
Forbidden Island, U.S.A. - bitops
http://www.neatorama.com/2011/12/05/forbidden-island-u-s-a/
======
205guy
A few more details about Ni'ihau that were left out of the article.

\- There was actually one other landowner, a native Hawaiian couple that the
Robinsons had to buy out to own the entire island. The story goes that they
didn't want to sell, but one of the Robinsons kept placing gold coins on a
table until they gave in.

\- The Hawaiian that is still spoken on Ni'ihau is probably very similar to
the one spoken there from the time of Western contact (James Cook in 1778[*]).
However, it is a slightly different dialect than that spoken on the other
islands that has become "modern" Hawaiian language.

\- The article briefly mentions the Japanese aviator who crashed on Ni'ihau
after bombing Pearl Harbor. Some say this small side-story to WW2 had some
sigificant impact on the decision to intern the Japanese on the US mainland
during the war:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niihau_Incident](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niihau_Incident)

\- There is no electricity on the island, but the department of education has
installed a solar PV system to run computers and refrigerators at the school.
I imagine that other houses may be replacing kerosene lighting with solar PV
as well now that prices have come down.

\- I do not think they have landlines or cell-phones, but I think there is a
radio for emergencies.

\- I think the Helicopter tour runs about $300-$350, someday I may try it.

~~~
jmspring
Having spent a bit of time on Molokai and visiting the Leper Colony late last
year, Ni'ihau could be interesting. The diverse history of the islands keeps
bringing us back.

For years, we've been spending time in Hilo with an old cattlewoman (recently
passed) who introduced us to an amazing array of people who have connections
with old Hawaii.

Yes, I've benefited from the tourism (being one), but whenever I hear stories
of old Hawaii, I always get Iz's song Hawai'i 78 from the Facing Future album.

Thanks for the added details.

~~~
jfb
Hawai'i is flat-out fascinating. I'm lucky in that over the last 20 years, my
pop has been moving in slow motion to the Big Island, so I spend a lot of time
there.

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205guy
After seeing the article about North Sentinel island, I wondered how long
until a similar one about Ni'ihau. It is typically dubbed the "Forbidden
Island" in the tourist literature, so it was bound to come up in someone's
searches.

BTW, there are 2 significant "forbidden" islands in Hawai'i, and numerous
small ones. The other large one is Kaho'olawe (due to unexploded ordinance and
nominally belonging to native Hawaiians now). The small ones (around several
islands) are bird sanctuaries. In fact another island near Ni'ihau is both a
sanctuary and an active bombing range:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ka%CA%BBula](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ka%CA%BBula)

Yes, I find islands fascinating.

~~~
JacobAldridge
OT, but I'd love your thoughts as an island lover. Which do you consider to be
the world's largest island?

(I've always said Australia, but it seems many people exclude it and go with
Greenland.)

~~~
205guy
I think it's a rather pointless question because there are so many ways to
define an island. If you say "land surrounded by water," then it's the
EurAsiaAfrican landmass, if you look at geology (of which I am no expert),
then you have a lot more nit-picky defintions such as continents, cratons,
crusts, rifts, etc.

I just read a lot on Wikipedia, where island is defined as a "sub-continental
land surrounded by water"[1]. But when you look at the definition of sub-
continental, the continents are "generally identified by convention rather
than any strict criteria"[2].

So it's just convention that large islands like Greenland, Madagascar and New
Zealand, which are "pieces" of continents, are not considered continents. Some
pieces of continents such as New Caledonia[3] are much smaller than volcanic
islands that rose out of the sea. For what it's worth, wikipedia follows the
norm and calls Greenland the largest island[4].

And then there's the whole issue of sea level which varies, and as it does, it
changes the size, shape, and connection of islands and continents.

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island)
[2]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent)
[3]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_caledonia#Geography](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_caledonia#Geography)
[4]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_Greenland](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_Greenland)

~~~
snambi
May be we should just have islands? Why so many names? it is confusing.

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jfb
I believe that a monk seal was killed on the island recently, which would be a
fairly serious crime.

The whole setup is weird and slightly discomfiting in a pure colonial
paternalistic sense, but hey, it's obviously working in some ways.

For anyone looking for a good overview history of Hawai'i, I would recommend
Gavan Daws' _Shoal Of Time_ [1]

[1]
[http://www.uhpress.hawaii.edu/p-195-9780824803247.aspx](http://www.uhpress.hawaii.edu/p-195-9780824803247.aspx)

