Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 24, Number 8, 1 August 2007 — 'Values' essay winners [ARTICLE]

'Values' essay winners

One teenager from India and another from the remote Himalayan nation of Bhutan were among four teens named as winners of an essay contest sponsored by the Polynesian Voyaging Society in partnership with programs at the EastWest Center and University of Hawai'i. In the "Values for Life" International Essay Contest, students 14-18 years old were asked to answer the question, "What values are essential for a world characterized by peaee and social justice?" On July 12, the contest's winners - Bhuwan Giri from Thimpu, Bhutan; Jalnidh Kaur from Ludhiana, India; Rosemary Owen from Cuyahoga Falls, See BRIEFS on pagE 18

BRIEFS Cūntinued fram page IG

Ohio; and Mikia Weidenbach from Waialua, Hawai'i - read their essays at the Pacific Educational Conference in Honolulu. The winners were also presented with awards by Polynesian Voyaging Society President Nāinoa Thompson and had the opportunity to go aboard the voyaging eanoe Hōkūle'a, recently returned from its five-month voyage through Micronesia and lapan. For Giri and Kaur, the trip was the first time they had left their native countries. Both said that visiting Hawai'i and going

aboard Hōkūle'a was "a dream eome true." The purpose of the essay contest, according to a PVS release, was to "provide an opportunity for students from around the Asia-Pacific region to explore how universal values bind us together as 'one oeean, one people' in a peaceful, harmonious and sustainable world." To read to the winning essays, visit http:// pvshawaii.squarespace.com/values-for-life.