Obon Season Starting on Maui

Tonight starts the beginning of Obon season on Maui. Obon season is celebrated at the various Japanese Buddhist temples throughout the island. Obon is a time where the Buddhist community honors the dead through music, dance and ritual.

Throughout the summer, the various temples of the island will host a public Obon dance. Members of the local temple will erect fund raising booths and a yaguro tower. The yaguro tower is the focal point of the dance with a combination of live Taiko drumming and recorded Japanese folk music emananting from the top of the tower. Members of the community will dance around the tower in a series of coregraphed Japanese folk dances. All may participate regardless of denomenation.

In addition to the dance, ancestors are remembered through tributes of flowers, food, incense and prayer within temples and at family shrines and grave sites. I had the opportunity to attend an Obon dance last year at the local temple in Paia. It was a fun event and a great reminder of the multi-cultural aspects of living in Hawaii. The synthesis of Asian, Polynesian and European cultures are one of the reasons that Hawaii is such a unique and beautiful location in this country and the world for that matter.