A local nonprofit is training hundreds of volunteers for the upcoming 13th Festival of Pacific Arts and Culture, the largest celebration of Pacific Islanders.
Last Saturday, at least 65 people attended an in-person volunteer training for FestPAC at the Mission Memorial Auditorium in Honolulu.
The volunteers will be in charge of helping more than 2,100 delegates from 26 Pacific nations and territories. Since each island has its own customs, volunteers underwent cultural etiquette training to better understand and help FestPAC participants.
Mālia Sanders, the executive director of the Native Hawaiian Hospitality Association, cautions volunteers to be mindful of delegates who come from several Pacific cultures.
“While in Hawaiʻi, in our environment, we like to hug, kiss and be very close and upfront and personal in each other's spaces,” she said. “There are sensitivities throughout the Pacific that you donʻt know who you are approaching.”
She said there will be delegates that have a high-ranked status.
The Native Hawaiian Hospitality Association has been training hundreds of volunteers and has reached its goal of recruiting 300 people.
But Sanders said more help is needed.
“We realize that our community may need more support than we had anticipated for this event,” she said. “We want to have as many as we can so that we can be as capable as we can.”
She said she needs at least 200 more volunteers so they can alternate shifts during the 10-day festival.
“It's not a three-day event where 300 people would be sufficient for a couple hours at a time,” Sanders said.
Some volunteers are new, while others can speak several languages and have experience in hospitality.
The rest of the training will be online via Zoom, where volunteers will learn about cultural etiquette in Hawaiʻi and the Pacific.
“We’re just wanting to make sure that we are over-prepared as best as we can so that we don't put ourselves in a corner with what we've asked,” she said.
For more information about volunteering, click here.
