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Viva Mexico
0September 15, 2017 by admin
The dogwood berries have started to turn red. They usually dangle over the button seller’s head, but today he’s not here. The hot dog cart on the north corner is gone. There are fewer pedicabs lined up in the shade, the drivers bent over their cell phones. The park seems to have emptied out for the season.
Today’s wood anemone score: 6-5.
(I noticed a rival league of pink wood anemones farther down the path, under a tree near the road, but decided that entry to the competition was closed for the season, and moved on without counting flowers.)
In the waters of the fountain, lotus flowers have ripened into brown-faced pods, large red and white flowers bloom singly or in pairs on their lily pads, and a tall grass that looks like bamboo rustles softly in the wind.
Nearly a half hour passes before a couple appeared from around the fountain to give me $2.
A tall young man recorded “All I Do Is Dream of You.” He gave me a dollar, and said he was from Uruguay. I was delighted; it had taken an hour, but I’d earned 30 cents more than a senior round trip on the subway, my definition of break-even. That was to be all for another 30 minutes.
As I came to the end of my set, four girls from Mexico showed up. “Have you got time for a hula today?”
They were shy, they demurred, they stared at their feet, but they did not walk away, and soon succumbed to kibitzing, Mr. Ukulele-style. They danced to both verses of “The Hukilau Song,” and together assembled 3 singles, doubling the day’s take.
Category Uncategorized | Tags: All I Do Is Dream of You, The Hukilau Song
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The Crowds Thin
0September 14, 2017 by admin
Today’s score in the wood anemone derby: 5-4.
As September progresses, the crowds in the park diminish. Kids are back in school. Tourists have gone home. For much of the first 30 minutes of my set, I played to empty benches. The trickle of people passing through gave me no notice. At last, a man sitting by the lake stood up, walked toward me, and gave me a dollar.
Two young Chinese women brusquely refused to hula. They wandered away from the fountain to sit down in the shade. After a few songs, one of them approached and put $2 in my case. Right behind her came a tall man with another dollar.
A pack of bicyclists dismounted. “Have you got time for a hula today?” None did. They scattered around the fountain area, taking in the sights. When they reconvened at their bikes, instead of mounting and riding off, 3 teen girls walked toward me. They were from Mexico. One agreed to hula, one stood by to take pictures and the last one, with some encouragement, donned a lei and joined her friend. At that point, the photographer asked for a lei too. They danced a synchronized hula with grace and humor, then each came up with a dollar for me.
“Are you Jewish?” asked a woman, putting a single in my case. “I thought so, so are we.” She and her husband were from Montreal. “We also believe in Jesus.”
“Me too, as an historical figure who has had great influence for millennia.”
They shook their heads. “No? If you mean do I believe that Jesus was the Messiah, then I’d have to say no.” They made a half-hearted attempt to convert me, then walked off in search of more fertile ground.
A young couple from Brazil was eager to hula. Like most Brazilians, they danced with style, adding inventive flourishes at lyrics like, “we’ll throw our nets out into the sea,” and “where the lovely hula dancers roll their eyes.” Unlike most Brazilians, they grasped the concept of tipping, in this case, a five dollar bill.
The last 15-20 minutes were again quiet. No further bill or coin covered Lincoln’s face in my case. I folded up the fiver along with 7 singles. On my way out of the park, I noticed that another flower had opened on the wood anemone near the path, increasing its lead, now 6-4.
I found a new video on Youtube this morning. I believe this is the Canadian girl from Monday (cf: Scotland and Kosovo Dance the Hula). Check it out here and on my Third Party Images page:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMrYd8ZPp5s
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What’s a Well-Tuned Ukulele Worth?
0September 13, 2017 by admin
Behind the northern benches at the entrance to the park, lantana and celosia are having a second blooming. The wood anemone derby, in which the two plants compete for the number of open flowers, is tied at 3. The south-facing catalpa pods, dangling like string beans, are reddening into ripeness.
As I set up at Bethesda Fountain, the cowboy introduced himself as Colin. I gave him my card.
My first dancers were a young Bulgarian couple, who seemed delighted to be asked to hula. They put a dollar in my case as I turned to entice a toddler in a straw hat with my baby lei. He threw it on the ground, at which time his parents led him away.
Another little boy seemed inclined to dance. His mom gave him a dollar for me. He dropped it in my case, then grabbed a lei and ran back to his mom. He put on the lei and started to walk away. I decided not to run after him; as it turned out, his mom walked the lei back to me.
One of the snake boys came down from the terrace in front of the arcade. He started hustling all around me. After collecting some money for photos with the snake, he approached me. “How about some Beatle songs?” he said.
“How about you take your snake back where you came from,” I said. “I’m working here.”
A family from Orlando stopped to let their little girl dance. “I know how to hula,” she said. “We were just in Hawaii. The boys do this,” she waved her arms to the left, “and the girls do this,” waving her arms to the right.
“Since your brother won’t dance,” I said, “you’ll have to dance both parts.”
After the dance, her dad and I discussed Hurricane Irma. “That’s why we’re here,” he told me, folding up a fiver and laying it in my case.
Two young men, with back packs and hiking boots, slowed to study my solar-powered hula girls. One of them bent down to get a closer look. When he got up, he gave me a buck.
A couple from the bench, having finished their lunch, also chipped in a buck.
A large man with a crew cut waited for me to finish “All of Me.” His name was Carl and he engaged me in a wide-ranging conversation about ukes. “Do you play?”
“A little,” he said. I offered him my uke and he proceeded to tune it before plucking out a ditty. He handed it back and told me he ran a music school. “I’ll be seeing a lot of you,” he said. “I come to the park a lot. Play me a tune.”
I played 8 bars of “I Wonder Where My Hula Girl Has Gone,” then switched to “Making Love Ukulele Style.” “That was written by Dean Martin,” I told him.
“He did lots of interesting musical things,” Carl told me, then he walked away. He didn’t give me any money, but he’d tuned my uke perfectly; it sounded better than it had all summer.
After Carl, no one else came by. I exited the park with $10 in my pocket, and a well-tuned uke on my back.
Category Uncategorized | Tags: All of Me, I Wonder Where My Little Hula Girl Has Gone, Making Love Ukulele Style
