Bare feet

Last evening I had the opportunity to spend some time watching Hawaiin dance by The Barefeet Hawaiian Inc. Time well spent I must say. Steve did a good job of anchoring the show using the right words at the right time.

It was fun to watch the swaying movements of the participating dancers with their smiling faces.

Among the Hula Dance implements they used, I liked the Puili for the rhythmic sound it made in sync with the beat of the song.

Other implements used were Uli uli, Poi Balls, and ii

The addition of Elvis Presley's song was a good touch as Elvis had a good connection with Hawaii including his movie Blue Hawaii. Some young girls came forward when Steve mentioned learning the basic steps.

The men were equally eager and some stepped forward (barefeet of course) to try out the steps.

I was a bit worried that some kid would spin the Poi Ball in the wrong direction and injure someone but care was taken and no one was injured.

I captured what I could (from where I was seated) and put it together to form a short video. The first two minutes of the video is Kaluva Pepe, the song featuring Hula from Hawaii, Otea from Tahiti, Haka from New Zealand and Sasa from Samoan.

As Steve mentioned, he was giving us a taste of Polynesian dance and music. Polynesian means many islands. I just looked it up on the internet and learned that the largest country in Polynesia is New Zealand. Here is a picture from Wikipedia.

As mentioned earlier, it was time well spent. I am sure all those who were present there, went home with positive vibes.

Hoisting the Flag

It’s a special feeling when you see your national flag being hoisted and it must be a totally exhilarating experience for the school children.

Last month I had the opportunity to attend the Republic Day parade of a school and it brought back memories of my school days.

In those days Republic Day was celebrated with great fanfare throughout the country. Not only were the government offices illuminated, but a bus, a tram, and a train was fully illuminated in every city (yes there were trams in those days in Bombay – now Mumbai) There were processions of colourful floats taken out in the night and it had a real festive mood. It was a real happy happy day.  But good things don’t last. This was called off after the 1962 China war and was never revived after that. Now as a token we have the Republic Day Parade only in the capitol.

Coming back to the school it was nice to see the girls smartly turned out in their RSP uniform (Road Safety Patrol)

The young ones keenly watched the dance skit performed by the senior girls.

I was amazed at these two girls who danced bare foot. I could see pebbles on the ground and was wondering how they could move around with such grace on those stones.

In comparison this tiny tot had some footwear and tried her best to synchronize with the music.

These seniors must be feeling good with some awards and prizes coming their way.

Then we had these school peons with tension written on their face as they were a part of the team who ensured the smooth flow of the programme.

The children in this school should consider themselves lucky as it is very rare where you see so many tall trees and greenery surrounding the school. 
What I liked best with the music group was that everyone who could play some instrument pitched in. So we have these two girls on the small  synthesizers and one on the key board. I wondered why this boy was standing and playing the drum, could be because there is no bass drum pedal to operate.

Then we had the school leader who doubled up to play the Congo with two budding guitarists next to him.

And they picked the right song for the occasion, Vande Matram by A R Rehman.

So I used the same song to string up this seven minute video and put in all still and video clips that I had.

Enjoy  J