The Separating Sickness, Mai Hookaawale by Ted Gugelyk and Milton Bloombaum

Title: The Separating Sickness, Mai Hookaawale
Author: Ted Gugelyk and Milton Bloombaum
Genre: Non-fiction
URL: Amazon
Price: $15.95

My Review:  This is an important work, not only because it helps convey what life was like at Kalaupapa on the island of Moloka'i for the "patients" interred there, but mostly because it records the feelings, stories, perseverance and strength of character of the residents of the one-time "leprosy settlement."

For those who do not know, starting in the 1860s, thousands of people afflicted with Hansen's disease were forcibly removed from their homes, ripped from their families and sent to live their lives in the isolated community of Kalawao on the nearly inaccessible northern peninsula on the island of Moloka'i where they were sent, essentially, to die. The Kalawao settlement was ultimately relocated to Kalaupapa. Forced isolation remained in effect until 1969 when the treatment for Hansen's was discovered.

The Separating Sickness (Mai Ho'oka'awale)was first published in 1979 and is the result of interviews with the 60 or so residents living at the time at Kalaupapa. These are their stories, in their own words. There is anger and love and bitterness and politics in all their stories, but most of all, there is an overwhelming sense of ohana (family) that was formed of necessity, and maintained by faith, hope and love.


These stories are not easy to read. Many of those who participated in the interviews were taken from their families when they were young children (as young as 6) and lived the majority of their lives at Kalaupapa before mandatory isolation was revoked in 1969. Many of their families abandoned them, thus the name "The Separating Sickness." Their stories are heartrending and touching, brutal at times. But what shines through is the hope and the strength of spirit of these people. No, they aren't saints, just very real people who lived through hard times and persevered and found that Kalaupapa had become their home.


According to various sources, there are only about two dozen former patients still in residence at Kalaupapa, which has been designated a National Park. Most of them have spent their entire lives there and those residents have been guaranteed that they shall be permitted to live there as long as they like. Many of those interviewed over 30 years ago have since passed away. In fact, the last entry in the book is an interview with Bernard Punikai'a, who passed away on February 25, 2009,and spent 68 of his 78 years at Kalaupapa.


That is what makes this work even more important. It preserves stories like Bernard's and all the others, records for history the wrongs done to them and the indomitable spirit that remains in their souls. The stories of too many of those incarcerated at Kalaupapa are lost to history, and this work makes sure that at least some are not forgotten.


For more, please look up Ka 'Ohana O' Kalaupapa on the internet and learn of the memorial the residents are trying to have erected. Alan Brennert's "Moloka'i" is also an excellent fiction work set at Kalaupapa.