Mauiÿs Fishing

From "Mauiÿs Fishing" in Maui Legends by Westervelt.

Retold here by Kirsten

INTRODUCTION:

One day Maui made a fishing hook, and as he was making the Fish Hook he prayed to the Ancestors to let this hook have mighty power!

The next morning Maui’s brothers were on their way to go fishing and Maui wanted to go with them, but his brothers said “NO”, and pushed him away. Maui got really angry because he wanted to Fish so badly. When the brothers came back that night, Maui asked his brothers if they had caught any fishes, the brothers replied laughing at him “You are so silly, there were nothing in the ocean!” Maui answered to them “There are, take me tomorrow with you, and I will show you what you can catch.” The brothers were looking at each other and they said yes.

So the next morning came and Maui was so happy that he was going. They all went on the boat and started off to paddle. As they were paddling in the ocean Maui tells the brothers to paddle out farther, but why? There was nothing out there but water? So the brothers did as they were told to, Maui told them not to look back for they will feel a pull on the boat, which is your signal to start paddling back. But why can’t we look the brothers asked themselves. So as they felt the tug on the boat, Maui yelled out to the brothers to start paddling back, and so they did. But one of the brothers was so eager to look back that he did.

When they reached shore, Maui got really mad at his brother because he turned his head to look back and he didn’t follow Maui’s directions. So Maui told them that he had caught islands and it was suppose to be a lot, but because one of his brothers looked back, Maui didn’t get to catch all of the islands he wanted to. And that, so the story says, is the way our Hawaiian Islands came above the ocean.