Aloha and mahalo for your interest in Malama Maha`ulepu.

Maha`ulepu, Kaua`i is a beautiful heritage place. Revealing 5 million years of continuous history, this undeveloped watershed is a living museum - a research site and habitat for rare and endangered plants and animals. Maha`ulepu is sacred and legendary to Native Hawaiians, many of whom are connected to this area by ancestral ties and by continuing cultural uses including fishing and gathering. In a rapidly urbanizing region, Maha`ulepu remains an important agricultural place. Maha`ulepu is a vitally needed recreational retreat, a source of renewal and connection to family and local culture for Kaua`i residents.

Maha`ulepu's coastal zone is perceived and enjoyed as open space and a passive recreational refuge, thanks to the landowner, Grove Farm Company, Inc. (Mr. Stephen Case), who maintains a policy of keeping the area open during daylight hours. But Maha`ulepu is not permanently protected and is vulnerable to resort development.

Please use this site as a resource to discover why Maha`ulepu should be preserved forever and how you can help make that a reality.

Malama Maha`ulepu - Meaning and Pronunciation

malama
[MA·lama] [a as in far; a as in above]
1. To take care of, attend, care for, preserve, protect, beware, save, maintain.

Maha`ulepu
[MA·HA ule·PU] [a as in far; u as in moon; e as in bet; u as in moon]
1. Land section and road, Koloa District, Kaua`i. Lit. and falling together.
2. One of the most spectacular and cherished undeveloped coastal areas in the Hawaiian Islands.

In the Hawaiian language widely taught today, Malama Maha`ulepu would be properly be written as Malama o Maha`ulepu or "Caretakers of Maha`ulepu. Having continued the name of one of the previous groups that organized to preserve Maha`ulepu, we do not use the "o". Since most people do not have the software needed to write and read Hawaiian language fonts, we have chosen, for now, to forego use of the kahako or macron that signifies vowels somewhat longer than other vowels and always stressed. We do use the `okina or glottal stop (`) which is "similar to the sound between the oh's in English oh-oh."

Malama Maha`ulepu humbly apologizes to the speakers, teachers and students of the beautiful native language of Hawai`i.

Sources:
Mary Kawena Pukui, Samuel H. Elbert, Hawaiian Dictionary, 1986, University of Hawai`i Press.
Mary Kawena Pukui, Samuel H. Elbert & Esther T. Mookini, Place Name of Hawaii, 1974.
University of Hawaii Press