Below are two archival posts I had made in the begining of the FOM. They are a bit dated now given our rapid growth and our membership role expanding to include Moai from multiple states, so please bear with me. The first one was the public "Welcome!" thread and the second is the "Who should join the FOM" thread. I have wanted to move these over here ever since we closed the forums to the public and opened the Port of the Initiate, but so much has happened that has kept me busy and I neglected to do so. Recently, with the interests of VDB and Damion in mind, I thought the Initiate Moai Ra'e might benefit from my effort to combat laziness and get around to it at long last.
So... here they are finally for the perusal of the prospective Moai:
Quote:
Firstly, I'd like to warmly welcome all who have wandered into this place!
I am truly glad to see that folks are slowly begining to check out the forum such as it is during what I hope will be a brief infancy. In time I'd like for this place to become a thriving community, but given its rather esoteric bent, I'll be satisfied if it serves its intended purpose as the root effort to organize the Central Ohio and surrounding areas tiki communities to whatever end should come of it.
Consider this the begining of an experiment.
So right now you may be thinking:
"WTF? This guy is gonna start a tiki forum for Columbus Ohio residents? That's stupid man, 'cause there's like eight of us."
Well, I know it might seem a funny notion to set up a forum purely for local folks who share a common interest as well as locality when there are national forums devoted to the subject, but this place is intended to serve an altogether different purpose.
The goal is not necessarily to create a forum that serves as a source point for information about the subject of tiki such as Tiki Central does.
I also realize that this forum even at it's peak of use may not be busy enough to generate what might be described as an online community due to the very nature of its audience.
Rather, my goal is to try to set up a convenient message board in the purest sense of the word, that allows all of us Columbus (and nearby communities) tiki folk to gather and organize.
Potential uses include (off the top of my head):
We can set up events or post invites and info about events of interest.
We can trade artifacts and coordinate purchases (like online bulk liquor orders of rums not avaliable in Ohio).
We could plan trips and arrange rides to destinations of interest to the midwestern tikiphile. Maybe even save money with group rates.
We could discuss local topics of interest like the Kahiki.
We could post pics of collections, or arrange viewings of our collective tiki paraphenalia.
Or frankly, we could just chat as friends who have similar tastes, a common hobby, and the real possibility of hanging out in real life over a few mai tais.
Now the dreamer stuff:
My ideal goal is to foster the beginings of a midwestern tiki social club that may eventually become a fraternal order of sorts with either a private club space done up as an old school lodge with a fully stocked bar, annual dues, and a charitable tax exempt status...
...or a group that organizes a large scale annual event in honor of the city that once called the Kahiki it's home.
Call it the "Fraternal Order of Moai".
The San Fran and Chicago groups all host crawls, participate in events as a group, have bar nights and hang out at home bar luaus.
The Floridians throw down at the Mai Kai.
There's Hukilau.
Etc.
So I just feel like we need to do our thing and get together as a group. I always enjoy meeting new people, and think some of you are very talented tiki artists, amazing collector historians, bartending masters, and all around aloha spirited folks.
To put it bluntly, it just plain sounds like a hell of a lot of fun to me to form a midwest tiki social club, throw some great parties, have a laugh, represent at the Hukilau as a group, and all the rest that goes with it.
So there ya have it folks. I'm just a big ol' fun lovin' kid with a tropical itch, who happens to be stuck in the landlocked town that used to be a tiki mecca. I think there's a lot of you out there close by that are just like me. I've met a few of you, chatted via the web with a few of you, and heard about some of you from others.
I think we should all start talkin'.
and...
Quote:
The Order is open to anyone who meets some of the following criteria:
-You are into tiki culture and live near enough to Columbus Ohio that you would want to drive down to meet up in real life with your fellow Moai
-The state and direction of tiki culture in Ohio and the midwest interests you and you want to become involved
-You want to help organize like minded folks interested in tiki culture in the Central Ohio region
-You'd like to maybe hang out at a real life private local tiki lodge on weekends sometime in the near future knowing that your hard work and annual dues paid for it
-You think Ohio needs a large annual Midwest Tiki event in honor of the Kahiki's memory
-You like tiki and live in Cowtown or Dayton or Springfield or Marysville etc.
-You're breathing and conscious and wanna chat
It's free and it's your forum folks, please jump on in.
If any other Fellow Moai would like to see an archival thread or any other thread that they feel is relevant to the Moai Ra'e moved to the Port, please let me know and I'll get right on it.
Keep the torches burning,
Ahu
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