more pics.....

Aloha,

Well it's another rainy day in Georgia (sounds like a song...) :) which is a good thing, we can always use the rain here. But I did promise to post more pictures & since the girlies are in school, & I'm gopped on coffee & there's not much else to do around the house today (caught up on swaps, everything clean, no dishes...yet, no dirty clothes...) I decided to go on the computer. so here it goes:

This was Friday morning, our 1st meeting with the musicians. We hired them through an e-mail, given to me by the people running the festival. I had contacted them once I found out that our Ohana in Hawaii couldn't come because of a family function that was taking place that same weekend (first obstacle we ran into...) Not a problem, cause the people running the competition, told me, they had a "house" band for hire, so that's how we found out about "Ulumau"! & what a find they are!! Lopaka was the one who contacted me back & we either e-mailed or called back & forth to figure out what was needed. They even sent us an MP3 of them singing so we could "practice" getting use to them. & on Friday morning, we were all together for the 1st time. All in one state, on the same floor, hearing the band for the 1st time in person....it was really happening!!!

We got to practice with them roughly for an hour, we got to use the stage roughly for an hour (kept getting interrupted though, but won't go into that rant....) Found a somewhat empty hallway in the hotel to use to practice a little more....figured it was time to start making our adornments...

(Here's a pic of Puamaeole, making her haku....one of the IL girls...) obstacle # 2... well, due to some miscommunication ( I totally take the blame for this one, just couldn't get a hold of the right ohana at the right time....even though I DID let them know ahead of time....) anywho, long story short, we were unable to get fauna from Hawaii, so figured we could use whatever we could find. Since most of the ladies were flying in, I tried to depend mostly on those of us who were driving down to Florida, but Kiakahi (MO girl) has a WHOLE PLETHORA of ivy & greens in her back yard ( she does outdoor photography...well, not that she takes pictures of the outdoors, she does most of her pictures outdoors....) so I begged (more so demanded...) :) her to bring whatever she could. Polinahe (one of my haumana here....or should I say, one of the GA girls...) :) also has ivy in her yard, so had her ( & hubby too...) bring whatever they could. GA girl Kalani & myself, ended up bringing bamboo leaves ( there's practically a wild forest of them near Kalani's house...) since I have nothing worthy of lei making in my yard & Kalani's maple leaves (yes, I said maple leaves...see how desperate we were getting....ever heard of using maple leaves to make leis?...It could happen....they do work rather well!) were too high to reach, we ended up bringing bag loads of bamboo leaves. Well, along with some (gasp, that I even admit this...) store bought flowers (& by-the-who, Lokelani, what were those flowers?...some kind of lily??...) anywho, we made due with what we had

our room looked like a forest threw up in it!!

I really felt bad about the staff at the hotel, I mean after all, we weren't the only halau doing this...I mean whatever floor you went on, there were others doing the same thing, making leis in lobbies, in hallways, it was too funny...I mean, we tried our best to clean up, I did put down paper first before we even started, but there were leaves EVERYWHERE!! & raffia & newspaper & floss & threads, you name it, we used it! Then as the night moved on, we wondered what to do for kupe'e, leis, etc ( we mostly used ivy & some leather leaf, that we got from another halau from Florida...) for our lei po'o (head leis) but we were quickly running out of time & of usable leaves for neck leis...Luckily we brought Kukui nut leis for our neck, Kiakahi brought enough kukui nui leis to breakdown for our kupe'e (wristlets & anklets) That covered it for kahiko (ancient) but what of our auana (modern, dance..)? Well earlier, Loke & I went on a search for flowers, which we ended up finding the lilies (at a Publix of all places...) & I had also brought white shell leis that we were going to use for our auana anyways...but we still needed something....That's when Loke decided to try to mess around with the bamboo leaves...what can we do with those? Well I suggested to try to haku them like our lei po'o...nah that didn't work, how about wili (braid...) them....nah didn't like how that was turning out....Loke : what about sewing them? ( ku'i), well....now that seemed to work...

so here's Loke ku'i-ing away....they really did turn out rather nice! & If there was a will, we'd find a way! & we certainly did! & this was just our first night!.....

I don't know for sure what time I finally went to bed ( roughly it had to been after 2am....) but little-by-little, whoever was done, we told them to try to go to bed...so as 1 would finish a lei, "ok, now go to bed..." was the next demand! Turns out none of us really got any sleep & for our 1st number we did kahiko ( & with no makeup on, which I'm sure the ladies STILL don't forgive me for that one.....long story....) :) we really did look like a bunch of pissed off volcano goddesses ready to BLOW! :) but it got better.....it really did!

'nuff for today, will continue the saga tomorrow....

a hui hou,

Tina