ABOUT - HO'EA INITIATIVE
Hō'ea Mission
With nature as the classroom, the Hõ‘ea Initiative provides training for both youth and adults in a wide range of life skills, including wilderness survival, nature awareness, traditional tracking, cultural appreciation and much more. These valuable skills are taught through fun and interactive camps designed to immerse participants in nature. These trainings help participants increase self reliance and appreciation of the natural world by teaching them to recognize utilize and manage the many traditional resources found in nature..“We’re taking the lessons passed to us by our Kûpuna about survival and how to co-exist with nature and passing them on to the next generation”.Participants learn a variety of skills to live off the land and ocean. Early Hawaiians lived and existed in total balance and harmony with all things in nature and their resources were nurtured and never depleted. The early Hawaiians knew and followed the seasons and cycles of all things in the universe following a spiritual protocol we call aloha...permission, conservation, preservation...sharing and sustaining life not just for one’s self but for the greater community. The Ho'ea Initiative programs are a passionate effort to provide universal understandings inside all of us through indigenous knowledge and principals found outside in the natural world. We provide the opportunity to increase one’s peripheral vision and strengthen his or her whole mind-body-spirit completeness.
Hō'ea History.
The Hawaiian Inside (HIT) began in 1996 as a high-impact life-enhancing program that took children of all walks of life outside, removing them from their routine environment, and usual comfort zone, using nature as the teacher.
Since 1996 there have been many HI camps and workshops of all ages ranging from one day to one -week full immersion camps. Through the years Brother Noland along with some of Hawaii's finest organizations, The Kamehameha Schools, the YWCA, The Pacific American Foundation, the Boys & Girls Club of Hawaii, The University of Hawaii, Palama Settlement, Kama'aina Kids, Ka'ala Farms, Leadership Kauai, aio Group, HSTA, PBS, have partnered to plant seeds of knowledge and offer opportunities for young people of Hawaii to participate in this outdoor program.
Our Mission.
Permission, conservation, preservation…sharing and sustaining life not just for one's self, but for the greater community.
The HIT Program is a passionate effort to provide universal understandings inside all of us through indigenous knowledge and universal principles found outside in the natural world. We will provide the opportunity to increase every person's peripheral vision and strengthen his or her whole mind-body-spirit complete-ness.
Somewhere between the, I have and the to be, is a life that is struggling to know. The kai huki (undertow) is strong and we must first learn to au au (swim, take a bath) in order to understand the au kai (tides) of life.
What you Learn.
Over the course of one week the participants would learn a variety of skills to live off the land and ocean. The participants learn how the early Hawaiians lived and existed in total balance and harmony on a tiny dot in the middle of the largest ocean. Resources were nurtured and never depleted. The early Hawaiians knew and followed the seasons and cycles of all things in the universe following a spiritual protocol we call aloha…
The HIT Program provides us all with an opportunity to make contact with ourselves, our ocean, our land, our community, our children, our elders, our peers, our consciousness, the very fabric that makes these islands a sacred and beautiful jewel of the world. We are all visitors when we visit the elements and we must respect, honor and exercise all the intelligences.
Hō'ea's TEAM Of Instructors and Trainers.
Brother Noland
PO'O
If we can sit down together and have a conversation like the "good ole days" would be the best! I can tell y'all about us, our teacher lineage, how we roll, our rhythm, our style. But for now, here are a few tidbits about the team and me, we are a Survival School, nomadic hunter/gatherers...
This Hawaiian grew up on urban Oahu and country Hawaii island. Has done a lot of "dirt time" and cultural work for many years on Molokai island. As an instructor and mentor, I teach the multiple intelligences, I believe in skills and the Creator's guidance when we're out there on the land and the ocean. My staff and students work a lot on honing a wide range of skills to take care of themselves inside and out. When they know that they are strong and sound in mind, body and spirit, they naturally learn to take care of others.
I believe in "we" the village, the community at hand, so as much as our students work on their own selfreliance, they learn to work together and move as a family unit. Everyone knows their role and where they stand in the lineup.
I simplify a lot and aim good. My Trackers learn skills that give them the ability to catch it, clean it, cook it, eat it... Lots of common sense, humor and observation...
Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit, wisdom is knowing you don't put it in a fruit salad...Lol
PALAKIKO YAGODICH
Instructor and Trainer
Palakiko Yagodich is an instructor and trainer for the Hō'ea Initiative's Hawaiian Inside Tracking program. Originally from Maui, he currently resides on the north shore of O'ahu. He is a graduate of a four year mentorshiip training program of The Tracking Project (Corrales, New Mexico) and Hawaiian Inside Tracking, and has worked for Hō'ea Initiative since 2008.
JENNIFER YAGODICH
Instructor and Trainer
Jenny Lynn is an instructor and trainer for the Hō'ea Initiative Hawaiian Inside Tracking program. Jenny first met Brother Noland as a participant in the Pacific American Foundation's NAPALI Leadership program and is also a graduate of The Tracking Project (Corrales, New Mexico) and of Hawaiian Inside Tracking's four year mentorship program where she excelled in traditional fire-making, kiloi 'upena, archery, and the gathering of plants and animals for food.
As an educator, Jenny is passionate about sharing her deep knowledge of the natural world with others. She's equally at home in the mountains and the ocean, and enjoys the simple complexities of nature.
"It's a beautiful thing to help people of all ages find a deep connection and appreciation for all the natural resources the Creator has provided us here on Earth. In this vast classroom, everything from the waters, to the winds, to the thunder beings, it's all connected and if we discover the right way to be one with it, the outcome is magic".
In addition to working with Hō'ea Initiative, Jenny is the Director of Educational Programs, the Community Outreach Coordinator, and the Makai Watch Coordinator for Mālama Pūpūkea-Waimea, the non-profit organization that cares for, educates about, and protects the Pūpūkea Marine Life Conservation District on the North Shore of O'ahu.
MELE COELHO BETER
Instructor and Trainer
Mele is a gifted Lomilomi practitioner and has studied under some of the greatest and most formidable in the field, Alva Andrews, Alapa'i Kahuena, Brenda Ignacio, Keola Chan and Kaipo Kaneakua. She represents a new generation and legacy of Hawaiian healers of the mind, body and spirit. She is a product of, Hui Mauli Ola, an ohana of practitioners studying Lomilomi and La'au Lapa'au. She also owns and operates Pikoakea Therapeutics in Kailua. Her journey with Brother Noland and John Stokes began in 2005 as her other classmates would say, curious and interested in this other knowledge not found in colleges and indoor classrooms".
The missing link, the complimentary piece to her cultural studies of traditional Hawaiian healing. The "Original Instructions" found in Natures classroom. Your body, the land, the ocean, the heavens are intimately connected into one.
Mele is a graduate of both the The Tracking Project in Corrales, New Mexico and the Hawaiian Inside Tracking program here in Hawaii. She has been a part of the HIT Team since 2010.
POMAI WEIGERT
Instructor and Trainer
Pomai Weigert hails from a mulit-generational, family-owned, native Hawaiian agritourism business in Hawai'i. Besides working for this family company, she is a workshop trainer for the Hawai'i Agritourism Association, As Brother Noland's daughter, she has absorbed his teachings throughout her life and is also a graduate of The Tracking Project (Corrales, New Mexico) and of Hawaiian Inside Tracking's mentorship program.
THOMAS "TOBY" YOS
Instructor
Dr. Thomas “Toby” Yos is a counselor at Waikiki Elementary School and a specialist in Philosophy for Children (p4c) at the University of Hawaiʻi, Mānoa. Toby’s strengths are sitting quietly, listening, and tracking the thoughts and feelings of children. He believes that aloha is at the core. Toby, his four children, and many students from his school have gratefully learned from Brother Noland and the rest of the HIT staff since 2009.
BLAYNE ASING
Instructor
Blayne has been a part of Brother Noland's life since they first met when he was in the 7th grade attending Kamehameha Middle School. He was a young chip setting up sound equipment for a Brother Noland performance in the gym. He looked and carried himself with such confidence at such a transitional time in a kids life. Young boy into manhood. Brother Noland's first question to him as he does with many was, Hey you got any skills?" A confident "Yes" was his answer, and moments later he was on stage performing with Brother Noland. The relationship has been ongoing ever since doing walkabout beyond the stage and into the field, the water, tracking, hunting, fishing, survival skills, mentoring. As he approaches his third year with the HIT program his work and study is steady and his consistency and dedication earns him a spot on the roster.
