FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM Lanterns drifted off to sea from Ala Moana Beach Park during yesterday's Toro Nagashi, or lantern floating ceremony, an annual Memorial Day event presented by Shinnyo-en Hawaii.

Floating lanterns
stir emotions at
Ala Moana Park

Donna Berg sat alone watching more than 1,100 paper lanterns glowing orange as they drifted to sea at Ala Moana Beach Park yesterday evening.

"It's amazing," she said, her face aglow and eyes welling with tears. For the 78-year-old Waikiki woman, it was more than a cultural event.

"My husband is out there in the Pacific Ocean somewhere," she said. "His ashes were scattered at sea."

The Seventh Annual Shinnyo-en Lantern Floating Ceremony drew thousands of residents, visitors and 2,800 members of a Buddhist sect from Japan, crowding the beach park to witness the ceremony.

While they did not hold the same religious beliefs, many shared a similar experience.

Sylvestre Young, 64, of Chinatown wiped a tear from his eye as orchestral music played over a loudspeaker. Young said he was thinking of those whose ashes have been scattered at sea.

Julia Gabriel, 74, of New York said the ceremony was "very emotional" as she lingered on the beach to watch the candlelit lanterns fading in the distance. "I think of my family, the ones who have died."

The Toro Nagashi, as it is called in Japanese, is traditionally the finale to the Obon season, the lanterns lighting the way for the spirits of ancestors. But Shinnyo-en founder Shinjo Ito was inspired to hold the ceremony on Memorial Day after a visit to the Arizona Memorial in 1970.

Ito's daughter and spiritual head of the order, Bishop Shinso Ito, presided over the ceremony wearing a dark saffron-colored robe and addressed the throngs in attendance.

FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM Thousands were on hand at Ala Moana Beach Park yesterday afternoon to witness the Toro Nagashi, a ceremony in which lanterns light the way for the spirits of ancestors.

While Shinnyo-en has about 1,000 members in Hawaii, there are more than 3 million adherents in Japan, with more followers on the mainland and in Europe. A European Shinnyo-en choir sang in chantlike fashion during the ceremony.

But the event was not without local flavor as Hawaiian music and hula was performed, shown on a 50-foot screen and several other monitors for the crowds at Ala Moana, as well as televised live at all the Shinnyo-en temples in Japan.

Tokyo student Shiko Akasaka, 20, accompanied his 53-year-old father, Naoto, to Hawaii for the ceremony. The Shinnyo-en member said it was his first time and his father's fourth experience. Akasaka explained his grandfather and great-grandfather's names are on one of the many lanterns.

"We believe my family's spirits are floating in the lantern," he said.

Those in attendance differed in what they appreciated.

Nuuanu resident Saro Genova said she felt her deceased mother's presence as she swam at Ala Moana yesterday.

She wrote the names of her mother and her father-in-law, both of whom died last year, on lanterns.

"I felt it was a really nice way to help them along," Genova said.

Florence Apo, 65, who attended last night with her family, grew up as a Buddhist in Fort Lupton, Colo., but has made Hawaii home for more than 30 years. "It's kind of exciting to see all the people here, all the tourists and all the local people."

Her granddaughter Cassidy Apo, 8, said, "It's pretty cool with all the lights on the ocean."