By Giselle Lee | Staff Writer
Students braved the rain Friday evening to attend Lu’au 2026, an annual celebration hosted by the Baylor Hawaii Club, with the support of the Baylor Activities Council and Baylor Student Government, in the SUB Barfield Drawing Room.
The event’s theme, paniolo, allowed students to experience traditional Hawaiian culture with a cowboy twist, with many attendees donning floral-print shirts and cowboy boots for an evening of food, singing, dancing and a fire show.
President of the Baylor Hawaii Club and Honolulu junior Faith Ota said she worked hard to create an event representing an “authentic and genuine” version of Hawaiian culture, incorporating a Texas-themed twist.
“Texas is known for their cowboys,” Ota said. “Hawaii actually had a famous rodeo master back in the day. We tried finding that connection between Hawaii and Texas to show people that we’re not as different as it seems.”
Ota said assistance from the Baylor Activities Council and Baylor Student Government in providing funding, resources and contingency plan arrangements helped put the Hawaii Club on the map.
“It means a lot to have their support,” Ota said. “A lot of us from Hawaii have a very different experience coming to college, and especially in a very new place in Central Texas, but after going through all of this, it makes me realize that it’s kind of like home. You find your family here.”
Cypress freshmen Joshua Hanson and Tyler Perry said they attended to support their friend, who sang and danced during the performance portion of the evening.
Perry highlighted how various elements of the event stood out to him in different ways.
“There was so much more passion than I expected,” Perry said. “It was really cool to see how in touch they are with their culture. I also really liked the food. I feel like it was just a cool glimpse into their culture and to try dishes that they had prepared.”
Hanson said that Lu’au 2026 was an encouraging stepping stone to attending future events organized by multicultural groups on campus.
“I didn’t really know much about it going into it, but I feel like I learned a lot, and I had a really good experience,” Hanson said. “I’d be curious to visit other cultures’ versions of this.”
Fort Worth freshman Gavin Schoffler, a program manager for the Baylor Activities Council, said that despite the rain, the council’s resources still brought the event to life.
“We get to have a unique role in helping empower some of those groups by coming alongside them and providing those monetary resources, but a lot of it is also just using the systems and things Baylor has in place to either rent out equipment or just use non-monetary resources to help put on events and get organized,” Schoffler said.
The integration of Texan and Hawaiian culture provided an opportunity to display the “vibrant diversity” on Baylor’s campus, Schoffler said. He encouraged other multicultural organizations to reach out to the Baylor Activities Council for help if needed.
“We’re always eager to work alongside other student organizations and also get to be a part of this bringing to life that we get to do, whether it’s Christmas on Fifth, the Sic’em Slam and the Jubilee in the coming weeks,” Schoffler said. “We’re just helping out and trying to be part of something bigger.”
