Talofa lava, my name is Moemoana Shwenke.
It's Frankie here from the Taro Boyz.
Stay strong Pacific!
Roar!
I am a dancer, performer and choreographer
and teacher at a Pacific cultural center in Sydney
called Matavai Pacific Cultural Arts.
The Taro Boyz are based in Auckland, New Zealand.
We're a big family that love to dance.
We're all Samoan, my dad's from Faleasiu,
my mum's from Vaiusu.
When we knew that the coronavirus
and just the panic settled in
we got together on a Sunday
and typically of Pacific communities
you always gather around food and
we said "Guys we're gonna shut down.
Let's do something, let's do like a 14 day video
and let's get into people's lounges so that we can
encourage them to get up and get moving."
So we sat down and then over five hours
we did all that content that you'll see on YouTube.
"So what's up family? We are up to day number 9."
14 days, 14 isolation tracks.
Like a lot of small businesses and specifically
creative arts people, they've had to close their doors
and that's the case for Matavai.
And it has affected us and instead of
you know, succumbing to the defeat of
all of the stress and chaos that this time
of closing our doors brought us,
we came up with the strategy to
continue delivering our classes online.
We're making it accessible to everyone in the world
and we've had enrolments from all around the world,
from Spain, Germany, America, New Zealand
and it's been a success, so we actually hope
to continue this, once this is all over as well.
As they say "What you get you give
and what you learn you share"
so I, full of love and with the most appreciation,
welcome you to my virtual class.
I think the art of exercise is knowing
you're not exercising!
'cause let's be honest, how many people if I say
"Come together, let's catch up for some exercise"
everyone's gonna be like "Yay!"?
If we can trick you by having fun and we can
get you up and just get you moving to the rhythm
and our choreography is really, really simple,
if we can trick you into it then that's us keeping mobile
and we've just gotta keep that really, really simple
and keep it innovative and fun.
After this COVID pandemic kind of swept
across the world, I've noticed on social media
a lot of different young people,
specifically Pacific Islanders,
dancing and recording themselves and
being creative with their spare time.
I think that dancing, for all cultures around the world,
brings people together and also empowers them.
A group of my friends from around the Pacific and also
around the world, we thought it would be a good idea
to bring our dancing together,
also known as the Siva Samoa and
we did this thing where we passed our sei
to and from the camera and once we received
the flower we would continue dancing.
It did go a little bit viral on the internet because
people were just so appreciative of
us showing our dances online and also connecting
with people near and far as well.
When you look at Polynesian culture
the commonality between all of us is
everybody has their own version of dance
or you know they have an interpretation of dance.
And I think sometimes there's no language.
You know, language doesn't do justice how you feeling
and sometimes you just need to let it out
through dance. And dance personifies joy,
there's so much joy when you see someone's movement
you know and that's what I love about dance.