mai kai mystery girl - escapade magazine, feb 1961

Oh my Brethren,

If you do not own a copy of the February 1961 issue of ESCAPADE Men's Magazine, then you should definitely try to find one for your collection.

I just bought one last week and it contains a beautiful 4-page article on the Mai Kai, featuring "Mystery Girl Puanani" (from her looks, she's probably a Claire or a Mary, but "Puanani" sounds much more intoxicating).

Here are some photos.

Sabu

[ Edited by: Sabu The Coconut Boy on 2004-09-26 22:48 ]

What girl?! The BOWL man, the BOWL!...this is the best picture of that bowl I have seen yet, what a clunky mother. What's that design on the side?
I don't know anybody who owns a first generation mold Mystery bowl like that. If the Trader Vic Tiki stem glass is the Holy Grail of Tiki, this must be the Arc of Tiki. (I always thought of the black "The Tikis" mug on page 113 of the BOT as the Maltese Falcon of...)

Sven, you know you've been searching for lost Tikis too long when don't even notice the Mystery Girl holding it out to you.

Even Indiana Jones looked at the girl once in a while, my friend.

By the way, that bowl looks like the bowl that King Kamehameha would have let his royal pooch drink from, dontcha think?

(Oh, and the design on the side looks floral to me...)

[ Edited by: Reever on 2002-11-25 12:50 ]

About the bowl. It looks like the same material/glazing or whatever as the Kona Grog mug. It sure would be sweet to find one of those big muthas.
About the article. Thanks for posting it. I saw this magazine on e-bay, but didn't bid. I'm also wondering if anyone has found the article Esquire magazine did on the Mai-Kai. Some of the old Mai-Kai postcards reference this article, but I've never found an issue of Esquire with this write-up.

sven- the wife and I have been living in our newly built pad for a couple months now and have been meeting the neighbors in our 2-street neighborhood. Turns out, the woman up the street is a Native Tahitian from a very small island (pop 100ish) in French Polynesia- she moved to Hawaii in the late 50's or early 60's to dance as one of the first dancers at the Polynesian Cultural Center, and was then wooed to Florida in the early 60's by her sister who was one of the early dancers at the Mai Kai. She danced there for years, and her sister married the owner. I believe he died and she is now the owner. I have become good friends with her, swapped some Mai Kai memorabilia and she borrowed the BOT for a few weeks- she and her husband loved it. We are big plant-trading buddies now (she is in her 60's or 70's I would guess) and I just scored her some Tiare (tahitian gardenia) special-ordered from a rare plant nursery and she flipped to have some again.

Anyway- she still sews the Mai Kai dancer costumes for her sister- I just saw her latest creations- pretty nice. When i saw her earlier today she was wearing a "I danced at the MaiKai" T-shirt hahaha

She and her husband have an almost complete collection of MK calendars dating way back, becuase they were all her friends- she gave me an old postcard of her as a young wahine posing with the other dancers. Pretty interesting coincidence.

I have yet to unpack the collection, so I don't think she realizes just how much of this stuff I have collected, but she was suprised to see some of the stuff we did have. She's got that bowl front and center in her living room, but I think it may be the newer version.. she also had some vintage lamps and other odds and ends from the MK- she gave me some napkins made from the old fabric that are the same as the shirt in the BOT. Very nice woman, and she's got some great stories.. I'll post one of the best ones later on..

EDIT: looking at that buffet table pic above, those are the lamps she has in her kitchen with the tapa shades- you cant make it out too well from the pic, but there are tikis on the bases.

[ Edited by: fatuhiva on 2002-11-27 00:43 ]

"..It's a small world after all, it's a small.." (after the Disneyland ride)

How great! She must be the sister of Mireille Thornton, the late Bob Thornton's wife. I always loved the fact that Bob as a Haole not only realized his dream by building his own Polynesian paradise AND getting the Exotica girl, but that she now is the owner and runs it successfully.
That's a better record than Danny Balsz's and Marlon Brando's.

She danced there for years, and her sister married the owner. I believe he died and she is now the owner.

This is too cool and kind of freaky. Any chance we could get your neighbor to come to the Hukilau?

