Friday 17 March 2017

The Big 2017 Polynesian Celebration!

Chehuuuuu! Guess what? Yesterday Team 5 got the opportunity to experience the 2nd day of Polyfest along with some other schools! The trip was for us to experience and learn more about our Polynesian culture. The stages that had cultural groups performing on were the Maori stage, Cook Island stage and the Diversity Stage! I really wanted to watch the Samoan and Tongan stages but they start on Friday and Saturday! We arrived on a bus and waited in line for about 5-10 minutes then we got to go inside well actually outside.

My 1st highlight happened when we arrived and got to attend some of the workshops. Some workshops were finding out about the ancient culture and traditions about our people.  Plus we saw a lot of stalls selling Island related stuff you could wear and eat. My group also got to go to a workshop called “Te Wananga o Aotearoa where they, had a 360 degree camera and record us with some cool moves!

ASB Polyfest 2017 Logo.
After participating in all of these fun workshops we had the opportunity to get into groups and spread wild! We got to go to different stages to watch people perform, do fun activities and heaps more! Even some of my family was there cheering on my cousin, as she was performing on Diversity Stage in the Fijian group. Also today, my aunty will be performing in a Tongan group for AGGS. After watching a few performances we were hot and dying to jump into a pool. We were so exhausted we went to buy some drinks to cool us down. Finally we got to watch some real action go on with the hard pukana’s and the hard poi movements, but I was really dying to go watch some Tongan and Samoan stages.
Us in the bus going back to school.

Lastly it is really important for students to participate in a polyfest group because it is priority to learn about your traditions in your culture and learn the dances of the ancestors that were there before you! Join a polyfest group even if you're Chinese or Indian, find out if there is a Diversity stage group in your school, but it is really important to join a polyfest group to follow the footsteps and the ways your ancestors shared.

It hit 2:00 and it was time to travel back to school! No… I didn’t want to leave, well at least I was coming back on Saturday where the Tongan and Samoan stages were on. Yay! Anyways we lined back up and hopped back into the bus and we went away! Also we got to take back some awesome gifts from the polyfest workshops such as: Mobile phone fans, Calendars, Posters, Temporary tattos and heaps more to explore and have fun with!

Thanks for reading and I hope this makes you want to go to Polyfest and learn about polynesian culture!

By Mitchell.M

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