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Despite the lack of blooms, flame tree arts fest still a go
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Posted on Apr 12 2005
The Flame Tree Arts Festival is set to take place this weekend, even though the flowers of the event’s symbol have yet to bloom all over the island.
As Saipan Arts Council director Robert Hunter lightly puts it during the weekly Saipan Rotary Club meeting yesterday at the Hyatt Regency Saipan, “The show must go on.”
Hunter said flame trees usually bear flowers in the months before summer time. However, when they hold the festival in summer, Hunter said they find it difficult to get participants from the community. “It’s hard to get the participation from the students, school groups, because they’re gone,” he said.
Teachers who could assist in the organization and invitations are also usually on a break. It is also impossible for them to get tables and chairs due to graduations and other parties at the end of the school year.
Thus, for the last seven years, the council has stuck to the second week of April, although there are only a few blooming flame trees.
For the first time in its 24-year history, this year’s Flame Tree Arts Festival will include a film festival. Hunter said the Flame Tree Film Festival aims to be an annual event and will first feature motion picture works by local filmmakers in a non-competitive forum. The public will get to view art films, which local amateur filmmakers have produced for the CNMI.
The Arts Festival will also be reviving the booth-decorating competition. There will also be a canoe display provided by the canoe federation, which will display traditional canoes used by the islands’ forefathers.
The festival will kick off with a Parade of Cultures highlighting participants in traditional costumes. The parade will start at 5pm on Friday. During the opening ceremony, more than 100 performers are expected to participate.
He said the celebration will be non-stop, with Saturday set to be the biggest day of the festival.
More than 200 delegates from the Republic of Palau, Republic of Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, and other island nations in the region are expected to join the festivities with the rest of the CNMI community. (Marconi Calindas)
