DENNIS ODA / DODA@STARBULLETIN.COM Kapiolani Hao and her Halau Ke Kia i A O Hula, from Honolulu, brave the wind and rain as they visit Kilauea volcano to offer hookupu to Pele as part of their uniki ceremony, a rite where certain hula students graduate to a higher level of hula.

Merrie Monarch hula
competition is a hot ticket

Many mainlanders and foreigners
are unable to get seats

Schedule

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By Tim Ryan
tryan@starbulletin.com

HILO >> Tokyo residents Janet Shibata, Irene Inafuku and Dawn Tominaga are sitting in Ken's House of Pancakes wearing this year's striking purple Merrie Monarch Festival T-shirts and reading a program of the upcoming hula competitions that run today through Saturday night.

"Hula is very well respected in Japan," says Tominaga, 22, a secretary for Sony, "so we make our plans to visit Hawaii just when the festival is occurring."

Earlier in the day, the trio sneaked into the rustic Edith Kanaka'ole Stadium, where the event is held, to watch some rehearsals and locate the best seats, which were free last night for exhibition performances by Oahu and Hilo hula halau.

"I have taken a few (hula) lessons in Japan, so I got up on that stage to, you know, do a bit of the dance so my friends could take my picture like I was really in this festival," said Inafuku, 21, giggling.

The three women were sharing one plate of Ken's Hilo Style Beef Stew, described on the menu as "messy but good."

"We're trying to go local this weekend," Shibata joked.

For the past 40 years, Hilo, for one week in April, becomes the center of celebration of the art of hula with the Merrie Monarch Festival, a defining tribute to King David Kalakaua, nicknamed "the Merrie Monarch."

This year's Merrie Monarch Festival includes 29 halau from Hawaii and California and 16 dancers in tonight's Miss Aloha Hula competition.

Festival organizers received requests for tickets to the 5,000-capacity stadium this year from Japan, New York, Germany and Saudi Arabia. Most were turned down, partly because each halau receives 75 tickets distributed to the dancers and two family members.

Christina Hastings, of Kailua-Kona, is making her first visit to the Merrie Monarch in the 15 years she's lived on the Big Island, but had no tickets.

"Tonight's easy because it's free, but it's the competitions we want to see," she said.

Hastings, a freelance writer, had been standing for 45 minutes in line at a booth selling T-shirts and programs when the man behind her offered her two Friday and Saturday night tickets for $100.

"Sold," she told the man, who will miss his first festival in a decade.

By the week's end, more than some 1,000 dancers compete for hula gold in three competitive categories: the solo Miss Aloha Hula, hula kahiko (ancient hula) and hula 'auana (modern hula).

Triumph earns enduring bragging rights but also the respect of fellow dancers and the Hawaiian community, said Luana Kawelu, assistant director and daughter of the event's matriarch "Auntie" Dotty Thompson, who will be 82 next month.

"We believe that Merrie Monarch is not only the Big Island's premier cultural event, but the state's as well," Kawelu said.