~~~
EvanKelly
There have been monk seal killings on Kauai and Molokai, but I'm not aware of
any on Niihau recently.

~~~
jfb
You're right, I just went back and checked the article in the _Times_ [1]

[1] [http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/12/magazine/who-would-
kill-a-...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/12/magazine/who-would-kill-a-monk-
seal.html?pagewanted=all)

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vermontdevil
I really wish I could get into the server and fix all these HTML errors.

The OCD in me is acting up.

------
hexagonc
I'm curious about the legal status of this land that was acquired prior to
Hawaii even being a state. Are the native inhabitants considered US citizens?
Does the Sinclair family have to pay property taxes on this land? I would
think not. It's kinda of cool to imagine truly owning land that no one else
can lay claim to, even historically.

EDIT: The native inhabitants may have originally claimed the land but does any
government claim jurisdiction over it?

~~~
205guy
Ni'ihau is part of the County of Kaua'i, State of Hawaii, USA. Just because
the king sold the land doesn't mean the king reliquished sovereingty over it.
Then the sovereignty of Hawaii passed to the Republic, then to the Territory
and State of Hawaii. So yes, this is incorporated territory of the USA, and
the inhabitants are full US citizens--as opposed to the various statuses in
unincorporated insular territories[1].

Oddly, I was recently reading about Liechenstein[2] where this was not the
case. It was formerly part of the Holy Roman Empire (titular to the Emporer of
such), but no one claimed it during the breakup (that's the short version,
it's actually more complicated). So the princes of the territory found
themselves to be sovereign--and then were able to somehow maintain sovereignty
continuing today.

PS: Amazingly, there is still some unclaimed territory[3] in this world, or
you could join seasteaders[4] out in international waters[5].

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insular_area](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insular_area)
[2]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liechtenstein](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liechtenstein)
[3]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unclaimed_Territory](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unclaimed_Territory)
[4]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasteading](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasteading)
[5]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_waters](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_waters)

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rdl
Wow, the nihau safaris look amazing -- a bit expensive, but I'd really like to
go (with a camera or an 1886 Winchester) for boar, someday. Although I'd
rather turn it into kalua pig rather than a trophy.

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rkowalick
This article and the previous one on North Sentinel certainly makes _Uncle
John 's 24-Karat Bathroom Reader_ seem like a pretty interesting book.

~~~
mcovey
It is awesome. I have 6 of them in my bathroom (they release 1 per year)

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l1ghtm4n
In this chain of forbidden places is also Gardiner's Island in New York at the
end of Long Island. Apparently gifted to the Gardiner family by the Queen
before the US existed. Signs surround it warning the public that they're not
welcome. I guess it's not forbidden so much as privately owned.

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s_q_b
With the traffic on and off the island, I'd imagine the modern native
population has a much higher resistance to Asian and European pathogens than
even a generation ago.

~~~
205guy
The article didn't go into details, but there was originally much contact
between Ni'ihau and the other islands, though mostly the nearest, which is
Kaua'i. During the period of initial contact with Westerners, many Hawaiians
on all islands did die of Western diseases, but their population did survive.
It's only in the past hundred years that Ni'ihau has been mostly cut off--
though the owners and residents do come and go and mingle with the general
population on Kaua'i. And nor have they been cut off from Western medicine, so
I imagine they are all vaccinated like everyone.

Still, it is an interesting question whether this semi-isolated population has
some lingering susceptibility to certain diseases.

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snambi
why is it forbidden if someone can take a helicopter tour? Looks like its a
private island.

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tomphoolery
Really? King "Kamehameha"?

Am I supposed to believe that a Super Saiyan was once the King of Hawaii?

edit: This article is crazy interesting.

~~~
geuis
History, read it. Note: this is probably the dumbest comment I've ever posted
to HN.

~~~
tomphoolery
Hah! Yeah I realize it was idiotic, it was partly satire. Incidentally, I am
also aware of the Dragon Ball series of anime to use weird words for character
names. I think Goku and Gohan mean something in Japanese (as in, they're not
normal names), and I always heard Vegeta meant "vegetable" but I'm not sure if
that's true or not. By "always heard" I mean "read on GeoCities". :)

~~~
toyg
Gohan is "rice" in Japanese. Can't remember what Goku is, but might just be a
wordplay on the original Chinese "Sun Wukong" character in the very famous
tale that inspired Toryiama.

