Jeno's beautiful granddaughters and 4-H club members Tatyana Kahunani and Sadie-Ann Kamalani manning the rodeo food booth at Honoka'a, Big Island. - Photo: Courtesy of Jeno Enocencio

R U mental 4 mentoring?

By Jimmy F. “Jeno” Enocencio

Look all around, you'll see kids “going off.” This past weekend I shared camaraderie with members of the Disabled American Veterans (DAV) on O'ahu. At the bus stop I heard grandchildren telling their grandma to shut up, pulling and tugging and demanding that this fragile grandma in her eighties buy candy and sodas – I wondered where the parents to these brats were? “My daughter stay on drugs,” she said. “She one CPS case. Dat one from her first boyfriend, he wen' dig out; and dis one, da fadda' stay in jail. I no can depend on my daughta', I gotta take care of dem … dis my mo'opunas, and I love dem. But they no listen, maybe somebody else need take kea' dem … we no can already, we too old fo' dis. I can hudly step on da bus; plus me and my huzban' get diabetes, mo' worse!”

At the same stop teens were passing around butts to share and bumming smokes from passers-by. Most had a vocabulary of expletive adjectives that brought about new meaning in any matter of topic discussed, “f'ing dis and f'ing dat.” I told this one teen that was spitting on the ground after every puff, “Eh brah, that's a filthy habit – knock it off!” All the kids stopped silent, none of his buddies said a word until the boy that I stormed nodded and whispered, “K.”

Mind you there are a lot of kids out there that don't have an adult figure to look up to. Boys rely on comic book characters and metallic megatrons as fantasy heroes. More often our young women want to be a part of something that'll get them in with the rest of the “kul chiks” their age. They image themselves to the weird fantasies of Hilton, Ritchie, Spears, Lohan and other highly publicized personages. The male rappers are focused on rhyming words with imaging gyrations of huge butts and sheer garments exposing nipples and crotch line, leaving very little to imagine – but lots to salivate over and pollute their young minds with. From what I see today, a lot of our teens are “wannabes”; that is, their passions are grasping to be something (or someone) other than themselves. They “wannabe” somebody that stands out to be noticed – they “wannabe” something that brings immediate self-gratification, which increases their self-worth, hence their reason for their existence.

Look – I may be wrong about what the kids are going through. Maybe I should just lighten up and look away from this youthful genocide – rid myself from viewing things from an adult's point of view and approach things from a sociological perspective (a methodological means utilizing a scientific approach). After all, I do have a degree in sociology and have worked with numerous youths and adults – so that should qualify me as credible. That's a bunch of horse's patoot!

While this may not be the answer forecasting our youths' devaluing standards of conduct – it's one that I've lived from a bumper sticker off a beat-up Ford pickup when living in Kansas in the seventies, which read, “Take your boy hunting, instead of HUNTING for your boy!” What profound messages a few words can make – and it stained my brain like spaghetti sauce on a white shirt. With that, I taught my three girls how to survive by not being beholden to any man for support – that they could survive on their own, no matter how tough things would get when raising their family. I taught my two boys and some of their friends how to hunt, dive and gather, fix jeeps and how to “make do” with the resources around them in order to make ends meet. It was tough as parents to get them to listen and understand the things that my wife and I had gone through as kids –nonetheless, we persisted.

We shared how we survived off the land to help our parents put food on the table. Days, months and years would pass before the lessons seeped through their thick skulls and they absorbed some degree of knowledge and started applying those skills that Caroline (my sweetheart) and I had taught them. Mind you, we don't take full credit; parenthood extended outside our immediate household to their tūtūs, aunties and uncles, our friends and neighbors, teachers and church members all played a huge part in their upbringing – after all, it “does” take a village to raise a child(ren). Then again, it's not easy being a kid these days. Dads aren't around and moms are always working to make ends meet, while kids are left to fend for themselves.

As the new commander for DAV Chapter 9 Puna, Big Island, I challenged my comrade-in-arms to take a stand for the betterment of our youths. After the initial design of our survival and learning center project (Kalalau: Rediscovering the Ahupua'a Life System) my 'ohana and I drafted a plan which includes our own Kalalau Ahupua'a 4-H Club, nicknamed “The Wanderers.” Here we established a plan for our youths and their parents (or any concerned adult) to become involved in a child's life and becoming a mentor unto them.

The kahuna of ancient times would select certain youths to specialize in canoe building, kapa making, thatching hale, lā'au lapa'au, lomilomi, and other vocations – all having a purpose for their own existence and the survival of the society (ahupua'a) they reside in. The skills that I learned from my dad Bungo, stepdad Juanito, Papa Joe, Grandma Virginia, Uncle Larry, Uncle Herbert, Scoutmaster Kubota, Johnny Pacheco and a whole bunch of Portuguese, Japanese, Filipino and Haoles were essential in my adolescent development.

Peers like Lambert, Glenn, Ralph, Fred, Eddie, Clifford, Donny, Roger, Randy, Stephen, Lester, Henry and Thurston (boys like myself growing on a sugar plantation camp in Wainaku) were also recipients of men and women experienced in their culture and traditions. What skills I learned from them whether direct instructions or mere observations helped me to survive combat as a point-man in a Reconnaissance/Sniper team in Vietnam – which also contributed to the person I am today. Skills which I am willing to pass on to anyone wanting this gift that has been given so generously by the few that I've listed above – my mentors.

This column begins a new series of endowments of survival skills which I will share with whomever desires to obtain it. I will focus on surviving in Hawai'i by means of growing safe foods, raising small animals for meat, raising fish for added protein, emergency preparedness, canning and food storing. The objective is to become prepared before disaster, war, drought, pestilence or when famine strikes – so as the Scout motto is to “Be Prepared.”

Jeno Enocencio writes about the many hats he wears.
Email pointman_jeno@msn.com