If you are going to be in Hawaii over the New Year holiday, you may want to learn this phrase: Hau’oli Makahiki Hou. It means Happy New Year and it is pronounced as follows:
Hau’oli — “how-oh-lee”
Makahiki — “mah-kah-hee-kee”
Hou — “ho”
In the Hawaiian language, the word makahiki means year. The Makahiki season (roughly around October to February time) was celebrated in Hawaii for centuries. In ancient Hawaiian culture, the time of Makahiki was a peaceful time to enjoy harvest, feasts, religious ceremonies and relaxation. The Mahahiki season also defined the transitional time between harvest and new planting — e.g. the new (agricultural) year.
The Hawaiian word hau’oli means happy, cheerful, joyful. While hou means new in this context. So, if you try to literally translate “hau’oli makahiki hou” from Hawaiian to English it would be “happy year new”.
If you are thinking or dreaming of celebrating the new year in Hawaii, check out our New Year’s Eve articles:
– Waikiki/Honolulu New Year’s Eve
– Hawaii’s Big Island New Year’s Eve
As the new year approaches, we’d like to be among the first to wish you Hau ‘oli Makahiki Hou!
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Learn how to say Merry Christmas in Hawaiian language.
Sheila Beal
Andy Beal
13 comments
I certainly hope it’s happy! 🙂 Right back at ya! Hope you guys have a nice time and enjoy seeing in the New Year!
Thank you, Evelyn! Will you be getting to see any of those fantastic fireworks in your wonderful city? Happy 2008!
You know what? I don’t know! Maybe I’ll go running at 11:30 and head down to Aloha Tower! At least I won’t have to worry about parking! 🙂
That sounds like a great plan, Evelyn. (I’ll pretend I’m not jealous now.) 🙂
Happy New Year, Sheila. Hope that 2008 is a great one for you and Andy.
Hau’oli Makahiki Hou! Have a good one.
Mele kalikimaka tooo!!
HAPPY NEW YEAR Sheila !!
I hope you are having wonderful days !!
Myself and Marco will be back to wonderful Hawai’i in Summer 2010 !!! so we will be reading your blog EVERY DAY !!!!!
We need to learn as much as we can !!!
Marco and I have already treasured some of your precious info and hints !!!
PLEASE , keep the excellent work up !!!!!!!!!
Love from Italy , laura
How good to learn how to say Happy New Year in Hawaiian. I am repeating that to my friends and relatives in my native Brazil. In Portuguese (official language of Brazil) it is ‘Feliz Natal’.
Now I am a happy resident in Molokai, a place I chose to enjoy my retirement. Hou’oli Makahiki Hou to all Hawaiians, Americans, Brazilians and all citizens of this world.
Could you please fix the spelling of Happy New Year – on the first page, the place you click on to get to this page of explanation, you incorrectly spelled it Makakiki. Thank you in advance for correcting this.
We’ve searched our site and cannot find “Makakiki” anywhere.
It shows up in Google search results. Search on “hau’oli makahiki hou.” Your site comes up first (congratulations). Go to the pulldown “How do you say Happy New Year in Hawaii?” You will see the error there. This probably reflects Google’s earlier harvest of text from your site that you have subsequently corrected. Good luck getting it corrected!
hau’oli makahiki hou!
Unfortunately, typos happen 🙂
Any changes would be under Google’s control, but we’ll look into it.