Post #609664 by Psycho Tiki D on Mon, Oct 10, 2011 10:38 AM

Post crawl Mahalos to all of our hosts for 2011!

This event couldn't never happen without all of you and for that I have been extremely grateful for the past six years.

Each of you as hosts opened up your homes, lives and collections to share with our tiki community and went well above and beyond with preparation of food, drinks and entertainment. You made your guests feel comfortable and welcome.

Nods of appreciation to all who co-hosted, to Lauren and his wife for their hospitality at Swanbergs and to the dancers who performed at the Alohacurrents home. For those who participated in the Tiki Garage sale and the Tiki White Elephant Exchange, again, Mahalo.

Not withstanding is my appreciation to Dan and Wendy Cevola for our event decanter. What a special couple we have here in our community taking hours of their time to help us recognize our Ohana and our hometown. They did an incredible job, whether you like Tiki Bob or not!

So, you know who you are as my friends and I appreciate you, nothing less than my respect.

But...

Unfortunately, not everything went as smoothly in years past. We had an incident at one stop where an item was discovered to have taken or misplaced; the host was uncomfortable about discovering this during their time slot and asked to have an announcement made to ask for the group gathered to leave. No one other than the host made this decision and it was acted upon by one of the host's friends to make the announcement. The missing item, in speaking with the host at the last stop Sunday night, has not been found.

I myself felt somewhat uncomfortable this crawl. There was what seemed to be a division and some friction between certain people which I have not experienced in the previous five crawls. Having people tell me "they can't understand why "_______" doesn't like you" seems to totally take away from the reason why this event was started to begin with, although I appreciate at least knowing who I can trust. I apologize if I have offended anyone, but I will not abide a bully or coward under any circumstances. Work out your issues or don't attend.

That being said, although bittersweet and with some reservation, I am bowing out from planning any further crawl activities in the future. I have appreciated the support and dedication of all of those who have participated in either hosting or attending these past six years, but this has gone to a level I never expected and I am sad it did. Hopefully, this can be brought back in line by whomever takes this over.

So my friends, I will see you later!

PTD