Junior Kamea Smith had her name in the spotlight on Friday, April 19 when she won the 2024 Miss Bishop Kenny High School Pageant.
Even though Kamea was born and raised in Jacksonville, Florida, her father is from Kentucky, and her mother is from Hawaii. Smith has family living on all the different islands in Hawaii, so her family likes to make an effort to travel to Hawaii as much as possible.
Smith learned her talent from her auntie Oh Tila, who lives in Hawaii. It is a native dance to Hawaii called Poi Ball dancing. This dance is obviously performed with Poi Balls, but once people get more talented, they are able to have fire on the Poi Balls.
Around 2-3 years ago, Smith started to perform Poi Ball dancing with fire, and it is very different from regular Poi Ball dancing.
“It starts out with normal poi balls. You can’t just go straight into fire because it’s a lot heavier, and obviously there is fire involved,” Smith said.
Smith is planning on performing her same talent for Miss Senior High, and is even considering asking permission to perform the Poi Ball dance with fire.
Smith was inspired to enter the pageant due to her sister’s past performance in the Miss BK Pageant. When her sister competed in 2020, she won Miss Sweetheart, which is the first runner up of the pageant. Throughout this process, Smith’s older sister has been her biggest inspiration.
“She inspired me to do the pageant and continue what she started,” Smith said.
Along with her sister’s support, Smith’s whole family encouraged her to enter the pageant in order to help implement more Polynesian culture into Bishop Kenny.
Smith plans to accomplish this goal by getting the Polynesian culture involved in the diversity student union club. One of her ideas to make people more aware of this culture is by celebrating Pacific Islander month, which is in May, just like Bishop Kenny celebrates Hispanic heritage month.
“I want people to get educated on the real Polynesian culture and not just think the stereotypical type things that you see, such as luaus, but actually get to know what is behind the culture,” Smith said.
