2 posts tagged “tiki oasis 9”
This is a great video summary of our Tiki Oasis weekend:
I'm finally getting around to blogging about the weekend before last -- i.e., TIKI OASIS 9! It was epic.
It was my third year attending, but my first year actually staying at the hotel and attending all the festivities. Definitely a good move - why didn't I do this before?
For those of you unfamiliar with Tiki Oasis, it's kinda like a big tiki geek convention. Think Comic-Con, except instead of comics, you get rum drinks, hula girls, tiki carving, pool lounging, swanky music, room crawls, and did I mention rum drinks?
The weekend kicked off with the Bali Hai opening party, where I saw the usual cast of tiki celebs - Doug Horne, Crazy Al, Otto von Stroheim, and King Kukulele. Here's me n' King Kukulele. The theme this year was "Surf City" so I was doing my best to channel my inner Gidget.
And here's my friend Todd, borrowing Doug Horne's glasses -
My tiki crew, which consisted of the honey, and Todd & Eliot, were encouraging people this year to bring/buy their own mugs in lieu of using disposable cups. So we made shirts for ourselves & handed out stickers to people with their own mugs. Special thanks to Nick at Tiki Magazine for giving us an ad for free. And Otto said that next year he'd help us advertise the effort some more. Next year, we'll be applying tattoos. :)
The weekend was full of pool lounging, and listening to swingin' 50s exotica music. Shag was there, making a rare appearance with his band the Hungtington Cads. (He usually just sticks to his art).
My favorite part of this year was the room crawls. Generous tiki-philes host room parties, with free rum drinks and usually music. There are enough parties to go to from 5pm till the wee hours of the morning. The first party we attended was Friday night in Queen Kamehameha's (Amy & Ray's). Here's what the line looked like:
We were handed souvenier tiki shot glasses with Limoncello 151 (hello!) upon entering. There were 3 additional yummy drink selections, food, and a band - the Martini Kings, with a stand-up bass and vibraphone! They were great.
I mean, where else could you find room crawls? Awesome. Our Saturday night room crawl was a pajama party.
Here's the elevator crowd - we're all traveling to room parties :) --
As you can see, the event was pretty big:
Here's me asking Shag to autograph my inner tube. (I had just visited the rum symposium, which may explain this situation):
Some tiki carving:
