Photos

Evry year, on the first w.e. of August at Avarua, the capital "city" of the Cook Islands, on Rarotonga island, there is the celebration for the Constitution Day.
All the villages of all the islands of Cook did a traditional dance competition long all the night.
It is not did for tourists as in French Polynesia or Fijii or Hawaii, but for the Maori people.

*scanned, badly, image*

"To the despair of many educated Cook Islanders the expression "culture" in the popular mind equates to traditional festivals, singing and dancing. There is some justification for this since the art of dance is taken very seriously in the Cooks. Each island has its own special dances and these are practised assiduously from early childhood. There are numerous competitions throughout the year on each island – Events – and these are hotly contested. The highly rhythmic drumming on the paté and the wild and sensuous movements of both men and women virtually guarantee that Cook Islands teams win all the major Pacific dance festivals.The Hawaiian hula and the Tahitian tamuré are probably better known because those islands have had wider publicity for the last 100 years but the Cook Islands hura is far more sensual and fierce. Every major hotel prides itself on the performance it puts on at least once a week on Island Night when guests, selected by the dancers, are led onto the floor to show what they can do."

from:
The definitive Cook Islands website