Spooked - Kū's Legacy

Episode Date: September 18, 2026

Joe Punohu is a ghost tour guide in Waikiki, Hawaiʻi. He spends his nights telling visitors about the spirits and dark history of the islands. But one night, one of those stories hits too close to home… and doesn’t let Joe go. Thank you Joe for sharing your story with Spooked. You can follow Joe on social media as "Hawaiian Hauntings." Produced by Erick Yáñez, original score by Sandra Lawson-Ndu, art by Teo Ducot.  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

I've been a bite of batter, but the batter bit me back. I bought it with some butter, then the batter did attack. The butter battle broke, my breakfast biscuit platter, so I brought a bat and battled back, but that just made it matter. Ah, you've got us over to sphout. Say, many religious traditions. And text many, there's a story where the God says to a man, you there, take your son, your only son, whom you love,

and go to the land of Mariah. where you will climb a mountain, a mountain I will show you. And at the top of that mountain, this is what I want you to do. I want you to kill your beloved son. Then burn his body as a sacrifice to me and offering to your Lord. And this man doesn't argue, doesn't beg or plead now. The next morning he rises early, gathers his son along with two servants, cuts the wood he's going to need for the fire.

Packs provisions on to his donkey and they travel for three days, three days. When they arrive at the mountain, he tells the servants stay here with the donkey. The boy and I will go up there. He straps the wood for the fire on his son's back for him to carry while he himself holds the knife. Father and son walk together up the mountain, the sun. Curious perhaps ask his father, father, we've got the fire. We've got the wood.

Where is the sacrifice? The man says not to worry the Lord will provide. At the top, the man arranges the altar, sets up the wood. And then he seizes his son, binds him. He places his only son on the altar. He reaches for his knife He raises the blade high To slay his beloved boy

Then, right then A voice An angel says, stop You have proven yourself Do not kill your boy There's a ram stuck over there in the bushes Go and offer that up instead And that's what the man does

Then he walks back down the mountain And as God says Because you did this because you offered your son, your only son to me, I will multiply your children like the stars in the heavens, like the sand upon the shore. Your children will triumph over their enemies, and through them all the nations of the earth shall be blessed.

Blessings beyond imagining. Blessings, blessings, blessings, blessings. I have known this story since I was a small child, but reading it again recently, I realized I missed, the most important part. The part they didn't bring up in services, that last part. See, the man walks up the mountain with his son. But even though the son is spared, the man, he walks back down alone.

In fact, there is never another mention of him speaking to his beloved son ever again. and as a father with a beloved boy of my own. I don't know if all the blessings of all the gods in all the worlds is worth the cost of what he left. Smooth stars. Me, different type. Joe was born and raised on the islands and growing up, he learned that spirits aren't just stories. They're also history. So in 2008, Joe started working as a ghost tour guy.

He teamed up with the veteran guide named Uncle Joe who taught him the basics of Hawaiian protocol. How to talk to spirits. How to show them respect. They each drive a van, pick up their guests, gather everyone in a circle at the hotel lobby. And before they began, they give one final. This is your last chance to turn around. We're taking you to real places with real history where spirits still linger. If you don't like that, go back to your hotel now.

Because once we start, we're not turning around. We ain't turn around either. I had been doing the tours for maybe a month, maybe two. I was still kind of learning how to do it. I can remember this particular night, one month into the job, we had over 20 people on our tour with us. We had local Kama Aina, military, we had tourists from other countries, tourists from the mainland. But at one individual certainly stuck out. She kind of introduced herself to me as a psychic.

She was short, she had black hair. She sounded like a local lady, but she said she was from Australia. Throughout the week, you get a lot of people who would come up claiming to be psychics. So I'm like, okay, you know, that's cool. If they think they're a psychic, then they can be a psychic. We started driving towards our first location at the Polly Lookout. It's a cliff, von Tocel. up to Kola Mountain Range.

This was a battlefield back in the 1790s where the Big Island fought against the island of Oahu, and many, many warriors died in this land. We're pulling off the off-ramp to the Polly Lookout, and the blackness just engulfs us. Every time people ask, are we actually getting out of a van here? I'm like, this is a ghost tour. This is where we ain't gonna get out,

and we're gonna walk. As we would get out, we would gather everybody in the front before we began. And as a protocol, we'd ask him for a moment of silence, and we would turn around and look towards the Polly Lookout, and we would address the spirits there. And at this point, all the fun and the humor is out of our voices because we're now talking to our ancestors. We ask permission to walk into your home as guests. We do not want to walk against you. If tonight is not a good night, let us know and we'll turn her on and go back. Our second stop after the Polly Lookout was a place called Ulupo Heyal.

