They delivered a mile-long “Lei of Aloha” to Paris’ bullet-riddled Bataclan nightclub following the 2015 attack that left 90 dead — and another last year to Orlando’s Pulse nightclub, where 49 died in a mass shooting.
But this latest “Lei of Aloha” hits closer to home: Las Vegas, known as the “ninth island” because of its large Hawaiian population.
That lei — and representatives of those who created it — arrived in Las Vegas early Thursday, accompanied by eight heavy-duty coolers, each weighing 60 to 70 pounds and carrying a woven lei segment.
Downtown’s California Hotel is hosting the volunteers — and the coolers containing the leis, which are being stored in a hotel refrigerator until Saturday’s planned presentations at Las Vegas memorial sites.
Volunteers harvested more than 20 truckloads of ti plants in Hawaii’s mountains and valleys, then stripped the leaves and cooked them a bit before weavers sat “side by side, with their shoes off, sharing and meeting new people, praying” as they worked.
“Even though we were thousands of miles away across the ocean, we wanted to send our aloha and healing prayers to the people of Las Vegas,” Panzo says. “The intent is to send healing and love, but you also see the love and healing happening at home” for those weaving the leis.
The positive response organizers have received from Las Vegas’ Hawaiian community testifies to the ninth island’s aloha spirit, Panzo comments.
Evidence of the close connection: Friday’s 6 p.m. gathering at Las Vegas’ Tevakanui Polynesian Dance Studio, which will provide “a launching pad” for Saturday’s presentations, according to studio owner Henry George, who became involved through a close friend who’s also a “Lei of Aloha” organizer.
Weaving love and aloha to wrap around the people of the world, the Lei of Aloha brings us together to grieve, to heal, to connect and to lift our collective spirits.
When we lift one, we lift all.
The Lei of Aloha is about connection: we sit, side by side, weaving lei, weaving conversation, weaving friendship.
Weaving leaves of every color: red, yellow, pink, light green, dark green.
Weaving people: gay, straight, Hawaiian, Asian, Hispanic, Caucasian, young, young at heart.