PC: Kalani Robb, Instagram
Over the past week, Kalani Robb’s Instagram feed has read like a movie, as he describes finding his biological family after more than 40 years. Adopted at a young age by Californians Richard and Linda Robb, it was never a secret that Kalani carried Hawaiian blood in his veins. However, only a few people, not including himself, knew just how strong his Hawaiian lineage was. That lineage is, in Kalani’s own words, “pretty fairy tale-ish.” Born a Dowsett, his father left when he was born and Kalani was “mysteriously adopted” by the Robbs.
In eight recent Instagram posts and counting, Kalani revealed that his biological family had been on the islands for years, and were involved in some pretty pivotal moments in surfing and on the islands. His great, great grandparents James Dowsett and Annie Ragsdale were some of the earliest (white) settlers of Hawaii and worked with King Kamehameha II. His great grandmother was engaged to Duke Kahanamoku, and a great, great uncle Hamana Kalili originated the shaka, he says.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CFdDeDRHALP/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
The knowledge of his biological parents was a closely guarded secret, “my adopted parents knew who I was from the very beginning and where my heritage came from. They hid that truth from me all my life.” Over text, Kalani shared with me that “this is just the surface because the stuff I haven’t talked about is pretty serious. Not all fun… if you think the information about my family is crazy just wait [until] you hear about my personal story and my beginnings.”
Despite pressing for an interview, Kalani said he doesn’t want to give away too much information too quickly as he’s hoping to do a documentary on his life soon. He has already been approached by a few different groups he says, including the producers of the Momentum Generation documentary which of course tells the story of a group of supremely influential surfers, including Kalani, Kelly Slater and Rob Machado, as they took pro surfing by storm in the 1990s. In the documentary, it’s revealed that many of the group’s members dealt with troubling home lives, something that brought them all together at the North Shore house of Benji Weatherley where they bonded over the courage and drive it took to, first be allowed into the lineup, then to surf, the Banzai Pipeline.
Specifics were never shared about Kalani’s own home life, but perhaps that’s because he didn’t even know the specifics himself at the time. By the sounds of it, that just changed.