It's an ancient Hawaiian temple that dates back to about 800,900 AD when it was built. It's where the remains of over 80,000 Hawaiians are supposedly buried, they believe. At Ulupo Heiyao, we would talk about Kamapua, the half-man, half-pig, shape-shifter, who would frequent Ulupo in the past according to the stories and the legends. But mostly I enjoyed that place and talk about how the Hawaiians consider the rock to be sacred and what happens to those who take rocks or desecrate rocks.

The last stop would be at the end of Paradise Park on the Manoa Falls Trail. It's a popular hiking trail, and it's the remnant part of the old Ali'i Trail, the paved road that the kings and the queens would walk. We get to the back of the valley, up to the gate, where that the Manoa Falls hiking trail begins. On the right is a drop off.

On the left is just a little mountain, and it's very, very dark. Me and Uncle Joe were in the front of the group walking down. We walked through a fence, and as we are walking, I could feel this very powerful, presence on the trail. I never felt this before.

It felt like there was a person standing there looking at me, but I couldn't see him. I wasn't sure if this was my mind playing tricks on me or not. And then all of a sudden, the psychic lady comes up to us and tells us that we need to stop. She tells me, hold on, hold on, hold on. There's a guy over here and he wants to talk to you guys. me and Uncle Joe. She says he's right over there and she points right towards one of the large trees

next to this ravine. It's a bit of a drop maybe about 40 feet, 50 feet down to the river. She said he's standing right there and he wants to have a conversation. And so we're like, okay, sure, let's go ahead and do it.

These are my kupuna. These are my ancestors. I'm eager to hear what the spirits would have to say. But I don't know this lady yet. She hasn't proven to me that she's a psychic. She looks at us and she says, he wants to know why you guys keep coming back here every night. What is your purpose?

You know, we're like, oh, we come back here to tell stories. And she turns to us and says, why do you guys seek him out? When I'm like, what? We don't want to seek anything out. And she says that this is somebody who people would seek out, and he would grant them favors. And if you want his favor, you need to leave the right offering.

Or in Hawaiian, Ho'okupu. Whether it be food, fruits, flowers, you wrap it in the sacred tea leaf, and you present it as an offering. And I'm like, oh, okay, that's interesting. what kind of hooku does he want? And so she looks back at us, kind of like eyes a little wide.

She says, well, he wants human blood. Me and Uncle Joe, we just went, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Nobody does it anymore. What the heck? You know, referring back to the ancient Hawaiian days and the art of human sacrifice and all of that stuff.

All of a sudden, a little thought pops from my head. I'm like, I wonder what will happen if you left the chicken over here. It just, like, crossed my mind. mind in a flash. You know, if we left something that wasn't human as an offering. The lady looks at me directly and starts laughing. She says, he doesn't want a chicken. And I'm like, what? Oh my God. I didn't say anything. This thing flashed through my mind. What the heck is this thing? It can read my mind? She's looking at me. She's like, were you thinking that? I'm like, uh, yeah, but I'm

I'm not going to ever do it. And then she said he thought it was hilarious, and he's laughing. And I just kind of looked at her like, what the heck is going on? She turns around and she's like, this energy I've never felt before. This is a very powerful male presence, but this was never a person. This is a God. The first thought in my head was no way. For me, gods are just stories that you read about, things that you learn, history growing up, and stuff like that.

We have a very, very male god in Polynesian and Hawaiian tradition. His name is Koo. A different version of him would be Kukai Limoo, which was the god of war. The god of war, people would seek out in the olden days. They would pay him with human sacrifice, human blood. and he would grant them victory in battle. So it made sense to me that this lady is referring to the god of war, Kukai Limoku. As a realization came, I feel a hand wrap around my upper right shoulder,

and I'd start getting pulled down towards a ravine. I can see nothing in front of me. There's nobody there. But I could feel like something gravity. me. It was a strong force, steadily pulling me down off of the cliff. The river is directly below there, so it would have been a fall onto these big riverstones. And at that point, I got so scared that I couldn't talk, I couldn't think. My mind just went blank. At that point, I can remember hearing Uncle Joe yelling about something, and then I could feel him grabbing my left hand

and pulling me back up. The rest of the tour grabs me. They're grabbing my hand, my upper arm, my shoulder, anything they can get a hold of. And from what I can remember, they started playing like a tug of war. And then all of a sudden, the entity let go of my arm. And we all went flying back onto the trail. We were all lying down on the trail now. We had all fallen everybody. Flashlights on the ground.

