Pacific Islander Festival

The 9th annual Pacific Islander Festival takes place this weekend (Sep 27/28) at Ski Beach here in San Diego. It gets bigger each year with more food stands, vendors, music and dancers. For more info contact http://www.pacificislanders.com. If you show up without aloha, you'll have it when you leave!

[ Edited by: Monkeyman on 2003-10-27 10:56 ]

I'm there.
I have a conference in SD until Wed. Anyone what to hang on Sunday.

Be Careful... the tikies are watching

[ Edited by: MTKahuna on 2003-09-26 10:00 ]

[ Edited by: Monkeyman on 2003-10-27 10:56 ]

Pop is in!

What time are you all going? Maybe we can meet up somewhere. How does Bali Hai or Islands Room sound for dinner?

Cool...
How about Bali Hai's at 7:00pm on Saturday.
What are their hours?

[ Edited by: Monkeyman on 2003-10-27 10:56 ]

Monkeyman-
Hey, I met you the other night when I stopped by your pad to pick up the tiki mug. I think we may be at the Festival this weekend. I will give you a call on your cell if we make it.

Excellent!...and I thought we were going to spend a quiet weekend at home for a change. Of course we're always up for any tiki event, especially when it's local.

Looks like we'll be at the Pacific Island Festival at around noon or early afternoon on Saturday. I see that the festival is on from 9AM - 5PM. We'll also meet everyone at the Bali Hai at 7PM. FYI, Bali Hai is open until 11:30 PM (ish), but stops serving food at 10:00 PM on Saturday.

We live a few miles east of where the PIF is happening. If anyone needs anything or wants to stop by our place feel free to call...619-379-9876 (mobile #).

See ya there...

ModMana :drink:

[ Edited by: ModMana on 2003-09-26 12:18 ]

I wish I could make it to the Bali Hai with everyone but I'll be up at Sixspace for the Shepard Fairey show. Enjoy and have a drink for me! :wink:

tikichic,

Besides tiki, we collect (or should I say "obey") Shepard Fairey. I'd like to see his show at Sixspace but we're just too burnt out from all the tiki traveling over the last couple of months. This local SD event is just what we needed. Let me know how the show goes.

ModMana :drink:

Although I got sucked into work tomorrow, I plan on doing a disappearing act at about noon and gettin' down to da festival about 1 ish. The PIF is a "non-alcoholic" event (none sold, none allowed in)so I pack a survival kit in the trunk of my car (kinda of a portable tiki bar, in case I get "thirsty"). Anyway, hope to see some TC'ers there tomorrow. Already planned on Bali Hai for brunch on sunday...but saturday at 7:00 sounds better.

Bali Hai...... Bali Hai......

Good times. It was to nice see the San Diego tiki family. Thanks for a fun night out.

Al & Shelly, Thanks for the tour & have a great time in Hawaii.

Adrian, give me a call about this weekend.

Rich and Marriane,
A very big mahalo to you both.

Derek & Olga and Terry & Sally, we'll try and get by your casa's on Wednesday. I'll call you with details.

See you soon,

Be Careful... the tikies are watching

[ Edited by: MTKahuna on 2003-09-29 14:01 ]

In case you were wondering what the Pacific Islander Festival was like. Here' s my take on it.

I had never heard of this festival before this year so I really didn' t know what to expect. My first impression was a good one as I walked past several large tikis to enter the grounds. My second impression was "Wow, I can't believe there are so many people here!". Many thousands of people of all backgrounds and ages in the crowd...definitely a family event. Of course people of Polynesian dissent were especially well represented and seemed proud to be there.

There was a main stage that had entertainment all day including hula shows, musical performances, and a variety of other types of polynesian entertainment. Unfortunately we arrived too late to spend much time watching the stage entertainment. But we still enjoyed what we saw and heard of it.

There was plenty of opportunity for Polynesian cultural enlightenment. Lots of educational booths showcasing all aspects of Polynesian life. Some nice artifacts but most were not for sale.

There were at least a dozen food booths with varying qualities of authentic island style food. We had some very tasty lumpia and empanadas. Unfortunately this was a dry event so no Mai Tais.

Lots of booths (maybe 30?) selling all things polynesian. If you were looking for tiki items like us, there wasn't as much as we had hoped. Didn't see any carved tikis that were especially impressive. Too bad some of the great carvers from this board weren't represented there. The other booth items were mostly cheap crafty things but if you looked hard you could definitely find a few gems worth purchasing. It was fun looking for hidden treasures.

Overall I'd say this was a great way to spend the better part of a day. Plus, it was free to get in. I wouldn't exactly call it a "tiki" event because the focus seemed to be more on the culture as a whole. Tikis had only a peripheral presence, but that was OK. I would recommend going next year if you can.

ModMana :drink:

[ Edited by: ModMana on 2003-09-30 02:16 ]

It was great seeing a good showing of the San Diego TC people at Bali Hai after the festival. And especially cool that even a few LA/OC people could make the road trip down. Thanks Al for leading a memorable late night hidden tiki tour of the Bali Hai grounds. PolyPop, I hope you made it home alright (sorry we kept you so late). MTKahuna, thanks very much for the mug swap, I hope we can do it again in the future. Monkeyman, we appreciated your lively tiki debates which grew more passionate as more drinks were consumed. And a big mahalo to everyone else!

ModMana :drink:

[ Edited by: Monkeyman on 2003-10-27 10:57 ]

Another great time at the Bali Hai! Sorry we missed out on Al's tour...it was getting to be past my bedtime. I think I had about four mai tais & two navy groggs. Sally had to tuck me in when we got home. Can't wait to do it again. Mahalo to all for the good ohana.

On 2003-09-30 13:58, Monkeyman wrote:
I cannot accept responsibility for myself when I no longer act responsibly. I will apologize for anything I might have said after my second mai tai.

Yeah, I thought I felt my ears burning for some (?) reason that day...

This years event is the weekend of September 24 and 25, 2005.

http://pacificislanders.com/

WooHoo!!! Sounds like ANOTHER Tikki-rrific Weekend. Looking forward to some more Fun in the Sun!!

Any suggestions for a hotel that is close to the event???

woohoo! watch out for "art of paradise" at da PIF show!

On 2005-08-23 18:25, WooHooWahine wrote:
Any suggestions for a hotel that is close to the event???

... bahia, catamaran, hilton... kayak or paddleboard over...

it's nui nui (very big), da parking is crazy! bring da strowla ! , come early... stay late!, swim in da bay!
It's a great show with lots of great venders!
'Ae !!

On 2005-08-23 18:25, WooHooWahine wrote:
Any suggestions for a hotel that is close to the event???

...sleep on the grass... lots of folks do it in mission bay park... under the stars and all that...

WooHooo! I hear The Bahia Calling :)

Hey folks, this festival is coming up again this weekend, September 23-24, 2006;

http://pacificislanders.com/

It's always a real big shindig, if you want genuiney Islander crafts this is the place.

This whole event is pretty amazing. Here's the pix I took yesterday. For one, it's HUGE, this audience goes right to the edge of the bay and this pic shows less than half the people there;

They had craft booths full of spears, clubs, tikis, tapa cloth, man it was overwhelming.

Here's a cool doll-house sized hut, this drew quite a few fans;

Hula and Tiki, a great combo. Next year I'm bringing a blanket like everybody else and just camp out all day. The food booths had long lines but were worth it.

This jovial fellow was pretty cool about letting me photo his guns, I thought his tats were the best ones there;

And of course the princesses!

The Eye of Tiki Central is everywhere, but so long for now from the sunny shores of San Diego!