Uncomfortable Tours: Cave Tubing in Kauai

Photo Credit: The Wavy Traveler, 2018

Photo Credit: Mike Coots 2016

In upcountry Kauai, there are a system of irrigation canals tourists can now utilize for a fun tubing adventure. The tunnels were built by American sugar magnates who wanted to harvest sugar year-round rather than on the schedule developed by Indigenous Hawaiians over centuries. While in the tunnels, you can see the rugged way it was carved out: pick axes used by imported Chinese laborers who were exploited, to death in some cases, for a very low wage. On the slowers moments, you can really lean into the rock and see the outline of a pick ax, one man's toil, as he worked in the unholy humidity so that some white people could, in turn, exploit the land to death. My family and I decided to go on this tour because it was enough physical activity for my young kids without overwhelming their grandparents. We were informed that one of the founders of AOL recently purchased most of this land that used to be sugar plantations with the intention of preserving it for future generations (we can hope), but this tour was allowed to operate on the property because they respect the history and nature along the way. It wound up being a lot of fun, but almost immediately, my attention was drawn away from the experience of tubing, and towards the tunnels themselves.

According to our Native Hawaiian guides, the Chinese laborers were brought in to work on these tunnels in the late 1870s, just before they were excluded from the United States in 1882 when the Chinese Exclusion Act went into effect. Hawaii was not yet an official territory of the US, but the sugar plantation owners on the islands were already trying to convince the US to annex the islands to avoid paying any tariffs on their sugar. These tunnels, now filled with the laughter and screams of joy from tourists young and old, were once a place of oppression, enslavement, danger, and trauma. Every single chute presented a new set of crevices, evidence of the superhuman work completed by men who left China believing they could find a better world for their families. I appreciated the Native Hawaiians' desire to continuously remind of us of this truth, but true to form, the majority white crowd was barely listening. Tourism like this is important because it allows us to bear witness to history in a way that would be less impactful if we were only reading about it in a book. But, this only works if we allow, and even force, ourselves to be uncomfortable in these places, reminded of the full story behind these tunnels and the tragedies contained within those rock walls. The impact of capitalism and colonialism seen on an island almost 2500 miles away from another land mass. Is it any wonder we are still fighting against these systems?