I’m having fun getting ready for this coming First Friday… Aloha First Friday, that is… I’ll be spinning the Exotica sounds… and there will be spam and… you’ll see these guys hidden around The Cartoonery. I love my Dremel.
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Squiddie Joe found this delicious Vespa Workstation. I think it would look fabulous in my office… not practical… but fabulous.
Squiddie stick-figurer found this at The American Tin Cannery (near Cannery Row)… It’s yours for just $250. It won’t get you very far (top speed- 0)… but it’ll probably look great with a plant on it… or near it…
Since returning to the mainland, I’ve been slightly obsessed with TIKI. I’ve been listening to my Exotica and ingesting all I can thru my ears. Yah… It helps that my current storyline (the one I’m working on) involves tiki culture. So I’ve been scouring tiki websites and eating up the Tiki Pop.
Whilst in Kona, I found Hawaiian Hands, a woodcarving and Hawaiian Arts shop not far from where I was staying. There I met Pat Marsh who hooked me up with some carved tikis…. which was a mission I was on…. to find the tikis (and drink in cheesy tiki bars). 
While I now know that the Tiki Pop has it’s roots in Waikiki (a future trip for certain!), there were no shortage of tiki-type things available on the Big Island for touristy consumption.
One place where you could see real tikis in action was Pu’uhonua o Honaunau (a real difficult name to say) which is actually the Place of Refuge…. where the ki’i live (tikis). There I met Charles Hua (Charles is not his Hawaiian name, Kalehua is) a park ranger, banana leaf coat maker (you have to see it to believe it)… and all-around fine fellow. Harold loved listening to his presentation on the Place of Refuge and enjoyed the day in general.
Aloha, Squiddies… I am returned.
Something has happened to me that I wasn’t expecting. I caught, what I am told, is Island Fever…. or in our case, Big Island (Kona) Fever. I didn’t really see it coming. But I should’ve seen it coming because I spent a few semesters at Palomar College studying Arts of the Pacific Rim. But you can’t catch Island Fever if you don’t go to the island. I went to the island. I got the fever.
Discoveries…
I discovered, via a groovy book I picked up in Kohala, Tiki of Hawai’i: A History of Gods and Dreams… Exotica and Martin Denny. It’s not something that is prevalent on Kona, this old 50’s & 60’s jazzy-jungle-tiki pop style… but I went looking for it (it’s more prevalent in Waikiki). AND The Tikiyaki Orchestra is rocking my hale.
Ukulele music is not something I really appreciated before this trip. With one or two exceptions (Over the Rainbow by IZ), I didn’t take it seriously. However, New Year’s Eve changed that…. we saw PonchoMan play at Rosa’s Cantina, and he rocked the joint with his uke. I don’t know that I’ve heard anyone cover Human Nature by Michael Jackson in quite that way. Now, Harold and I are fans.
I discovered that Kona Koffee really IS AWESOME. 100%, that is… the blends are clearly less than. Mountain Thunder Organic Coffee and Lava Java are amazing and after a tour of the Mountain Thunder on the side of ol’ Hualalai (dormant volcano), I understand the appeal of Kona coffee. It has less caff, and it’s ever so smooth. I’m a mainland fan.
Okay… this is where my first account ends. I will continue with more thoughts and observations in upcoming blog entries… until then… living Aloha.
OH… and pics are up on Squid Row Mama’s Flickr Site… enjoy! (captions in due time…)
