Public Story
The Last Shinto Shrine on Maui
Maui's Jinja (Shrine) is over 100 years old, and the last remaining Shinto shrine on the island. It was originally built and attended by the Japanese laborers (like my great grandparents) who had immigrated to Hawaii to work in the sugar cane fields following an agreement between Japan's Meiji Emperor and the Hawaiian King, Kalakaua in 1885.
Like Shinto and Buddhist temples throughout the Hawaiian islands, these days congregations sizes are waning and many of the wooden structures need repair and upkeep. When my auntie and I visited the Maui Jinja in the winter, the shrine's caretaker, Wally, told us that the woodworkers who had maintained the traditional wood carving in the beams of the temple had either died or were too old to keep up the work.
The temple is in a quiet residential neighborhood of Wailuku, Maui.
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