May Day - 05/01/2014

The first of May is always the May Day Festival, regardless if it is on a Monday or a Saturday.  I went a couple of years ago and realized that there was a whole May Day program that I had missed. So this year, I took the day off from work so I can enjoy the entire festivities.  When I got to Kapiolani Park, there was such a large crowd that I soon forgot it was Thursday and not Saturday.  Even the Queen Kapiolani statue was covered in lei strung with jade flower, said to be her favorite flower.
This year, I went 'light' and used just my 100mm lens.

When I found a spot to sit, the hula performance had already started.

When Mayor Caldwell was making his speech, the monthly noon time test siren had gone on and Kimo Kahoano did an impromptu emergency announcement that made everyone laugh.

The 2014 May Day Queen performed a hula about lei giving.

Under a tent, there were lei making demos.  I spent most of my time taking pics of all the flowers.

One of the lei maker even got interviewed by a TV crew.

They offered leis to the cutest visitors to the booth..

I became fascinated by the colors of the flowers that were randomly strewn on the tables.

There was a tapa demo.  I have to admit that the smell of the wet bark that was used to make the tapa smelled worse that the corpse flower.

I waited in line for about 20 mins so I could see all the lei entries and winners on display.

There were all kinds of leis of every color of the rainbow, from strung leis to haku leis.

 I believe this was the Mayor's winner.

There were also ribbon leis that were made to look like real flowers.

It was a hot and sunny day but I was glad I spent a day off to enjoy this May Day. I think I'm gonna do it again next year!

Eyes of Hawaii State Library Exhibit - 05/01/2014

The State library exhibit is the main event that shows the member's of Eyes of Hawaii's work. This year, the displays were in the main lobby of the library and there were a lot of great photos. The exhibit runs for a month thru May 29th.

Lunar Eclipse - 04/14/2014

I have no idea what to expect of shooting a lunar eclipse a.k.a. the blood moon.  I started out hand holding my shots but realize it was getting really dark so I got out my tripod. The moon kept moving (duh!) and I kept having to readjust the camera position and it was near impossible to focus as it got darker. Even though the whole eclipse lasted about 3 hours, I was still struggling trying all kinds of different adjustments.  After seeing other peoples shots, doing a little more reading, and having this experience, I hope I'll get better shots next time around in October.
Here is my series of shots. These were cropped from my max 200mm zoom shots.  By the way, I donno how blogger stacked up my shots like this.. it was purely coincidental but I think it works so I am not gonna reformat the layout.

Corpse Flower @ Foster Botanical Garden - 04/12/2014

I saw the news about the corpse flower (Amorphophallus titanum) blooming at Foster Botanical Garden and took the chance to see and smell it. Parking wasn't too bad as I got there around 3pm and they extended the hours at the garden to 5pm that day. In just a few hours you can really tell the difference.   It was really amazing.  The only disappointment was that the flower didn't really smell as bad as I'd thought.  I got this photo below from my nephew who got there earlier in the afternoon.

This is what I saw when I first arrived.

By late afternoon, I check it again and it had opened and you can see the inside of the flower.

I decided to go and check this out again on Sunday morning around 9am and the flower had opened wide. I noticed they cut a large hole on the side of the flower.

from the hole, you can see the flower buds at the bottom of the flower center.

Here's the inside of the flower.  I couldn't smell the stench.  It didn't smell nice, but kind of a musty dull smell but wasn't really 'bad'.

They have another bulb growing on the side.  The guide said they are fortunate that they have enough plants so there's been one blossom a year. He also said that this plant is in the same family as the konnyaku plant. 

The plant can go thru two cycles, one cycle would become a tree like plant.  Then after it absorbs all the nutrients from the leaves, it will collapse and then go thru another cycle that can result in a blossom again.  I can't believe this tree was a flower blossom. 

Just to show how large the flower was..here are people in front of me in line.

There was quite a crowd on Saturday afternoon ready to take a whiff. Luckily the line moved at a steady pace. I was glad to see the flower, but I guess too bad it didn't smell..

Pregnant Opae'ula again - 04/01/2014

It's been a while since I've seen my shrimps carried eggs. The last time I had posted about them here was in 2009!  I just happened to check my very dirty Eco tank and saw a pregnant shrimp swimming at the top ear the water line. I'm not sure why but the tank gets very dirty but then they'll eventually clean it themselves, I guess, hence the 'eco' system.  These are really dark colored eggs and I was lucky to have spotted them.   This means I'll have more shrimps to help in the cleaning.

Monday at the Zoo - 03/17/2014

This post is a bit out of order due to all the other festivities that happened but best late than never. Erick, Celia and I checked out the zoo after the St. Patrick's Day parade. I had read about the new antelopes at the zoo and wanted to see them. Being it was a pretty hot afternoon which means a great time for napping, the animals all must've had the same idea cuz we didn't see a lot of them.  I think the Flamingos were all pretty sleepy..

One that wasn't sleepy..

Sleepy..

Not sleepy..

Sleepy..

Giraffe, looking kinda sleepy..

It was the Rhino's feeding or snack time as the zookeeper tossed apples into the water and he (or she) came for it and I got a closeup of his muddy exterior.

I took this w/ my iphone just as we exited the zoo when it was closing time.

These were the cutest water bottle holders.   Since I can't possibly 'collect them all', I just took a pic of them.. Although it was a fun day, I never got to see the antelope.. guess will just have to go back again soon..perhaps while they're not sleeping..