Tiki Doesn't Have to be Taki

Eric Felten has written a solid article in The Wall Street Journal (October 4) celebrating the ongoing revival of the tiki craze. Here's a thought-provoking snip:

I suspect Donn [the Beachcomber] would have frowned at the technological tethers -- cellphones, BlackBerries and such -- that bind us to our workaday world. We live in an obnoxiously insistent age, with its relentless blog slog and the Sisyphean ordeal of answering emails. This tyranny of hyper-connection may be why tiki culture has a new resonance -- the promise of being detached from the cyber-grind. A thatched hut on some forgotten atoll is the sort of place alluring in its lack of cell coverage.

Happily, the article offers plenty of praise for Alameda's sublime Forbidden Island (though I think Felten could heap more righteous scorn on San Francisco's awful Tonga Room).

Read the entire article, Tiki Doesn't Have to be Tacky