Pacific Games Opening ceremony to bring PNG’s history to the present

PORT MORESBY, July 4 – Crowds can expect the opening of the Port Moresby 2015 Pacific Games to be a celebration of Papua New Guinea’s rich cultural history while pointing to the country’s future direction says Airleke Ingram (PNG) co-artistic director Saturday’s opening ceremony.

“We can use our culture to draw upon our values and maintain our integrity as a people and use that to guide us into the future,” says Ingram, a music producer, traditional drummer and famed percussionist who hails from Gaba Gaba.

The ceremony will be themed closely around the local region’s hiri trade, an important cultural influence.

“It’s a really key part of our culture. There are a lot of songs, dances and tattoos.” he says.

The ceremony will pay homage to the trade relationship between the motuan and gulf province people and the role this played in shaping historical and modern day PNG.

“These things set our culture up, where we really got our spirit of generosity and the fair distribution of wealth,” says Ingram.

“The opening ceremony is on motuan land, they are the traditional people of the area and we wanted to pay respects to what we called the ‘papa ground’, the traditional people of the land.”

It would not be a celebration of Papua New Guinea without a sing-sing.

Opening ceremony Merryn Hughes (AUS) says that it might be biggest sing-sing ever in Papua New Guinea.

“There are about 800 to 900 sing-sing performers who will be part of the cast,” says Hughes. “Nothing like this has ever been seen before in Papua New Guinea.”

The sing-sing performers are part of a cast of 3,000 performers, and almost 300 ceremony staff, approximately 200 of which are volunteers.

A team of people that both Huges and Ingram say they are “blessed” to be involved with.

Pacific Games Media