By Russell Omo

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On April 11, the MHS winter guard made history by demonstrating their prowess on the stage and progressed on to the semifinals of the 2013 Winter Guard International (WGI) Color Guard World Championships, a first in the seven years that the winter guard has competed.

“(Performing in the WGI World Championships) really just recaps all of my feelings about performing and opens my eyes to just how amazing the production is. It’s very humbling to be surrounded by so many performers,” expressed guard captain Senior Robert Longboy.

The WGI Color Guard World Championships is an annual event where over 400 schools compete in various venues in Dayton, Ohio. Each school is placed into one of two divisions: scholastic, where the guard belongs to a specific school and independent, where the guard has no affiliation with a specific school and is its own group. The MHS guard was placed in the scholastic division, totaling 112 groups. Of those 112 groups, 48 moved on to semifinals, 15 of which moved onto finals. This year, MHS had placed in the semifinals as the only school from Hawaii as well as the first to make it this far.

The reactions from the judges were  mostly positive, which allowed the MHS guard to move on to the semifinals. “In terms of our movement, we actually placed second so they placed us really high for that category. For our equipment, (the judges) scored us high in our equipment vocabulary, which means the choreography with the equipment. And for ensemble we received a rather general score. One judge really liked how we designed the show and the other judge thought it was at the norm,” explained winter guard adviser Derek Kaapana.

The routine that the MHS winter guard performed was entitled “Out of the Darkness”, whose theme centers around the morbid creatures of the night. “When someone would see a dark forest, the kind of imaginings that they have going on, the sort of creepy, mysterious aspect of it,” said Kaapana.

Despite not moving on to the finals, the individuals of the winter guard are more than happy with the results. “Our guard has been working extremely hard all these years to make it on and we finally make it; we finally surpass the expectations,” said Junior Rachel Yonamine.

For the winter guard, WGI was an experience that left a lasting impression. “Not only was the experience great but we were able to watch world class guards and get to see the best guards in the world live, meet new people and strengthen our bond as a Mililani High School winter guard,” said Yonamine.

MHS’ future participation will bring a new set of performers on-stage, including the winter drum line for the WGI Percussion World Championships.