The Hawaiian Room...

On Saturday of the conference, there was a gathering of a special

group of ladies.

In 1937 the Lexington Hotel was in need of something to bring in money, so 

they opened the "Hawaiian Room"

and for the next 30 years for two shows a night, 6 days a week

Hawaii was brought to New York.

Famous Hawaiian performers played there; Alfred Apaka, Ray Kenny,

Kui Lee to name a few.

Part of these shows were the hula maids dancing both hula and Tahitian.

These girls traveled 5000 miles from Hawaii to New York to 

dance in these shows.  

So on Saturday a group of these girls got together to "talk story"

about their days there.

We were invited to the conference by TeMoana (Marcie) who is the

niece of the Alama Sisters.

some pictures of Marcie during her Lexington days

one of the oldest girls still gets up to dance

they talked about what it was like to be chosen to go and how they were chosen.

What they thought when they first arrived, "where is the sun? Where are the trees? Where is

the ocean? Where is the blue sky?"  

It didn't seem like they were paid much, so they talked about how they went out as

a group to parties.

one of them had the actual dress she wore when a group of 

them danced on 5th Ave. when Hawaii became a state

that's her in her dress in the middle

there was lots of hula,

once they heard the music, away they went

listening to this group talk about their New York experiences

was something I'll never forget.

even after this many years they're still dancing...

I'm so thankful that the Hula Preservation Society has gotten all of them

together again to tell their stories.

This was really something that I'll never forget.

Mahalo Marcie and all the gracious girls.