Post #305080 by AlienTiki on Wed, May 9, 2007 5:04 AM

For what it's worth, these "Bali-Wood" Tikis have flooded the market here in Hawaii. I see tons of them all over the place. I can instantly tell them from the many other kinds of tiki found here. I honestly can say they suck ass. The carvers are technically skilled and the wood is of fine tropical hardwood that could not be purchased for these prices UN-CARVED. The designs and proportions are way off though and that's the dead giveaway to me. But the reason I don't like them is they are imported. Many of the sellers claim they are from the islands. And where the hell is the "island of the gods"? And by "Carved in the islands" they won't tell you they mean Philippines or Indonesia where the child who carved these wooden figures receives only a slightly better wage than their friends who work at the NIKE factory down the road.

I'm not trying to say it has to be from Hawaii to be "tiki/polypop" or even from the U.S. This is just a case of an American businessman making money off of the sweat and labor of the hard indigenous workers and gullibility and wealth of the American tikiphile.

There are many excellent tiki carvers here on TC, no need to go all the way to China to find one.