Kū, his wife and children lived during the time of a major famine. Kū worked the land every day, but food was still scarce.
Kū told his wife that he could save them, but he would have to go away forever. His wife said, “No!”
But one day, as she could not bear to hear their children crying from hunger, she asked Kū how he would save them. He told her that he would go into the earth, head first. He said when she sees his toes come out of the soil, the rain will come and grow an ‘ulu tree, from which only their family can eat. But when the seedlings of the ‘ulu come out of the ground, they can give those to their neighbors for them to eat and share. This was the origin of the breadfruit in the Pacific.
