Hawaii|Mokuʻāina o Hawaiʻi

Hawaiian Surfer

Say Aloha Again to Men’s Hawaiian Shirts

Over the last century the Hawaiian shirt, also called the Aloha shirt, has become a fashion icon. One of the biggest attractions to Hawaiian shirts is the variety of themes, designs and colors, making it easy for any man to choose a shirt that fits his own distinctive individual style. Until now, however, finding the right Hawaiian shirt has been difficult for consumers unless they are sifting through the racks in a retail clothing shop near Waikiki beach, like Hilo Hattie’s. The Internet has brought a wide selection of Hawaiian shirts to the fingertips of every consumer on earth, however, sparking a comeback of the ultimate tropical casual wear.

Hawaiian shirts are not just clothing—they represent a tropical state of mind and Hawaii’s laid-back lifestyle. These colorful, floral-print shirts evoke an feeling of exotic locales, tropical sunshine, palm trees swaying in the breeze, hula girls dancing on sandy beaches, and paradise Hawaiian style. The reemergence of Hawaiian shirts in recent decades has been driven in part by the popular Casual Friday or Aloha Friday trend that encourages everyone to unwind and wear Hawaiian shirts.

The louder, bolder versions of the Hawaiian shirt are also popular as a retro style, evocative of Don Ho and Elvis Presley. In addition, Duke Kahanamoku style shirts—named for the father of modern surfing, gold-medal swimmer and one of Hawaii’s greatest heroes—also bring back the days of 60s surfing, with a variety of surfer-style prints.

Hawaiian shirts are the top textile export of Hawaii, but shirts manufactured for local residents of the Hawaiian islands present more subdued colors, Hawaiian quilt designs, Polynesian motifs, and simple patterns. In fact, some of the local Hawaiian shirt styles are actually printed on the interior of the shirt, to mute the colors. In contrast to the informal feel the Hawaiian shirt projects to the rest of the world, in Hawaii these shirts are considered formal and business attire suited to the tropical island climate.

A recent trendy spin on the Hawaiian shirt has been the inclusion of Asian comic or anime, as well as martial arts emblems, Asian calligraphy and samurai designs on Hawaiian style shirts. This new movement has greatly expanded the appeal of Hawaiian shirts beyond the classic style. Consequently, the bold new look for Hawaiian shirts have become very popular in urban areas. Wearing the Hawaiian shirt over a t-shirt or as an oversized shirt has also expanded the appeal.

Hawaiian shirts are not just about the look, however. This style has been designed with lightweight fabrics such as cotton, rayon and silk, to provide maximum comfort in hot and humid tropical regions. Short-sleeved, button-down Hawaiian shirts are meant to be loose fitting and untucked, further supporting the relaxed Hawaiian lifestyle.

When delving deeper into the origin of Hawaiian shirts, you find that they reflect more than just Hawaii. Hawaiian shirts represent a pan-ethnic fusion of the many cultures that make up Hawaii. For example, Filipinos, a large ethnic group in Hawaii, influenced the style of the Hawaiian shirt with their own untucked “barong tagalog” short-sleeve shirt. Japanese kimono-cloth shirts worn by plantation workers in Hawaii during the early 20th century were also early versions of today’s Hawaiian shirt. This combination of Asian and Western cultures is at the heart of the magic of Hawaii, as well as the unique and forever fashionable Hawaiian shirt.

Source from: http://www.dhgate.com

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Are there different styles of surfing?

Hi everyone, I'm currently doing a report on surfing. I really don't know much about surfing yet, but I was wondering if anyone knew if there were different styles of surfing? Possibly SoCal surfers have a different style than Hawaiian surfers or something like that?

Thanks!

Yes there are some main styles, then there are personal styles. So much detail here, I'll give a summary:
Main styles:
- Longboarding
- classic: usually a tank of a board, slow graceful movements with a focus on minimal effort for maximum smooth gliding and nose riding, cutbacks and creative transitions between the two.
- high performance: usually a lighter board, single or tri fin. riding more difficult waves, more of a shortboarding intent with a long board. not easy to pull off.
- Shortboarding
- thruster: three fins on the underside make for a distinctive style where the turns are done in a pivot / accelerate manner. the board itself can be turned very easily in any direction and is hyper sensitive to its glide through the water. this type of board when matched well to the wave and the rider is like a magic carpet that will do anything you want it to do
- quad: four fins under the board with two per side. the fins line up with the rail (side) of the board and in doing so give the board a speedier glide than a thruster. with two fins to work with, the turning still has a bit of the thrust component to it that 'thrusters' have. many riders use these boards now and surf them very similar to thrusters.
- twin / fish: two fins under the board. one per side. this board has the fastest glide because of less friction with the water, but with only one fin in the water at a time, the boards are generally unstable. the boards themselves are usually designed for 'mushy' or 'fun/cute' waves and are therefore fat with pinched rails to help grip the water better, which is retarded.

- my board: I have a twin fin that is not fat, and has normal high performance rails. I've found a pair of fins that create a lift force that pulls the rail into the water and forward with my motion. funny thing is, this fin model feels too stiff on a thruster or quad so no one buys them. everyone believes that you need really big fins for a twin fin board, so no one uses this setup and I've seen absolutely nobody riding the waves I do on a twin fin, having the fun I have. There are a small handful of people on this planet that do ride heavy waves on twin fins, I know there's one guy in the Mentawais doing it right now, and there's another guy in Santa Cruz who has found the same twin fin board I've found - I hope his friend gets him word about the fins I use, it's too much fun to keep to myself.

Hawaii Five-0 CBS World Premiere Pacific Ocean Hawaii Surfer KauAIcr07 #103

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 14th, 2010 at 3:37 pm and is filed under Hawaii. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.