| The Hawaiians are credited with being the fathers | | | | wave sliding that if the distant storms didn't |
| of surfing, and are known to have practiced the | | | | generate sufficient waves to ride, surfers with |
| sport as early as the 15th century AD. The | | | | enlist the help of a "kahuna" - a priest who would |
| Hawaiian name for surfing "He'enalu" - can be | | | | pray to the gods and ask for surf to come to |
| translated as wave sliding. During its early history, | | | | Hawaiian shores. |
| surfing was taken as a sacred practice and only | | | | However, surfing was to move into a period of |
| those with a high social status could take part; in | | | | decline following the arrival of Christian Missionaries |
| other words - Hawaiian kings and queens were | | | | who believed surfing was a hedonist act and a |
| surfers. Ironically, today, surfing is seen by the | | | | waste of time. They adamantly preach against |
| general population as a sport for those who have | | | | surfing's existence, and by the late 1800s, the |
| dropped out of society, the very opposite to how | | | | sport had almost been completely exterminated. |
| it began. | | | | Had it not been for a few hardcore surfers who |
| As a people living on a cluster of small islands in a | | | | continued to practise the sports and Hawaiian |
| very big sea, the Hawaiians were not surprisingly | | | | kings such as David Kalakau, surfing may have |
| fascinated by the ocean, and attached great | | | | died out all together. |
| meaning to its moods and forms. In a similar way | | | | However, the gradual decline of the missionaries |
| to which the Inuit are said to have many names | | | | influence allowed surfing to breathe again, and by |
| for snow, the Hawaiians also have hundreds of | | | | the start of the 1900s, surfing had not only |
| words to describe the various forms of the ever | | | | regained its former popularity in Hawaii, but was |
| changing sea. | | | | beginning to spread to other beaches of the |
| Just as modern day surf bums insist on surfing as | | | | world. |
| a lifestyle rather than just a sport and thus | | | | By the late 1920s, tourists from all over the world |
| devote great portions of time and money to the | | | | were booking into newly built hotels in Waikiki in |
| pursuit of the waves, Hawaiians also found | | | | their hundreds, all eager to experience the world's |
| unfathomable bounds with the practise, as the | | | | most famous beach and see the exotic "surf |
| writings of Kepelino Keauokalani, a 19th Century | | | | people" for themselves. Another 30 years on, and |
| Hawaiian Scholar, shows in his observations of the | | | | waves of American surf migrants began to arrive |
| local Hawaiian surfers: | | | | from California in search of the renowned |
| "All thought of work is at the end, only that of | | | | Hawaiian waves, that had reached legendary |
| sport is left. The wife may go hungry, the | | | | status is surf circles. |
| children, the whole family, but the head of the | | | | Now, surfing is a billion dollar industry, practiced |
| house does not care. He is all for sport, that is his | | | | across the world from Iceland to Indonesia - but |
| food. All day there is nothing but surfing. Many go | | | | let's not forget those pioneering Hawaiian kings |
| out surfing as early as four in the morning: men, | | | | and queens without which, the sport of surfing |
| women, children." | | | | may never have been invented. |
| Such was the desire of the ancient Hawaiians for | | | | |