Glad to be asked to join the new organization called, We Are Oceania (WAO). Based out of Oahu, WAO’s mission is to advocate for the health of Micronesian individuals and families, empowering them to weave their indigenous skills, knowledge, and being/values with their newly acquired knowledge of their new community on O‘ahu, in order to reach their full potential and become self-sufficient.
WAO’s unity anthem with the same title, “We Are Oceania,” debut at the Pacific Islander Youth Day on Oct. 25, 2014 at University of Hawaii at Hilo. It was first envisioned by the Pacific Students Media team led by Axel Defngin to create a unifying anthem for Pacific Islander youth in Hawaii and the United States. Axel assembled a team of Pacific Islander singers and composers from University of Hawaii at Hilo and Hawaii Community College. They were given some key values to think about and they composed a masterpiece:
We Are Oceania
We are one people, many cultures
We are one ocean, many islands
We wish no other home than ours.
Our differences enrich us,
Our islands sustain us,
Our ocean binds us together.
Having displaced no one, we welcome you,
Having been divided, we seek unity,
Having been ruled, we seek freedom.
Together, we renew,
Our hearts with love,
Together, we renew,
Our minds and soul,
To be ourselves,
To live in harmony.
(Check out the highlights of the Pacific Islander Youth Day in which this song was debuted as a way for the college students to welcome and inspire their younger brothers and sisters from the local high schools.)
We Are Oceania is inspired by the strength of our Pacific Island ancestors, hopes of our elders, and the dreams of our youth.
Our Pacific Islander youth are often victims of discrimination as the newest immigrant to the United States. We Are Oceania encourages our youth to live in peace and harmony. It tells the story that even while we struggle abroad our hearts and minds remain in our home islands…our own homes.
In, We Are Oceania, the college students tried to express the struggles of our youth to hold on to, seek to understand, want to celebrate, mourn the absence of, long for the freedom of, and make sense of their roots and identity as Pacific Islanders. These conflicting feelings are exacerbated by a world that views our islands as small and separated without recognizing our ocean as large and binding.
To me, the song honors the spirit of Epeli Hau’ofa who wrote the essay, “Sea of Islands” to reverse the colonialistic views of the Pacific Islands. It also honors the hopes of our founding leaders expressed in our various constitutional preambles.
We Are Oceania expresses our hope that when all is said and done, the Pacific Islander always carries the islands, our values, our strength of our seafaring ancestors, our people’s hopes…all of that deep inside of us wherever the wind of change blows our canoes in the world.
We Are Oceania is…
Produced, Written, Sung by: Pacific Islander Students at UH Hilo & HCC
In collaboration with: Pacific Islander Student Center at UH Hilo, Pacific Students Media
Members: John Alokoa, Joseph Anastacio, Bonaventura Ayin, Aku Costa, Axel Defngin, Buster Fritz, Joshua, Joctan Lopes, Erbiland Mandira, Calvin Myazoe, Fagalima Paleafei, Peter Ramofolo, Bill Yang, Vidalino Raatior
Chuuk, Kosrae, Marshall Islands, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Timor-Leste, Yap
Melanesia, Micronesia, Polynesia
Project Started: September 2014
Lyrics Completed: October 10, 2014
Recording Completed: October 24, 2014 – Buster Fritz