We can't really see anything. I was so scared I was frozen. I couldn't move. Uncle Joe gets up and looks at us and says, What are you doing? Run! Everybody just booked it for the vans. We got out there so fast. As I drove away, I was still shaking.

My driving was entirely on automatic mode. I'm trying to crack jokes to make the mood lighter, but nobody would laugh. They wouldn't say a word. They looked really uncomfortable. I pull over to the Alamuana Hotel. And so I tell them, okay. Everybody, Alamuana Hotel, yes, and get off here.

Everybody else in Waikiki, I can go drive you guys to your hotel. And everybody piles out of the van. And I look at them and I'm like, no, no, no, I can drive you guys to your hotels, you know. No worry. And they're like, no, no, no, we're just going to call a cab. It's fine. I saw the psychically. grabbing her things.

And I'm like, wait, wait, auntie, what's happening? And she looked at me and she's like, he's still with you. Instantly, I got chicken skin, goosebumps, up my arm, up my body. And I'm like, what am I supposed to do about that, Auntie? What am I supposed to do? She's like, I don't know. Now I'm by myself. I'm trying to calm my nerves, trying to figure out what I'm doing.

I call it my dad. My dad, you know, I cannot come home tonight. Something might be following me. I cannot bring it home. Can you go to the bar with me? I just need company tonight. My dad ended up coming. We went to one of the bars down the street from my house,

and we just sat and talked. As I'm telling my dad about pulling on my arm, my right shoulder, I pull it up, and I had forgotten that on my right shoulder, right where the pulling happened, is a tattoo of mine that I had gotten when I was 18 it's a petroglyph of a sail with two rocks under it

but what it represents is our last name, our family name who know who so I pulled it up my dad touches it and it's hot to the touch it didn't burn me but it was hot to the touch

my dad was tripping out so he puts a beer bottle over it ice cold, drink and leaves it there for a minute, touches it again, it's still hot. We get home when the bar closes about 4 o'clock. I stay up to the morning, feeling my tattoo every now and then. The burning went down, but I felt scared.

I called my boss the very next morning and I told him, I need a few days off. I might have just had an experience with the god of war, Kukai Limoku. What the heck does that mean? he had no idea he's like Joe we have a sold out tour tonight can I count on you if not I got a refund all these people

26 people and I'm like ah I don't know he's like I tell you what I have a friend who lives on Oahu she's a Kahuna she has a deep connection with the spirits what if I have her be your backup driver

and she can support you and she could be there for you. And I'm like, all right, all right, that'll be something. It felt safer to me knowing that I had somebody spiritual that I could rely on. I met the Kahuna in one of the hotels in Waikiki. She had a haku-lay of flowers around her head and the little robe over one shoulder that the Kahunas would wear. She introduces herself to me and we talk a little bit

and she's nice. You know, she's very nice, very polite. We picked up our people at the hotel, then we headed to our sites, and I noticed as we went to each site, she stuck by me the whole time. She's like, I need to be with you. We get to the last site.

This is in Manoa Valley, right where everything happened. We get out of the car. The Kahuna came up to, me and said, okay, I heard this is where you had some trouble. Let me go see what's going on. And she goes walking down the trail in the pitch black, no flashlight. And I'm like, I'm not going down that trail tonight.

I'm not that brave. So I stand and we do the stories by the car. As I'm done with the stories, Auntie's not back yet. And I give her five more minutes. And Auntie's not back yet. I'm starting to get worried. And I grab my life. and I'm like, great.

Now I need to go walk back here by myself. And as I'm going to step out and go look for her, she comes through the dark and she's mad. She looks at me and she's like, Joe, what are you doing back here? Huh? What did you do? I looked at her, I'm like, what are you talking about?

She's like, can you tell me why? Kukai Limo is back here and why he's mad at you. I told her auntie, I don't know, I never did nothing. He's telling me, you stopped worshipping him. He's telling me you forsook him. And I'm like, Auntie, I never know he was real till Tuesday. And then all of a sudden she starts to contort. She starts contorting her arms and she goes,

Ow! I'm getting a message from the spirits. I'm getting a message from the spirits. And her arms are twisting. And, you know, and I'm like, uh, okay, what are the spirits have to say? She starts to calm down and she's like, your family used to break bones for human sacrifice.

