As Lunar New Year festivities continue, I spent the weekend enjoying continuation of new traditions too:
Welcoming group of visiting High School students from across Okinawa / Ryukyu Islands who are visiting Hawai'i for a Geijutsu / performing arts cultural exchange program!
Excited for them and the opportunity for all involved to reflect on what it means to be Shimanchu, what our ancestral sukubun / kuleana is to our precious land, water, traditions, and to each other.
Spent time reflecting on this as I prepped the leaves and when meeting up with my shinshii and some classmates from Uchinaa Udui to braid lei la'i to welcome these visiting students. As we combined our harvested ti leaves to create these braids - twisting each piece with the next and combining to create something more beautiful and stronger than any one piece - I smiled about the multiple layers of metaphor there...
