It was also the birthday of my late father i.e. 27th of May and when we were planning for it, I also wanted to honour my dad as I knew that he loved to prepare for such occasions.
What made it even special was my eldest daughter dancing the siva (dance) Samoa as a second generation diaspora New Zealand born and raised Samoa much like myself.
The neat thing was that my mother-in-law and sister-in-law as well as her cousins who were born and raised in Samoa etc. were able to show her how to siva Samoa (on the week of the dance and day before) that she had enough confidence to dance for our family.
It made me so proud and happy for her as it was something that she had wanted to learn and as I was the second eldest girl growing up, I didn't have that privilege of learning as it was my elder sister who was taught by my aunties etc.
It was a successful night and we raised over $23K for our centre's teachers and families to support in resources and also for paying off centre payments for our parents. This has especially been a difficult time with so much competition out there for teaching children in the mainstream who often offer free food and free transport and it's something that we as a centre are working towards as well.
So that pic above was taken when I didn't know that there was a phone/camera facing me and I'm dancing my moves i.e. keeping it simple in my black long ie (long skirt - material) lavalava, kimono-type long jacket with some accessories. I did over 14,000+ steps that day and that was without breaking a sweat! Just busy!
All in all, it was a successful event in not having hosted one before and only in memory through my late father's hardworking efforts when first trying to establish the church as a foundational member back in the 1960s. A true blessing that brought back many such special occasions with my father...
No comments:
Post a Comment