What does this mean to you? I'm like, I don't know, Auntie, I don't know. I promise, I'm not worshipping the god of war. You know, she's like, huh, okay, okay, maybe in a past life. And she's like, no worry, Auntie, take care of it for you. You can come back over here. Kuka and the Mokobata you no more.

I have no idea what she did, but if you're a Kahuna, you should be trustworthy. I tell her thank you. Gave her a hug, and she said, if you ever need me, you know, let me know, I'm always there for you. Two months after this occurrence, I did some research of our genealogy because there's clearly more to our genealogy than we were told. We find out that we had come from a man named Hava-Havanui.

Hava-Havanui was the high priest, the Kahuna Nui. Basically, this guy was in charge of giving human sacrifice and performing it to Kuka Ilimoku. We also come from Kamehameha. Kameha, his responsibility, his Kuliana, was the god of war. So the two people that were in charge of the human sacrifice were both in my blood. And then I later found out that the petroglyph, my tattoo, isn't our real name. I believe it was my great-grandfather who changed our name.

to Punohu. Why he changed their name? We're not entirely sure. But all of this was during the time when people were being pressured to be Catholic and you get arrested if you spoke or practiced anything Hawaiian. It felt heavy because with this Hawaiian blood comes Kuliana, responsibility.

That would mean I still need to worship this god of war. this god of war. But I'm a Catholic. I can't believe in this stuff. I had spoken to my pastor about this conflict. He told me good advice. He's like, Joe, you're Hawaiian. I'm Hawaiian. These spirits, they are not gods. They're your ancestors. Treat them like respected, venerated elders, but do not worship them. That put it a lot into perspective for me on how I can proceed with this. I think Kukai Limoo was upset that our family had forgotten who our ancestors were. But now how I pay homage and how I pay respect to him is by telling these stories about him. Last year, I went all the way by myself into the middle of the forest,

set up a table, set up a chair, and I left an offering of food. And I left an offering of food. And And my purpose at night was to sit down and tell the same story that I had shared. And as I talk about Kukai Limoku, I start to hear the snacking of lips next to me. Like somebody eating the ho-ocupu that I had put down. Thank you, Joe, for sharing your stories spooked. And follow Joe on social media as Hawaiian hauntings. That piece was scored by Sandra Lawson Undu. is produced by Eric Yonyes.

And signs, sometimes on a person, sometimes on a place, connecting planes and spirits and times and actions and events. If you, dear spookster, are aware of such a mark, or you know someone who is, please. Do me a favor. Let me know. Spook at snapjudgment.org because there's nothing better than a spook story from a spooked listener.

KQED is the holder of the dark flame wherein Spook resides. Don't seek to find it. Let's it seek to find you. On Team Spook, the union represented producers, artists, editors and engineers, arms of the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians, Communications, Working of America, AFL, CIO, Local 51. We've got the special incantation from Spook legal, saying that no, Snap Studios content may be used for training, testing, or developing machines. learning or AI system without prior written permission. Spooked is brought to you by the team that enjoys a good book to read.

Except, of course, for Mr. Mark Ristich. Middle school, he vowed to the universe that Huckleberry Finn would be the very last book he ever read. He has kept that promise. Let's believe there's David Kim, Zoe Frigno, Eric Yannias, Mercer Dodge, Tailed Decott, Miles Lassie, Regina Barriaco, Nicholas Marks, the Spook theme song, is by Papa City Miller. My name is Gunn Washington, and I want to apologize.

Because just now, just a moment ago, I suggested, I intimated that my partner and dear friend Mr. Mark Richard does not read books, and that is an outrageous slander. And really, just because something is true doesn't mean someone should just toss it out into the world.

I could just have easily said that Mark doesn't believe in a place called Cleveland that's true enough that Mark thinks that shampoo is just a corporate money-making scheme that's also true but just because something is true like telling you that

Mark eats ice cream with chopsticks doesn't mean that is helpful in fact certain truth might obscure the truth of who Mark Ristich really is why because certain facts are unconnected to the whole some facts distract instead of informed and facts

facts can hide truths. Because I assure you the reality, there I say, the truth of who Mark Ristich really is. It's far, far darker, more sinister, more terrifying than you can even imagine. Never, ever, never, never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, never, ever, never, never, Turn out