"What are you protesting?" the man asked me while we were both painting the street in my neighborhood. I had just told him I was planning on protesting an event that was happening at a local bar that evening.
In a flurry of feelings, I didn't answer his question well. To be honest, I hadn't quite figured it out myself. I just knew it was a luau that wasn't a luau and this wasn't okay.
And three hours later as I was in my room trying to sort through what to write on my sign, I still hadn't figured it out. I wanted to write "Native Hawaiian culture is not yours for pleasure and consumption" but I didn't think anyone in Akron, Ohio would understand what that meant. No one really thinks of Hawai'i as a land in Akron, just a paradise vacation destination.
I was told from a couple of friends heavily involved and a part of the Hawaiian community in Hawai'i that to represent Hawai'i and Native Hawaiian people well I should protest with a spirit of aloha. I didn't quite understand what that meant but I kinda read it as "Amber chillax it's all gonna be cool just speak your heart and speak the truth and don't protest out of a spirit of violence."
I'm sitting, staring at my blank sign, wondering if I should talk about how Hawai'i was illegally overthrown and then eventually annexed by William McKinley who is buried a half hour from Akron, or if I should point out that none of the five luau foods are being served at their event.
Neither one feels like a good route but this is the third "luau" event I've seen at three different bars/pubs in Akron this summer and on top of the varying "Hawaii" floral sprays and "paradise fabric prints" found in any store I just cannot be silent anymore.
And so I think of Jesus, and how he speaks to the people he loves.
He calls them by name: "Mary" "Jerusalem" "Peter"
And so I start off my sign by calling by name my city that I love--"Akron"
I don't know where to go from here because there is so much I want to say to Akron and beyond. And I begin weeping because I'm thinking of Jesus standing over Jerusalem, his heart breaking for the city and watching it be it's own destruction because it is too blind to see. And I feel connected to Jesus in that moment, somehow, in someway that I can't describe but is real.
And I ask myself, "What is it that gently needs to be said?"
And I paint:
And although the protest/education station didn't work out (due to rain and me recognizing that moving my solo protest to inside wasn't going to be the best idea) it doesn't change the fact that Hawaiians are important, and so are their stories and culture.
