No Thingyan Festival

We aren't at the Thingyan Festival...bummer. I have another terrible cold. Its like I am catching all of the island fevers this year. Yesterday when I woke up I didn't feel that great and by the time I was at work, I knew I was in trouble. Even my ears are plugged up. We got up this morning and I just knew I couldn't handle being outside in the sun eating weirdo food. Thingyan festival is the Burmese Water Festival (Buddist New Year). They have food booths, face painting, crafts and then shoot each other with water guns (water throwing).

I layed down on my chaise lounge and fell asleep for 3 hours. When I woke up Brian had gone to Home Depot to get wood and had already created an entire new support system for the new bed. We have a terrible foundation for our mattress (what they used to call a boxspring), so there needs to be good support for our mattress to not leave us in traction. You would think that $1000 could buy you a good nights rest on a good mattress...not so. Of course after twisting around in people's mouths all day, maybe we require more back support than the average person.

Been watching the Merrie Monarch Festival on TV. I have it DVR'd. It is amazing!!! It is held every year on the Big Island and is a HUGE hula competition. It runs for three days, 6 hours each day. First is the individual women's competition for Miss Aloha Hula. Then there is a group competition with ancient hula dances and chanting and last they have more contemporary hula in groups. The ancient hula is so amazing. I am sooo impressed. There are both groups of men and women. They dance to traditional music and chant in Hawaiian, then they dance. They are all in complete unision. Then after three groups go, the commentary goes back and shows part of the dance and tells you what it means. People train for this their entire lives. Each Halau (hula school) has its own Kumu (teacher) who teaches them the language and dances that have been passed down through generations. I'm going to try to buy the dvd of it when it comes out since it takes up so much of our DVR space. But I'm really inspired to find someplace to learn hula now....