Isles’ youths often leave, so try to assist their return

Boy, we’ve been worried about brain drain for a really long time.

This week Gov. David Ige told members of the Hawaii Venture Capital Association that he will request $10 million to build the innovation sector of the economy and create more job opportunities.

“We all know the story of our children going away to college and never coming back,” Ige said. “It’s about stopping that brain drain.”

This promise by Hawaii politicians goes back for at least as long as Hawaii has been a state. One example: a 1959 campaign speech for Jimmie Kea­loha, Republican candidate for lieutenant governor.

“Jimmie Kealoha is distressed that every year, hundreds of young people who are graduated from our schools are finding it necessary to leave their home islands to go either to Oahu or to the United States Mainland in search of permanent employment and opportunity. Most of these youngsters would like to be able to build their futures right here at home. But they cannot if they can’t find work.”

(BTW, that was a speech on Jimmie’s behalf. He wasn’t speaking in third person, which would be weird and kind of funny. He ended up winning and was Gov. William Quinn’s lieutenant governor, the first LG in Hawaii.)

No one would ever argue against providing meaningful, challenging, well-paying opportunities in Hawaii, but there are worse things than leaving home to pursue opportunities — like wanting to leave and, because of lack of support or lack of gumption or crushing filial obligations, not being able to go.

Know what song Hawaii kids are singing right now, right this moment? At the top of their lungs and with full commitment, Hawaii’s keiki are belting out the lyrics of the “Moana” anthem “How Far I’ll Go,” and guess what? Moana has a serious case of curiosity and wanderlust.

“I know everybody on this island seems so happy on this island.

Everything is by design.

I know everybody on this island has a role on this island.

So maybe I can roll with mine.”

If those lyrics don’t kick you in the gut, then you have lived a blessed life untouched by the terrible pull between ambition and inertia. Poor Moana, she spends half the song trying unsuccessfully to talk herself out of going while everyone demands she stay home.

“See the light where the sky meets the sea

It calls me

And no one knows how far it goes

If the wind in my sail on the sea stays behind me

One day I’ll know

How far I’ll go”

If you haven’t seen the movie, it’s not spoiling anything to say that Moana ends up fulfilling both her quest and her responsibilities to her island.

But that’s one of the great things about Disney movies: The hero gets to be happy in the end. Real life isn’t always so satisfying. But offering talented Hawaii people a choice to come home if they want to, that continues to be a heroic quest.

Reach Lee Cataluna at 529-4315 or lcataluna@staradvertiser.com.