50 Palestinian women, 3 taiko drummers, 15 taiko drums to be built, 7 days, 1 performance, 0 common languages.  This was a week to remember!

Drumming for Peace

Working in partnership with the Holy Land Trust, Taiko Journey travelled with PJ Hirabayashi and Pear Urushima of San Jose California to Bethlehem for a week of workshops culminating in a dramatic performance in the heart of the city.  There were huge challenges to overcome for participants and leaders alike and as the week wore on the political situation heated to almost unbearable temperatures daily threatening to collapse the festival in its entirety.  But this is just another week in the lives of those living in Bethlehem, and gave all the more incentive to persevere through adversity and build the drums, share the basics of taiko drumming and focus on the community building taiko song written by PJ Hirabayashi.  As cliched as it may sound, there was a true feeling of drumming for peace from start to end of the project.

Synonymous with the TaikoPeace inititave, Ei Ja Nai Ka? (meaning ‘Isn’t it good?’) involves three drum parts, a Japanese folk-inspired circular dance, a vocal call and response, and a song.  The song was composed by PJ Hirabayashi to commemorate the hard manual work of her grandparents’ generation, the first pioneers from Japan to America and as it has spread around the world it has developed a universal connection that transcends cultural barriers.

Throughout the week of constant logistical, political and countless other obstacles, the resounding feeling was that people felt their universal human bond to our land, the earth; working together; and steering our lives to a better future. EJNK has become a dance for community building and bridging cultures, and as we had hoped when we set-off from the UK with nothing more than an idea, it did translate to this culture. The reverberations of the taiko project truly transcended the stage and workshop walls and had a much bigger impact than anyone had ever predicted.  The drums have been left in Bethlehem in the hope that the young people there will continue to honour their intention: drumming for peace.