She felt that the only chance the Hawaiian people had to survive as a once proud race was by education.

The Bishop trust is the single largest private land owner in the Islands today and is also the nation’s largest endowment fund of nearly 10 billion dollars.  That is larger than the endowment funds of Harvard and Yale combined.

KS has 3 main campuses (Oahu, Maui, Big Island) and several preschools and extension programs all throughout the state.  I work at the head office in downtown Honolulu.  I work for a department called Operations as part of the Information Technology Division.

I won’t bore you with the details of my day to day but Ill highlight some of the perks of the job that I consider most valuable to me.

As a mission based organization that has vast resources, you don’t hear any talk around the office of things like ‘quarterly sales figures’ or ‘stock prices’.  We don’t feel the pressure of how well the most recent software release is selling or things like ‘market saturation’ or blah blah blah.  At the core of this company is just a lot of really valuable land in a great climate where people love to visit and live.  The absence of this traditional type of business pressure enables people here to focus on the mission of helping the Hawaiian children to get a quality education and thereby preserve the Hawaiian culture.  It wasn’t that many years ago that children were punished for speaking the Hawaiian language.  The language was nearly lost as were many of the other traditions.

One of our core values at KS is called ‘Ho’omau’ or ‘preservation’.  That means to preserve the legacy of Ke Ali’I Pauahi but also to preserve the Hawaiian traditions.  There is department at KS that is in charge of providing cultural enrichment to the faculty and staff.  Every morning we start the day off in the beautiful court yard with blowing the conch shell and a pule (prayer) and a mana’o (short daily words of encouragement) and mele (song).  I play the ukelele every morning with a small group of musicians at these gatherings.  It has been so fun be able to put the ukelele that I bought last year in Kauai to use finally.

Some other types of cultural enrichment I have been able to participate in are things like lei making, identifying native plants and the use of the plant in traditional Hawaiian medicine.  In the future, I hope to be able to go with a group of staff to the big island to plant Koa trees in the dry land forest on the slopes of Mauna Kea (active volcano).  We are also encourage and provided time to learn the Hawaiian language as well as use it in our day to day working environment.

Kamehameha Schools is a Christian organization and the head office is located next to one of the oldest and easily the most historic churches in Honolulu called Kawaiaha’o Church The church has been the scene of many royal weddings, coronations and funerals.  Recently, KS celebrated founder’s day which is Princess Pauahi’s birthday.  There was a founder’s day ceremony at the church and participated in singing in the choir.  It was a surreal experience to think  that I was singing at a church that has been the epicenter of so much Hawaiian history.

To make a long story short, Lisa and I have always felt a very close connection to Hawaii.  I’m sure a lot of people feel the same way because it is very easy to like Hawaii.  Every day at work I have to pinch myself that I’ve been given the opportunity to learn so much about Hawaii as well and the opportunity professionally to work as a full time production DBA.  It just feels so unreal that not only do I get to have all these great opportunities but that I’m basically working for an organization that was started by the Hawaiian royal family smack dab in the middle of Honolulu just steps from Kawaiaha’o Church and the Iolani Palace. 

As Lisa mentions in her blog, there are many modern day challenges to living and working in Hawaii and every day isn’t like being on a Hawaiian vacation.  I’m pleased to say that my experience so far has grown into so much more than a Hawaiian vacation.  I’m pleased to say that spirit of Aloha is real and it is alive and well and I’m proud to be a very small part of helping to ‘malama’ (to protect) and ‘ho’omau’ (to preserve) the  ‘aina (the land)  and the Hawaiian culture.   

 

‘Ua mau ke ea o ka aina I ka pono’     -Kamehameha III

(The life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness)