Kaaihue-Paopao’s Spoken History
Jamie Calderon | STAFF WRITER
April 09, 2026
As Whittier begins saying goodbye to its senior class, one senior’s presentation had people saying “a hui hou.”
Fourth-year student Ku’uipo Kaaihue-Paopao gave attendees a sneak peek of her senior symposium with a demonstration in the practice of poke preparation.
The tables in the room were scattered with recipes created by Kaaihue-Paopao and her mother: Shoyu Ahi Poke, Spicy Ahi Poke and the classic preparation with coconut cream and salt.
The main table was set up with everything you would need to recreate her recipes, including sample bowls to find your favorite. Kaaihue-Paopao would recommend the shoyu ahi recipe: three spoonfuls of soy sauce, one spoonful of green onion, one spoonful of onion and a sprinkle of salt.
After Kaaihue-Paopao walked me through the process of making my own bowl, I was able to speak with her about the steps she took in creating the event and her senior project.
“Like any great idea, it came from my mom. Because I was telling her I had to come up with a topic for my senior project, and she brought up the topic of diaspora.”
The conversation around diaspora—the dispersion of people from their ancestral homeland, whether by choice or by force—was central to her artist statement for this project.
In it, she talked about the effects of diaspora and cultural exclusion on Hawaiian people living in diaspora.
Her statement shared many real emotions and difficult feelings she navigates as a Hawaiian living in diaspora and her connections to the culture, but her project reflects a hopeful outlook.
Kaaihue-Paopao is a Whittier Scholars Program (WSP) student. Her self-created major, “Creative Expression Through Hawaiian Language and Culture,” aims to open up a pathway for Hawaiian culture to make its way into the mainstream conversation.
Much of Hawaiian culture is passed down through oral speech, with traditions unwritten but still kept alive.
Although Kaaihue-Paopao wrote down her recipes for attendees, the process of building them came from her mom and from experimenting in the kitchen.
“When I was working on this demonstration, my mom was feeding me info. Because Hawaiian culture wasn’t written down until contact with other people. So she told me the traditional way first, and I asked her, ‘Wow, where do you find this?’ and she said, ‘You don’t. It’s passed down through word of mouth.’”
And hats off to Kaaihue-Paopao: her recipes were delicious.
The conversations she inspired in the room were just as meaningful. Outside of her artist statement, she shared many personal feelings about her senior symposium topic.
These conversations included the erasure of Hawaiian culture from American conversations, such as how the capital in Hawaii had electricity before the White House. Others focused on how the presentation itself connected to the larger idea of diaspora and cultural preservation.
Poke was used as an example of the cultural diffusion that has happened—a disconnect between the deep threads of culture and meaning and the commodified American version.
Kaaihue-Paopao’s program, much like the goal of her larger project, was meant to bring culture back into the practice by reminding us what it really means to make and enjoy poke and reconnect it to its roots.
So next time you’re looking for a fulfilling meal, try her shoyu ahi recipe.