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Samoa's Fashion Showdown
Entry 17 of 23 | show all | print this entry |
My volunteer friend Jani before she left Samoa assisted a number of Samoans in starting the Samoa AIDS Foundation. How proud she would have been this Friday night to see their first major benefit in Samoa. And Samoa's first major fashion show.
Sure, I hear fashion shows have been done before here but not like this. The who's who of Samoa were out for this night. Tickets were ST$25 to ST$100 and went to the Foundation for research and assistance.
A number of local designers were in the show. It was rumored that some even bought dresses off the rack and doctored them up! Five of the Peace Corps volunteers modeled in the show. Categories ranged from Traditional Wear to Urban Wear, Kids Wear to Puletasi (traditional Samoan dress), Mens Wear to even bridal gowns!
I went with another PC volunteer and an Aussie volunteer. I ran into two of my coworkers, a number of Peace Corps personnel and some friends from town there. In fact, one of my coworkers whispered to me, "I won't tell if you won't tell". Meaning this better not get back to our coworkers. I agreed with HIM.
What fun it was. Of course it started at 8:45 even though the tickets explicitly stated being seated by 7:30 start promptly at 8 pm. (Island time, common theme.) The show began with some fun local talent, singing from Ben Mahkisi the South Pacific Pavarotti Opera Singer, and continued on with the start of the designs. In between there were other acts including high school girls dancing in traditional hula skirts and bikini tops. I do admit, the girls could really isolate their hip movement in ways I could never achieve the time I took a belly dancing class in California but my daughters will play soccer, not gyrate in minimal clothing in front of so many people. However, they were very good. Adeaze, the New Zealand R&B group came out and sang my favorite song. Great entertainment. Worth the pricey ticket fee and for a good cause.
Really though, my volunteer friend and I were there to support our "model" volunteer friends. Originally, when they agreed to do the show, it was a low key thing. Within a couple of weeks it had exploded into "the thing" in Samoa. They were very nervous. This would be broadcast over and over on Samoa's only TV station, SBC One.
When the only PC volunteer guy to model came out on stage to do his catwalk, he was fantastic. The Samoan guys before him had strutted their stuff down the walkway, smiling and winking, being as cheeky as they could. When our volunteer came out, he smiled a cocky smile, tilted his head, and gave that "I am hot stuff, you know you want me" look. Pretty crazy for a guy from Nebraska who is as shy as can be. Later, he admitted he was doing his best to keep the act up cause he was scared to death. But, what can you do when a huge room full of women are cat-calling you on the catwalk.
Ultimately, it was a fun night. Completely different from the traditional fia-fias and good for the Foundation too. Later we headed to our favorite dance club and celebrated with our "models". They just sighed relief it was over. For now. We reminded them it would start back up when people started recognizing them from the show's continual repeat on TV.
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