About Me

We are a family of six. Mika (the dad) is originally from the islands of Western Samoa. Tiffany (the mom) is originally from Pennsylvania, but loves the Polynesian culture. Tavita is 10 years old, Sinalei is 8, Sosefina is 5,and Viliamu is 2 and his days of dancing have just started :) Our family loves to dance and perform. We enjoy being able to share our culture with others.

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Pictures from Summer of 2012

Summer has been good to us . . . although it flew by way to quickly! Here are some pictures of a couple of our performances this summer. Most of the pictures are of the kids (the only one I get of me is taken by myself :) As you can see the kids are getting bigger and fun to watch perform. The baby of the family, Vili (2 1/2) danced with us 3 times this summer and will be ready to do them all next. He loves it and is hilarious to watch, but he tries his hardest! Some of my kids are so shy, but you get them up on stage and it is like night and day. One of my children's teachers commented on their poise and self confidence when doing a presentation in front of his class, and I told her that "I owe it all to dancing" I have realized that we started this to help them learn and keep some of their culture here on the East Coast of the US. But I soon realized that it does so much more for them than that . . . also for us as a family as well. It has brought us closer, and to that I will say again that "I owe a lot of it to dancing" Have a fabulous fall!!

Getting ready backstage . . .






 
Hawaii
 
 
Tavita got a solo number this year, which he was really exited about, because then Vili couldn't steal his spotlight.  :)

 
Introducing my auana (modern) hula number using puili (split bamboo sticks) implements


 
 
 
Tavita blowing the conch shell to start the show . . .


 
 
 
 Fiji
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Samoa
 
 
 

 
Husking the Coconut
 
 
Finding the eyes, nose and mouth of coconut
 
 
 Tahiti