Also, this brings up something I keep thinking about, but never get off my duff to do. Some of the original owners, bartenders, and craftsmen of polynesian pop era are still around. I think it would be so great to grab a video camera and tape an hour or so of them talking about the good old days.

I see THEJAB is in the Black and White photos receiving his "mystery girl Lei".--ps Dark hair and glasses

If the hukilau is in Ft. Lauderdale, I might be able to persuade her to go, but both she and her husband are very retired at this point, so I don't know. Do you have any invitations I could give her?

What are the dates/info for the hukilau?

They often go down to visit her sister, so its a good possibility if it's gonna be in Ft. Laud

(weird double post)

[ Edited by: fatuhiva on 2002-12-04 01:12 ]

If the hukilau is is Ft. Lauderdale, I might be able to persuade her to go, but both she and her husband are very retired at this point, so I don't know. Do you have any invitations I could give her?

What are the dates/info for the hukilau?

Here is the scoop on Hukilau from an earlier post in the main forum. Swanky is getting the web site ready, so there should be more info. soon.

"The 2nd annual Hukilau is set for the weekend of Friday, June 27 and Saturday, June 28, 2003, at what the BOT calls the finest remaining example of Polynesian pop culture in the United States, the legendary Mai-Kai Restaurant in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.

According to Tiki-Bre, a block of rooms have been reserved for our group at the Oceanfront Holiday Inn--Ft Lauderdale Beach (954 563 5961 or 1 800 HOLIDAY).
Friday night's mega party will be in the hotel ballroom which overlooks the ocean. On Saturday, the Mai-Kai is opening one hour early for our group. We have the run of the place until normal opening time, then everybody who has arranged dinner reservations will eat and watch the show.
People who prefer to just drink and have appetizers can hang out at the bar.
After the 1st show the Hukilau will continue in a private room at the Mai-Kai with more entertainment. Everyone must arrange their own hotel reservations and Mai-Kai dinner reservations, mentioning Hukilau at both places when making reservations. The hotel is giving all Hukilau attendees a special rate of $79 a night which can be applied a couple days before and after the 27th and
28th. It is important to encourage everyone to make the hotel reservations early (even now) because it will sell out fast."

Saturday June 28th is when we will be at the Mai Kai. It would be awesome to have a Mai Kai girl reunion that night. The owner of the Mai Kai is a former Mai Kai girl herself and likely is in touch with a lot of the ladies. If someone planted the idea... But then, we might end up fighting for space at the dinner show and we want to have all 280 seats for us tiki weirdos.

On 2002-11-25 10:19, bigbrotiki wrote:
The BOWL man, the BOWL!...this is the best picture of that bowl I have seen yet. I don't know anybody who owns a first generation mold Mystery bowl like that.

[ Edited by: filslash 2008-09-15 15:35 ]

Here are pics of the mysterious Mystery Bowl, and others. This was bought in a lot which contained perhaps 6-7 early Mai Kai mugs and this Harper original bowl for about $600 (not by me unfortunately. I would have sold every mug, menu and swizzle I owned for what was in that box!).

Here is a slightly later one ownded by Boutiki, which does not have the flower design on the side, just the logos:

The Swank Pad Broadcast - If it's Swank...

[ Edited by: swanky 2006-03-06 10:09 ]

Heres my mai kai bowl. Odd the heads don't tilt back as much as swankys. Plus my guys are fatter. You can see the ribs on swankys. I got this from mr.taso late owner of the kahiki. I wonder if this is the bowl they used to copy the mai kai bowl? for thier kahiki/mai kai knock off bowl?

The Harper bowl is likely the prototype for the Kahiki bowl. Maybe it was even made by Harper. Skip says there was one on Ebay a while back. Who has it? That's my Holy Grail. I mean, the 1956 Mystery Bowl is worth everything in my collection, but the Kahiki version of the 1956 Mai Kai bowl is worth way more. My left nut. The Holy Grail.

This is a picture of the cover of the dispatch insert for the kahiki. Is this the bowl that you speak of? In other photos the inside looks green, Plus the tiki men look kind of different.

It's in the drink menu I have. I don't have that image handy.