Following His lead

Jiyeon does the traditional hula dance in a traditional homemade ti leaf skirt! see the video!

One of the benefits of being in Hawaii, is the opportunity to experience rich Hawaiian traditions. 

At SRM (Solid Rock Ministries, which is the church we're attending while we're here on Kona Island), Jiyeon had the opportunity to learn the traditional hula dance. 
She's been practicing twice a week for the last few months, and she was finally able to show-off what she learned at the SRM Christmas party on Christmas eve last night. 

But this wasn't as easy as I thought... We actually prepared a traditional ti-leaf skirt, and made it the traditional way, which was a lot of work! 
We first went to one of the botanical gardens to pick the ti-leaves. we needed about 2000 leaves to make about 20 ti-leaf skirts. 

After bringing all the picked leaves, we filtered out the bad ones and then cleaned and de-boned (take out the stem so the leaves can sway when the girls dance) the good ones.
and then used old t-shirt parts to tie the leaves to the string to make the ti-leaf skirt. 

After finishing the skirt, we wrapped it up in a wet towel and one day before the event, 
we stripped the leaves so the leaves get thinner, and then refrigerated it until the event.

We had an awesome time at the Christmas party, and you can check the video below of Jiyeon performing.
Only catch was the pouring rain, but it just made the occasion so much more memorable. 

(download)

To Posterous, Love Metalab