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Ukulele Picnic

Walked over to the Ukulele Picnic at the Kaka’ako Waterfront Park today. Only found out about it via Twitter. Apparently, it’s put on by an Ukulele shop in Japan. It was a lot of fun. Here’s Aldrine Guerrero on stage.

There were a bunch of food booths, vendors, and crafters. There were even food trucks in the parking lot.

There were ukulele manufacturers there including Kamaka and Kanile’a. There were also free ukulele and hula lessons for the visitors. Nice….

There were jumpers and activities for the kids. (And porta potties.)

andagi

For lunch, I had a plate of yakisoba noodles and an andagi for dessert. So ono….

But the person who had the most fun was this little kid sliding down the hill on a piece of cardboard. Good times.

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Kung Hei Fat Choi

Attended the Night in Chinatown Street Festival & Parade this late afternoon / early evening. Ran into friends there. Had a great time!

As the parade moved along Hotel Street, I had to run down King Street to catch up to it for this pic.

Then I headed over to the food booths before the parade ended to beat the crowds. Good call….

The side streets were jam packed. There were food booths, vendors, kung fu demonstrations, pageant queens, and even a reggae concert!

The parade ended at River Street with what looked like a dance battle. Here’s a link to my Viddy video.

Sampled a few unusual desserts with friends. Had fun. A great celebration….

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Google Apps for Education Hawai’i Summit

google

Had a blast at the Google Apps for Education Summit this weekend. Learned a lot and made new friends. Here is the link to my notes and takeaways on my school blog. Here is the Twitter hashtag, #gafesummit.

phoenix

Walked over to the University of Phoenix for the two-day conference. My first time there. There were about 200 participants.

terminal 10

The keynote was held across the street at the Aloha Tower’s Terminal 10. Soundcheck 1, 2, 3….

kope

We were treated to baristas from the Kope coffee catering company.

tweet

Shared my iPhone keychain/tripod and got tweeted. Should get commission….

Enjoyed all of the sessions. Looking forward to sharing at school. And looking forward to next year’s summit. See y’all there.

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Wicked Honolulu

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So blessed to have seen Wicked last night! It was amazing! Went with a bunch of friends from church. Here’s a pic of “the cousins.”

Actually purchased the ticket back in 2011 at a group rate (when I could still afford it.) It was so worth it. The production was great. The story & storytelling were amazing. The music was inspiring, and the two leads were fantastic. I highly recommend it.

This was the last play that I absolutely wanted to see. I’ve seen the “Big Four,” Phantom, Les Mis, Cats (hated Cats,) and Miss Saigon. I’ve also seen Rent, Beauty & the Beast, Grease, Chicago, Lion King, Chorus Line, and High School Musical (hey, it was good.)

Go see Wicked. You’ll definitely be “flying high, defying gravity….”

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Natatorium Service Project

Participated in our Kamehameha Schools service project for the Waikiki Natatorium today. I was unable to attend my scheduled event at the fishpond yesterday, but I was able to make the switch.

On the way, I stopped for breakfast in Kapahulu. But I digress….

Parked across the street at Kapiolani Park.

Here I am standing in front of the Natatorium. You can read about its storied history here. I hope that it will be restored. It would be such a shame to lose it.

Our service project was specifically the removal of invasive limu (seaweed) that is harming the coral reef (just beyond the Natatorium and fronting the Waikiki Aquarium.) This effort is led by the University of Hawai’i. They provided two scuba divers. Our volunteers consisted of snorkelers who transported the bags from the divers to the shore. We also had a group of people collecting the limu in the shallow waters. My job was to dump the bags into bins that were rolled up to the sorting tables. Here are more pics from the Star-Advertiser.

All together, our 65 volunteers removed over 1300 pounds of invasive limu. A truck transported the limu to the nearby Honolulu Zoo for composting.

After rinsing off, we had a nice bento lunch under the banyan trees. (I’m so glad that we didn’t have to eat the limu.) It was a great time of bonding and fellowship.

It truly was a “good and industrious” kinda day. Imua….