Heiva i Tahiti - by Gary

Our arrival in Tahiti managed to coincide with the end of the annual Tahitian cultural festival Heiva i Tahiti.   The event is competitive and each of the five island groups of French Polynesia enters individuals and groups.  This year featured 14 dance groups, 15 singing groups, untold percussionists, Polynesian artists and artisans, traditional Polynesian sport people such as coconut tree climbers, stone lifters and fruit carriers along with outrigger sailors and paddlers.  We only managed to attend a single event – featuring two Society Island dance and percussion troupes and a troupe of Marquesan singers – what an amazing privilege that was.  For such a small country it is dazzling how much enthusiasm is mustered, particularly among young folks, for their cultural roots.  But even more wonderfully, it’s not just a static regurgitation; passion and creativity applied to choreography, costume, and music along with countless rehearsal hours resulted in us witnessing productions of outstanding quality.  A real WOW experience!

Some of the events we missed!  Next time huh?

But we did see singers!  At times it was difficult to tell how many parts were being sung simultaneously – it was many.

Their traditional mou mous (Mother Hubbard dresses) and fresh flower couronne de tete (head crowns) were eye-catching.

The instrumentation wasn’t all percussion, scattered in there were guitars, ukuleles and even at times a wind instrument (a flute maybe?)...

  

... but the real guts of it comes from the driving beats belted out of these tuned lengths of hollowed timber (centre), creating that distinctive Tahitian sound.

Backstage most of the girls of this company were just about ready!

At times there were upward of 50 dancers in the arena and the level of synchrony achieved by these amateur performers was amazing.

Occasionally the girls would slow down enough to be more than just a blur across the screen of our camera.

There’s a whole lot of high speed hip shaking happening here!  And those costumes; just luscious!

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