HOW TO GO
WHAT: Grand opening of the Spirit of the Pacific Islands Dance Studio and Professional Entertainers. The event is free and open to all members of the public.
WHEN: 2 to 6 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 21
WHERE: 2402 Pleasant Ave.
MORE INFO: Call Spirit of the Pacific Islands at (513) 737-0874 or find them on Facebook.
While Hamilton’s Lindenwald neighborhood will celebrate the grand opening of its newest business on Saturday, for the Spirit of the Pacific’s owners, opening their dance studio on Pleasant Avenue is more of a homecoming.
Francesca Trego, a Guam native, has been dancing for more than 40 years and teaching for more than 20 years, and when Spirit of the Pacific was first open at 2402 Pleasant Avenue about 10 years ago, it was mostly family members who participated in the troupe-like dance group.
Now, Trego and her “family” — daughter, Elena Graham, Graham’s partner Donna Vickers, and longtime student Briana Brooks — have joined as partners and directors of the studio, and invite the public to celebrate the grand opening of Spirit of the Pacific at their renovated studio.
“It’s going to be a lot of fun,” Trego said. After she closed the former Spirit studio two years ago for health reasons, ideas began to form in October to enhance Spirit by offering more cultural dance classes — covering hula from Hawaii, tamure from Tahiti, and more dances from Samoa, Fiji, New Zealand and more — and culture education with outreach into the community through schools and community centers.
Dance instructors Trego and Graham will do dance demonstrations and offer prepared island food samplings, and will also be taking registrations for monthly dance class memberships.
“When Spirit was here before, it was more of a hobby, it wasn’t really a business to speak of,” Trego said. “We did travel and did a few shows, but it was mostly our family, people asking us to do a backyard luau or something,”
But the women felt so passionate about sharing the power and beauty of Pacific Island culture and dance with the community, “we decided, ‘let’s take Spirit and let her fly,’” Trego said.
Future plans include different cultural workshops at the studio, including flower-making and histories of the culture of Hawaii, Tahiti, or Samoa. Long-term, the four women would like to open a Pacific Island cultural center.
“They have to keep telling me, Mom, baby steps,” Trego said, laughing.
“I’m finding more and more that we’re not that much of a minority,” Trego said. Graham added that to go to another halau — a school where the authentic hula dance is taught — you have to travel up to Chicago or to the East Coast. “We keep everything authentic, when we do a dance from Tahiti, we wear their clothing, and even our greetings, we’ll say the greeting from Fiji or Samoa, it’s very important that we represent our people, the people of the Pacific Islands, with pride, grace and dignity, and yet let people see how much fun we have in everything that we do.”
“There’s a lot of sacredness and respect in what we do,” Trego said.
Trego emphasized that you don’t have to have Pacific Island ancestry, or be any specific body type, to learn the dances.
“You have to teach your body how to bend and flow with the music,” she said. “And have you ever seen a Samoan woman dance? When they dance, they look like they’re gliding on air.”
Classes are open to anyone older than the age of 6, and will be separated by skill level, with more advanced dancers able to perform in troupes. Classes will also include hula and Tahitian for low-impact and high-cardio workout options.
Graham said while they were considering opening out of town, they wanted to stay in their hometown and give back to the community.
One of those ways would be to bring traffic to the city by holding culture and dance workshops that out-of-town Islander dancers and teachers will travel to Spirit to attend.
“One of the ways other halaus learn new cultures, is to travel to different workshops, so we’re trying to hold those workshops,” Graham said. “Most studios focus on one culture, whereas we try to encompass them all.”
All members of the public are welcome to stop by on Saturday to celebrate the grand opening, or stop into the studio anytime to watch a class, Trego said. Tuition will cost $100 per month for a once-weekly class, but at the grand opening, dancers can receive their first month of classes for only $50.
“We just can’t wait to share our culture with everyone,” Trego said.
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