Fishing in Hawaii

Nkosi Stewart is our student aid in the Office of Honor. He is a 6’6” young man that is from St. Vincent in the Caribbean. He came to BYUH about 3 years ago as a non member of the Church, on a basketball scholarship. He was baptized a member by one of the players and 1 year later was called on a Mission to the West Indies Mission. He served in his home country of St. Vincent. He had some wonderful leadership experiences on his Mission and is now back to play basketball for BYUH again.


A couple of the kids that he knew before his mission have had him come fishing with them and he invited Elder Olson and I the other day. They had set the gill nets out the night before and we went with them to pull them. They take a 2 man kayak out about 200 yards and load 3 of the nets on and bring it back to the shore and we pick the fish out of the nets. It was just like back in Utah helping the Fisheries Biologists with their sampling of the reservoirs there, except I don’t recognize any of the fish over here. We didn’t catch as many fish as they usually do but it was just like talking to the Fish Heads back home that can look at a stream and tell you where they will catch what fish. Amit Lal, from Fiji has been doing this with his family his whole life and can read the ocean. He pointed out where the breakers are, the water is only about 3’ deep and the channel that comes through is where you want to set the nets. The large fish come in at high tide and then we gather nets at low tide. Of the 4 nets, one had about a 4’ shark in it and the one next to it only had 2 fish. He knew that the shark had thrashed around enough to scare the other fish off before they got caught. He gave the shark to a Tongan friend. He said back in Fiji, they make fish for fish and chips out of shark and they really do taste good.