Lantern Floating Ceremony

Each Memorial Day, there is a lantern floating event at Ala Moana Beach on O'ahu. Thousands of people come to inscribe a lantern with memories of loved ones who have passed and float the lantern into the ocean. This year, there were 47,000 people at the event and about 6000 lanterns were released.

The entire event is broadcast live, and it's now my tradition to watch every minute of it. One year, I made lanterns for several of my favorite fur friends and floated them in my backyard pond. I didn't have time to do that this year.

There is much formality at the beginning with a blessing and musicians and a Buddhist priestess performing all sorts of rituals. And then they release the lanterns...

I took these pictures from my TV screen. I'm sure there are better pictures and videos and such online. The official video isn't available yet, but it will be here soon - Lantern Floating.

I guess this is the official beginning of Summer 2015. If you haven't already booked up your entire summer, I'd love to see you here! Megan and Jeff will be here for a week in June, but the ohana is empty the rest of the summer. 

Aloha y'all!

Not to be Confused with the Mayweather-Pacquiao Fight

I've heard that the hugely hyped fight turned out to be more of a "dance."

This is Sophie and her friend Chloe dancing at the beach on Sunday.
They are NOT fighting!

It began like a normal romp in the sand.

Then words were exchanged.

And the dance began!

There was never a bark or growl, and we saw no reason to stop them. This dance continued for several minutes. And then they went back to their normal play. Dogs be crazy.

Aloha y'all!