Pukui, Mary Kawena. ʻŌlelo Noʻeau : Hawaiian proverbs & poetical sayings. Honolulu: Bishop Museum Press, 1983.

E ʻike ana ʻoe i ke liʻi nui o Oʻahu, ʻo Kakuhihewa.

••• Translation: You will meet with the great chief of Oʻahu, Kakuhihewa.

•••• Explanation: You shall find out how wrong you are. A play on kuhihewa (erroneous).
#309

••• Translation: ʻEwa is a long way off; Nuʻuanu is a cliff; Kulaokahuʻa is a dry plain; but all will be here before long.

•••• Explanation: Said of an unkept promise of food, fish, etc. Oʻahu was once peopled by evil beings who invited canoe travelers ashore with promises of food and other things. When the travelers asked when these things were coming, this was the reply. When the visitors were fast asleep at night, the evil ones would creep in and kill them.

#768

••• Translation: The chief-destroying sands of Kakuhiheiva.

•••• Explanation: The island of Oʻahu. When the priest Kaʻōpulupulu was put to death by the chief Kahāhana for warning him against cruelty to his subjects, he uttered a prophecy. He predicted that where his own corpse would lie in a heiau at Waikīkī , there would he the chief’s corpse as well. Furthermore, he said, the land would someday go to the sea-that is, to a people from across the sea. This was felt to be a curse. When Kamehameha III was persuaded by a missionary friend to move the capital from Lahaina to Oʻahu, a kahuna, remembering the curse, wamed him not to, lest the monarchy perish. The warning was ignored, and before the century had passed, the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi  was no more.

#1772

Modern: Nā ʻale hānupanupa o Pailolo.

••• Translation: The choppy billows of Pailolo.

•••• Explanation:   Pailolo is the channel between Oʻahu and Molokaʻi.

#2200

••• Translation: The long-backed billows of Kaʻieʻie.

•••• Explanation:   Kaʻieʻie is the channel between Kauaʻi and Oʻahu.
#2201

••• Translation: Beautiful Kaʻala, a pool that holds the dew.

•••• Explanation:   Praise of Mt. Kaʻala, on Oʻahu, a depository for the dew.

#2273

••• Translation: Oʻahu, island of Lua.

•••• Explanation:   According to an old legend, Lua is the father of Oʻahu.

#2352

••• Translation: Oʻahu, gem of the seas.

•••• Explanation:   Oʻahu is the principal island of the group.

#2353

••• Translation: Oʻahu of the averted eyes.

•••• Explanation: This saying began with Hiʻiaka, who asked two of her kinsmen on Oʻahu for a canoe to take her to Kauaʻi. They gave her a broken one, which she and her companion mended with no help from the men. In disgust, she called them Oʻahu makaʻewaʻewa. After that, Oʻahu was said to have the least friendly people of all the islands.

#2354

••• Translation: Tough are the men of Kauaʻi.

•••• Explanation: Oʻahu was once inhabited by supernatural beings who ate people. They would extend their hospitality by day, but at night they would eat their sleeping guests. A canoe came from Kauaʻi one day, and among the passengers was a man who was distrustful of the Oahuans. When the other men went to sleep, he dug a hole under the wall, crept into it, pulled a mat over himself, and waited. Late at night he listened as the hosts came and ate his companions. After the evil beings were gone, he hurried to the canoe and sailed home. He told his friends, and together they made wooden images, hid them in the canoe, and sailed for Oʻahu, where they were welcomed. That night the images were put inside the house, while the men hid outside. When the hosts came around to eat the visitors, they bit into the hard wooden images. The Kauaʻi men bumed the house, thus ending the evil on Oʻahu.
#2560

* ʻailana: 2. n., Island. (Pukui-Elbert)

“E lei ʻohuʻohu nei i ka pua / Aʻo ka ʻilima”
* Translation: “Wearing/adorned in the flowers / Of the ʻilima” - refers to Oʻahu being adorned, dressed, made beautiful by the ʻilima flower, like a person wearing a lei.
* ʻohuʻohu: Attractive or pleasing from personal adornment; attractively decorated with wreaths or other adornments: Ohuohu Helemano i ka lei lehua. (Parker)… other ʻohuʻohu references, “Attractive or pleasing from personal adornment; attractively decorated with wreaths or other adornments: Ohuohu Helemano i ka lei lehua.” (Andrews)
* ʻilima: 1. n. Small to large native shrubs (all species of Sida, especially S. fallax), bearing yellow, orange, greenish, or dull-red flowers; some kinds strung for leis. The flowers last only a day and are so delicate that about 500 are needed for one lei. Fruits of maʻo (Abutilon grandifolium), when green and soft, are used with ʻilima leis, one fruit at each end of the lei; or the pale-green, cap-like calyx of the ʻilima flower is used. A mild laxative for babies is made by squeezing out the juice of flowers; this is called kanakamaikaʻi. The ʻilima was designated in 1923 by the Territorial Legislature as the flower of Oʻahu. It is related to the hibiscus. (Neal 552–3.) See songs, nōweo, pue 1; cf. ʻāpiki. Ola nō i ka pua o ka ʻilima, healing in the ʻilima flower [reference to its medicinal use]. (Pukui-Elbert)

Famous is Honolulu
In the Kūkalahale rain
in the town that is honored
In the islands of Hawaiʻi.

Kūkalahale n. Name of a rain and wind famous at Honolulu. (Pukui-Elbert)

kaona- town
ʻailana- islands.
(Pukui-Elbert)
**many hawaiianized words in this mele. 

Ka ua Kūkalahale o Honolulu.
The Kūkalahale rain for Honolulu.
The rain that announces itself to the homes by the pattering it makes on the roofs as it falls. Often mentioned in songs.
(‘Olelo No‘eau #1575, pg. 170)

Source: Pukui, Mary Kawena, and Dietrich Varez. “Ōlelo No”eau : Hawaiian Proverbs & Poetical Sayings. Honolulu, Hawai’i: Bishop Museum Press, 2011. Print.

2. A lake or spring on Mount Kaala which is said to have taken its name from the mountain: Nani Kaala, he kiowai, na ke kehau." Beautiful is Kaala, fountain of the dewdrops


Pūkuʻi, ʻŌlelo Noʻeau:

Pg. 248, proverb 2273
Nani Kaʻala, He kiʻowai na ke kēhau.
Beautiful Kaʻala, a pool that holds the dew.
- Praise for Mt. Kaʻala, on Oʻahu, a depository for the dew.

iʻa hāmau leo - n. Pearl oyster, once numerous at Pearl Harbor. Lit., sea creature that silences the voice, so called for a taboo of silence maintained by fishermen there. Pukui and Elbert
- *Anu ʻo ʻEwa i ka iʻa hānau leo e. E hāmau!* ʻEwa becomes cold by the fish that silences voices, be quiet! Puke ʻŌlelo Noʻeau 123

Sound changes and need for salvage

New Names

Being Kanaka Hawaiʻi, we have a connection to this ʻāina that surpasses surface value. This ʻāina is what sustains us physically, as it is the resource that feeds us spiritually as we have genealogical ties to it. With this relationship to place, we are responsible for caring for this place we call home.

“For virtually everyone on the earth there is a deep association with and consciousness of the places of birth and childhood” (pg. 7)