Carving Demo at Keōkea Marketplace, Aug. 9

Cultural practitioner Norman Abihai, shown at his Waiohuli homestead, will demonstrate carving a poi-pounding board at Sunday’s Keōkea Homestead Open Market. Photo credit: Kekoa Enomoto.

By Maui Now Staff

You can see an ancient Hawaiian practice in action on Sunday.

Waiohuli farmer Norman Abihai will mold a poi-pounding board, or papa ku‘i‘ai, during the Keōkea Homestead Open Market on August 9th, from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. The Keōkea Marketplace is at the 17 Mile Marker of Kula Highway at Kaʻamana Street, a quarter-mile past Grandma’s Coffee House.

Abihai cultivates mango, kalo, banana and ʻawa on his one-acre homestead at Waiohuli. Shoppers can order a papa ku‘i‘ai in mango wood or ‘ulu (breadfruit) wood. The cultural practitioner says he will carve only two boards for the holiday season. He also offers red ti-leaf plantlings for sale.

Abihai is one of a number of cultural practitioners and vendors at the farmers market that unfolds on the second Sunday of each month. For more details, including vendor applications at $15 per seller, contact Kalena Park at (808) 870-3220 or [email protected].

The Keōkea Marketplace will also bring you the 2nd-annual Keōkea Ho‘olaule‘a on Saturday, Sept. 5, 2015 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Vendor applications are available for a $50 fee. Admission is $1 to the Labor Day weekend event, hosted by nonprofit Keōkea Homestead Farm Lots Association.