“Hit and Run Hula” Invades Apple Store

Welcome to the Internet Age, Hawaii.

Actually, that’s a bit unfair. Hawaii’s been connected to the World Wide Web just as long as the rest of the country—Break Out The Oreos would certainly be considerably barer if yours truly wasn’t able to post anything during during his visits back home. It just seems that the 50th State hasn’t really registered a significant footprint within Internet culture; as far as I know, there hasn’t been a notably popular web page or video or image that people would immediately identify with Hawaii—that is, until now.

Nā Lei Hulu I Ka Wēkiu is a San Francisco-based hula hālau that’s been making waves by staging a series of guerrilla performances called “Hit and Run Hula.” Perhaps taking inspiration from the viral videos of Improv Everywhere, Hit and Run Hula spent this past Saturday converging upon various locations around downtown San Francisco, running through impressively synchronized (and brief) displays of choreography, and then quickly scattering into the surrounding crowds and streets.

Pretty cool, huh? We certainly think so, and we’re appreciative of the increased profile that this will no doubt lend to hula itself, which for a few decades now has been both overcoming popular charicatures of itself and experiencing a revival as an art form. And while it’s a bit disconcerting that the folks behind this virally-geared breakthrough had to come from somewhere other than Hawaii itself, perhaps this is the sort of outside influence that will eventually lead to hula—and perhaps Hawaii’s own distinctive cultural personality as a whole—being better appreciated within the mainstream.

Devon Grandy is a writer, blogger, humorist, filmmaker, and musician. The creator and Editor-in-Chief of Break Out The Oreos, Devon is chiefly responsible for the alternatingly mind-numbing and glee-inspiring process of transforming his brainchild into a "for real" web magazine. Read more.