Less than a mile from Brigham Young University's main campus is BYU's Museum of Peoples and Cultures.
Inside is an exhibit dedicated to Pacific Island artifacts, centered on a kava bowl more than a century old.
The kava bowl serves as a bridge to generations and represents community, connection and family.
Kava is an intrinsic part of the culture of the Pacific Islands. It is traditionally used in cultural rituals as a ceremonial drink and is prepared and served in a kava bowl.
Kava bowls vary in name and design across the Pacific.
For example, in Samoa and Fiji, the kava bowl is called a tanoa. In Tonga, the kava bowl is referred to as the kumete.
The exhibit at the Museum of Peoples and Cultures is centered around one kumete.
The kumete comes from the Wolfgramm family and has been passed down through generations after it was gifted to Emil Otto Friedrich Wolfgramm by Tonga’s second king, King Tupou II.
On March 28, the Museum and the Department of Anthropology will host a kava ceremony to reunite the Wolfgramm descendants and the broader Tongan community with the kumete.
Lynette Finau, a professor in the cultural anthropology department at BYU, is one of the Wolfgramm descendants.
She has been a key coordinator of the Kumete and the integration of the kava ceremony at BYU.
“I honestly feel that my ancestors are behind all of this. That perhaps, you know, as I think about my great great grandfather, he would have wanted his story to be told,” Finau said. “I think it’s very symbolic of his love for the island, and for the people, and his transformation as a German man ... to being a Tongan.”
The event will be a reunion, bringing a story passed down through generations of families to life by connecting the past to the present.
This connection between past and present is one of the museum’s main purposes.
By preserving artifacts, the museum hopes people will engage with and connect to these physical embodiments of history.
Paul Stavast, director of the Museum of Peoples and Cultures, shared his thoughts on the purpose of this connection.
“That’s what we want to do here, is help people make connections to their ancestors, particularly other people, and build on the bonds of humanity, build the bonds of humanity and build connections between people,” Stavast said. "And especially ancestors … things that they touched, things that they made."
Sia Tupai, who is part of the curatorial team at the museum, shared her thoughts as well.
“We are very rich in that. In our heritage, in our cultural heritage,” Tupai said. "I think those are some very important things that our museum is doing to preserve those cultures for people who are no longer here and for communities that are still here and just learning about them."
The Pacific Islands exhibit is, at its core, a story of family.
It represents generations of people, stories and memories.
It embodies culture and serves as a physical link between the past and present.