The new year is off to a great start at the Polynesian Cultural Center. For example, our first newsletter of 2005 reports on the annual E Luana Kakou Concert and Moanikeala Hula Festival on January 21-22 (see You should have been here). In fact, now's the time to start planning for our upcoming Samoan World Fire Knife Dance Competition and Samoan Arts Festival, May 12-14, 2005, with more details and other news of PCC coming in future e-newsletter issues. Enjoy!

Aloha . . . and other island-style greetings

Most Polynesian greetings fall into two broad categories: love and life.

Almost everybody knows the Hawaiian greeting word aloha not only means hello and goodbye, but also "love." In other words, it's the universal expression of emotion upon greeting and leaving dear friends and family.

The Samoans similarly greet people with talofa — which is actually a contraction of ta or "you and I," and alofa or "love" — although there's a different goodbye word in Samoan.

Most other Polynesians use a greeting word that falls into the "life" category. For instance, when a Maori from New Zealand says kia ora or a Tahitian bids you iaorana, he's really wishing you ora — life! Incidentally, Samoans sometimes say soifua for goodbye, which is really a respectful way of saying "live!"

You and your friends can count on finding plenty of aloha and ora during a visit to the Polynesian Cultural Center.

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The E Luana Kakou Concert and Moanikeala Hula Festival were terrific: You should have been here.

The Center celebrated Hawaiian culture on January 21-22, 2005, with its annual E Luana Kakou Concert and Moanikeala Hula Festival. Both events were fantastic.

The E Luana Kakou (which means "let's enjoy ourselves") Concert on Friday night first featured the 86-year-old matriarch of Hawaiian music, Aunty Genoa Keawe, who has been singing professionally for over 60 years. This octogenarian, who actually grew up in Laie where the Polynesian Cultural Center is located, still delights audiences with her lively brand of Hawaiian music.

The second half of the concert featured the award-winning Makaha Sons trio, who have been sharing their tight harmony and contemporary island music for almost 30 years. Typical of authentic island-style gatherings, both Aunty Genoa and the Sons called people up from the audience to share their hula talents. In short, it was a beautiful evening...and if you didn't make it this year, try to plan ahead for next year's event.

The 15th annual Moanikeala Hula Festival filled the Center's Pacific Theater the next morning with hundreds of hula dancers, ranging in age from little girls to graceful grandmas. Dressed in their hula finery and accompanied by rich island music, the dancers performed in honor of Aunty Sally Moanikeala Wood Naluai, the PCC's first kumu hula or hula master.

Aunty Sally, as everyone called her, taught hundreds of BYU-Hawaii student employees the finer points of hula from the time the Center opened in October 1963 until she retired in 1980. Thereafter, Aunty Sally remained a hula consultant until she passed away in 2000. Her niece, who was also one of her earliest students and a PCC dancer, started the festival to honor her kumu.

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PCC's "living treasure"

The Honpa Hongwanji Mission of Hawaii recently presented its prestigious Living Treasure Award to Sione Tui'one Pulotu for his 40-plus years of excellence and creative contributions as a master Polynesian carver.

Pulotu was only 20 years old when he came from Tonga to help build additions to the campus of the Church College of Hawaii (which became BYU-Hawaii in 1974) and the brand-new Polynesian Cultural Center as a "labor missionary" for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which sponsors the both university and the Center.

Soon after arriving, he became intrigued with Hawaiian tikis he saw at the then-new Ala Moana Center in Honolulu and started to teach himself to carve. Before completing his labor missionary work almost four years later, Pulotu had already carved several heroic-sized tikis and went on to create many other tikis, numerous Polynesian buildings at the Cultural Center, and more recently a series of strikingly beautiful, traditionally styled Polynesian voyaging canoes.

For example he spent the year before New Year's Day 2000 in Nuku'alofa, the capital of the Kingdom of Tonga, carving a 105-foot traditional double-hulled kalia (where one hull is smaller than the other and acts as an outrigger) — the largest-ever modern Polynesian voyaging canoe. Before dawn on Y2000 morning, Pulotu and the Mileniume sailed out of Nuku'alofa to watch the sun rise.

More recently Pulotu served as the primary carver for BYU-Hawaii's 57-foot traditional twin-hulled Hawaiian voyaging canoe, Iosepa — a floating classroom that is part of the university's Hawaiian Studies program. The Polynesian Cultural Center tentatively plans to complete a new home for the Iosepa later this year in the Hawaiian village.

Pulotu's uncanny ability to use six-foot chain saws, a wide range of chisels including traditional Polynesian toki or adzes, to shape huge logs into beautiful, priceless yet completely utilitarian canoes — all without benefit of written plans — demonstrates why the Honpa Hongwanji Mission named him a "living treasure."

He is currently raising funds to carve his final canoe in Suva, Fiji — a double-hulled voyaging vessel that will incorporate various aspects of ancient Polynesian designs.

Read more about Pulotu's accomplishments...

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Dive into Coral Reef Adventure,
a beautiful new IMAX™ film at PCC

On February 21, the Polynesian Cultural Center started featuring the fabulously beautiful MacGillivray Freeman IMAX™ film, Coral Reef Adventure, on our 65-foot high (19.8 m) by 93-foot wide (28.3 m) screen throughout the day.

Coral Reef follows the real-life expedition of underwater filmmakers Howard and Michelle Hall as they explore underwater locations in Fiji, Australia's Great Barrier Reef, Tahiti and Rangiroa (French Polynesia). In addition to traditional island songs, the soundtrack includes music by Crosby, Stills and Nash, and narration by award-winning actor Liam Neeson.

Coral Reef Adventure replaces Dolphins and The Living Sea. Plan to see it when you visit the PCC. A DVD of this movie is also available at www.pccgifts.com, our online store.

Enjoy the PCC's Alii Luau, again and again...

The Polynesian Cultural Center's online gift shop will soon offer a new DVD that captures the spirit, flavor and fun of the award-winning Alii Luau — PCC's most popular dining and entertainment option.

The production features "Cousin" Benny Kai, PCC's "ambassador of aloha," the royal court representatives, hula dancers, hapa-haole-style Hawaiian music and all-time favorites such as Pearly Shells and the Hawaiian Wedding Song, the uncovering of the imu or underground oven, a complete explanation of the luau food and, of course, lots of fun.

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