Glamborous
Photo by Anton Glamb
There’s been a lot of hype about Bike Month and the King Street protected bike lane officially opening for two-way traffic. Honolulu Bicycling League recently had a pau hana at Kakaako Agora, complete with free food, giveaways like reflective bags, straps (to keep your khakis away from your greasy chain) or lights, and everyone over 21 received a wristband that entered them into a raffle for bigger, better prizes. There was a pretty decent live musician and a presentation by a couple that is biking around the world (except for the giant oceans that get in the way).
The turnout this year dwarfed last year’s at fishcake, but the coolest part was seeing how diverse the crowd was. In the past year, many of my friends have switched to riding a bike for at least some of their commutes, and the infrastructure upgrades are enticing a lot of new riders to take two wheels to work instead of four. It feels like ridership has at least doubled, if not quadrupled, on my daily route since the lane opened — although part of that could be that some riders used to go down different streets and now are choosing to take advantage of our new cycling superhighway.
That same Friday, there also was a beast feast dinner party in the back of Manoa, where hand-slaughtered game and freshly caught fish were served potluck style by guests who had claimed their carcasses and took them home to prepare. It was like one of those Food Network cooking competition shows, except that everyone was a winner and nobody got cut — except for the animals, into bite-size morsels.
With all of the pretentiousness that commonly surrounds eating choices, it was nice to see everyone come together to use those canine teeth that we have evolved for a reason. There also was a sick DJ set by Alex Globerson (aka Globes) and a dance party that even made me blush.
To continue with the spirit of bringing people together for positive pursuits, Mental Rager hosted a beach clean up at Sherwoods Beach in Waimanalo. After picking up trash for a couple hours and filling up several garbage bags, finding spare tires and assorted mechanical objects, DJs B-ILL and Substatik pumped up the jams and turned it into a pizza party of epic proportions. The highlight was when a pizza flipped out of the box face down in the sand, definitely the biggest party foul I’ve seen in 2015.
