Day 7 Oahu--Apr. 8

All day today was set aside for the Polynesian Cultural Center. We decided to go with a tour group because of the challenge in getting to it on the northeast shore of the island, about an hour and fifteen minutes away. Our ticket included the ali’i (Royal) luau dinner, which we figured was going to be a big meal. Rather than worrying about taking a lunch or paying exorbitant prices inside the Center, we went to Smorgies, just a block away, for their $7.95 breakfast buffet. After filling up there, we figured we could get by with a snack until dinner. We caught the bus at the Hyatt Regency, another two blocks away took off at 10:30 for the park. Our tour guide, Cousin Gandhi was a native of Samoa who came here in 1999. His chatter along the way was a bit over the top but he did tell us the points of interest along the way. It was also enough to make us glad we hadn’t paid to have him be our guide for the remainder of the day. We arrived just as the park opened at noon. The Polynesian Cultural Center (from here on I’ll call it the PCC, like they do) is administered by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Our ticket included a tram ride to the town of Lale to visit the campus of Brigham Young University Hawai’i and the Temple, which was the first LDS temple built outside of the continental U.S. But we didn’t avail ourselves of that part of our ticket. Seventy percent of the people who work in the park are students from the University and ones who work in the “Villages” come from the country or islands represented. We were pleased to find there was no proselytizing within the park. And I’ll give the LDS Church this: while the Congregationalists tried to wipe out the dances, language and traditions of the natives wherever they went, this is a beautiful setting that is all about preserving those same things for some of the Polynesian Triangle nations. The Center is an idyllic mostly outdoors setting with six separate “villages” for Hawaii, Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, Tahiti, and Aotearoa (New Zealand), and exhibit areas for Rapa Nui (Easter Islands) and the Marquesas. The villages have indigenous buildings, activities and presentations. We learned greetings and other words in the native languages. Drumming and dancing are integral to each culture and the differences and similarities are highlighted. There is also a lagoon running through the area adding to the illusion that these are islands, just as the Polynesian nations are. Indeed, the word Polynesia is Greek for “many islands”. We started by taking a canoe ride from the entrance to the very back of the PCC, where we found very few people. It made our first encounters very personal but gradually the crowds worked their way through the park. At 2:30 there was a canoe pageant on the lagoon with islanders performing on each canoe. After a very full afternoon we enjoyed the luau complete with a roasted pig and a band and accompanying hula dancers. Our day ended with an extravaganza called “HA: Breath of Life”, which featured more than 100 dancers doing dances from the six island nations about which we had learned so much. We were all happy to have a bus driver to take us back to the hotel, to which we didn’t return until 10:30. It had been a very full day.