Superstitious…Strange Occurrences
- 08.10.10
- General, Ghosts, Night Marchers, Pele, unexplained
- 83 Comments
If you’ve spent much time in Hawaii, then you already know that the locals are very superstitious people. Many malihinis (newcomers) scoff at some of the Hawaiian superstitions and stories that are told of strange happenings…until they experience them themselves.
Oh, I’m not referring to the hundreds of people who have returned lava rocks and black sands to the Volcanoes National Park and various hotels to be returned in hopes of ending the senders’ streak of bad luck since returning home. Everyone knows Madam Pele does not take kindly to those who take her children from her.
I’ll have another entry at another time on Madam Pele. This entry is about all the local happenings that cannot be explained by rational means. Call them ghosts, spirits, or whatever, there are a lot of strange happenings that happen to a lot of people including many who were non-believers until it happened to them.
When I was growing up, I got to spend a lot of time at a small concession stand/snack bar my grandparents ran in Naalehu, on the Big Island. Every once in a while, the subject matter would turn to “obake” (ghost”) stories and everyone would share personal stories.
Virtually everyone in Hawaii knows about the “Night Marchers”, the nocturnal movement of Hawaiian warriors from the past who still make their treks from mountain to sea. What I didn’t know was that my grandparents house at the time, was located right on such a path!
I never experienced anything, but my grandmother would casually mention that a few times a year, you could hear them running thru the house, right down the hallway connecting the two bedrooms. Glad I didn’t know or I might have had a lot of sleepless nights there.
There is a heiau located at South Point, a popular fishing spot, where a retired policeman friend had gone fishing one night and had forgotten that it was the “night” of the night marchers. He started to hear the approach of a canoe, complete with chanting and torches.
Instead of bolting into the night, like I probably would have, he simply picked up his fishing gear, put them to the side and hid behind some rocks out of the way. He said the canoe pulled up, they disembarked, marched up the path to the heiau, had their ceremony, then marched back down to the canoe and literally vanished into the night, as they rowed back out to sea.
He calmly gathered up his gear and went back to fishing.
Not as fortunate were another couple who had gone fishing to one of their favorite spots near Honuapu. It is normally about a 10-minute walk from the car to their fishing spot. One particular night, they arrived, unloaded and headed for their spot as usual.
After a few minutes of walking, they noticed they were being followed by the light of a lantern. If they stopped, it would stop…if they moved forward, it would follow, but kept its distance. After more than a half-hour of walking and NOT reaching the coast, they decided that it was probably not meant to be and so decided to return to the car and go home.
They were back at the car within 5 minutes! And, the light?…the light just vanished.
I have a link on the side to Weird Hawaii blog that has many more local experiences, if you’re interested in this sort of thing. Its just another part of what makes Hawaii, Hawaii! I would love it if you would add your story here for me and others to share.
Incoming search terms:
- hawaiian superstitions
what I was looking for, thanks
Thank you for your comment…hope you pass the word along about this site/blog.
Randy
Thank you this made for intresting reading. I really love your site, the theme is really cool. I have came here numerous times but never commented, just wanted to let you know… Keep up the brilliant work! Another thing i adore to do when reading blogs is play Flash games 🙂 Worlds Hardest Game and Crush The Castle are the two favorite.
Thank you for your comment…you might also enjoy my website; http://www.myhawaiionline.com
Good luck with your games!
I love the theme on your blog, I have a website too, and I would really love to use this theme. Is it a free style, or is it custom?
This theme is available for free on http://www.wordpress.com. This particular one is called Web Minimalist 200901.1, but they have many more, many of which can be customized.
Very educating blog, saved your website for interest to see more information!
Thanks for your comments…suggest you may want to check out my full website: http://www.myhawaiionline.com
This formal summary assited me a lot! Bookmarked the site, very excellent categories just about everywhere that I see here! I really appreciate the information, thank you.
Thanks for the compliment…hope you’ll go check out my website; http://www.myhawaiionline.com
I think you’ll like it, too.
Nice post
Thank you…hope you’ll check out my hawaii website: http://www.myhawaiionline.com
Hello,
I was googling for a dating site when i came across your site. This is no dating site, but this is much more interesting! I will come back here. Thanks for the info, for this lonely dater.
See you!
Thanks for stopping by and for your compliment. If you’re interested in learning more about Hawaii, you can always go to my full website: http://www.myhawaiionline.com
Randy
Well, my site is also hosted on hostgator, using WordPress.
Thanks for the post, do you have any other similar related posts?
Thanks very much, I’ve found this extremely good!
Thanks a bunch for this kind of perfect publishing; this is the sort of detail that preserves me though out the day.I have forever recently been searching close to for a webpage following I seen about them from a good friend and was thrilled when I was able to locate it after looking for a while. Being a passionate blogger, I’m thrilled to see other people taking project and contributing on the neighborhood. I just wanted to opinion to display my thanks for your personal publish as it’s quite pushing, and lots of freelance writers usually do not get the credit score they ought to have. I’m certain I’ll be again and can deliver some of my acquaintances.
I would like to thank you for the efforts you have made in writing this article. I am hoping the same best work from you in the future as well. In fact your creative writing abilities has inspired me to start my own BlogEngine blog now.
The best paper I have read all year…
Brant
Thank you very much for your compliments. I admit to having been a bit busy these past few weeks and not kept up very well. Hopefully, I’ll be able to get back into this soon. In the meantime, you may want to check out my website at http://www.myhawaiionline.com
I have a more complete website at http://www.myhawaiionline.com.
But, if you are specifically looking for Superstitions and Hauntings of Hawaii, follow the link I have on my blog home page.
Thank you for your compliment…glad you enjoyed it. I invite you to visit my full website at http://www.myhawaiionline.com
I am flattered by your comments. Best wishes and good luck with your blog!
Thanks for your comment…hope you’ll check out my full website at http://www.myhawaiionline.com