Going to elementary school in Hawaii proved to me that the educational system hides the truths behind everything. For example, I was never told about the true circumstances that led Hawaii from being an independent kingdom to a State. In my history books, it was glazed over with a simple short paragraph, that implied that Hawaii wanted to become a part of the United States of America, and they forgot to include the overthrow, the annexation and the disregard of Hawaiian petitions against the annexation.
We were taught to worship dead presidents and understand the checks and balances of the United State Government. As a child I didn’t know anything about my Hawaiian heritage other than a 1 hour lesson with a our Kupuna who visited us on Tuesdays. I was taught to want a life like the white-anglos and that was the reason I was in school, to become an American.
However, as I began to learn for my self about the truth behind my heritage, I began to see the differences between me and the American ideology. I suddenly realized that I could never be white and have the ideal lifestyle taught to me in elementary school. That I had to be different, and work in a hotel and struggle to make ends meet. My parents didn’t live the life that I was taught to want in elementary school, and I think my parents felt it too. I was never taught anything about myself, and who I was supposed to be.
In civics class in at Baldwin High School (the namesake of a family of missionaries who swindled the Hawaiian royalty into partitioning their land) I learned that I was a minority, a minor person of importance. I hated that I was now supposed to accept that I was less important than white people. I read text books on statistical data, and I was no longer worth becoming like the white people I envied, because now I was was separated from them. I was a minority. I really feel that the American education system, treats us a being different even if we all are granted equal rights. I had to ask many questions of myself and of the world, why were Caucasians considered a single group, when I had to list my self as Hawaiian, Japanese, Korean, Filipino, and Chinese. It seemed that the Caucasians were the ‘in’ group and everyone else had to just accept the non-acceptance.
Now in college, I come to school on free scholarships, another means to further separate the poor from the rich. Being Native Hawaiian, a minority, and being poor has allowed me special treatment because I can now receive money for school. Sometimes I feel like I am traitor to my heritage, because I accept these handouts. Sometimes I feel that I deserve them, and many times I feel like I am not worth a dime to spend on because I am not in the majority.
