For this year's annual trip, we decided to visit during the week of the Honolulu Festival, which took place on March 13th-15th. Having been to Honolulu over the years, we never had the chance to partake in the festival activities. I had always thought the Festival was an event promoting Hawaiian culture but from being here, I found out his was the 30th year for this cultural event that promotes mutual understanding, economic cooperation and ethnic harmony between the people of Hawaii and the Pacific Rim region. Over 2,300 participants from Japan and other countries were here to participate in this Festival with events at the Convention Center, Ala Moana Shopping Center and Waikiki Beach Walk. I went to the Saturday events at the Convention Center. On the main performance stage, there were 25 various performance acts of traditional, dance, musical cheerleading, and a singing performance by Hitomi Shimitani to conclude. There were art and craft vendors and a sake and food fest section with free sample offerings. Love the sake and beer tastings, cookie and cracker tastings and a sushi making workshop. Due to the Kona storms that hit Hawaii during this week, I was disappointed that the Grand Parade and the Nagaoka Fireworks to conclude the festival were cancelled. I will plan to be back again next year for this Festival and look forward to the Parade and famous fireworks. read more

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This year admission for adults was $10 at the door ($8 online). In the past, especially last year, there were many food sample booths offering samples of different Japanese food products with none of them offering any for sale. But this year there were no samples, only food for sale, so there was no way to try it before buying which would have been helpful. read more

The Honolulu Festival is Hawai'is premier cultural event. Its goal is to promote mutual understanding, economic cooperation and ethnic harmony, between the people of Hawai'i and the Pacific Rim region. The three day festival takes place in early March, and culminates w/ a parade on Kalakāuā Ave on Sun afternoon, followed by a fireworks show on Waikīkī Beach in the evening. If I am not mistaken, it takes place the weekend before Spring Break, so that all locals are encouraged to attend. We stayed at the Moana, and all traffic was blocked on Luxury Row (Kalakāuā), so we planned accordingly. The street was lined on both sides with viewers, and announcers were strategically located to announce the groups participating. The announcers were also engaging the crowd, asking questions like, "Is this your first Festival?", or "How many times have you attended?". The viewers were vocal, and having a lot of fun. The fireworks show was put on by a local family biz that has been around a long time. I think it is now run by the grandchildren. We watched the show from the Moana, and sat at one of the tables facing the infamous Banyan Tree and beach afterwards. All in all, a great way to soak up local culture, and spend a relaxing Sun afternoon. read more

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the best Place to visit for fun activities and events at the Honolulu Festival try different vendors and food and wine and watch A Live Performance on stage read more

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Fi ally the return of the parade and the other exhibits. Good entertainment and food ,drink booths.A lot of coordination. Between vendors and local entertainment like rain. Games for kids and fun for all ages. read more

Honolulu Festival - Photo booth - Festivals Near Me

Finally attended our first Honolulu Festival, we had a great day, spend about 4 hrs there, nice to see events back in-person. We lucked out we got parking on the ground floor inside one of the conventions rooms (so worth the $15, walk right out the door to the entry to festival). Loved loved loved the festival, highlighting Japanese culture and arts and featuring local made in hawaii vendors our goal was to donate and participate in the genki ala wai click on link for more info: https://genkialawai.org/ It was an amazing experience and to hear from the director about the project was so inspiring. We will definitely go assist this project when they have events. Walked every aisle and found some unique and amazing locally made products. Stood in the loooong sake tasting line, was worth the wait, interesting and unique flavors we never knew existed. Our fav was the one we tried from the nagaoka vendor, very smooth. Had only one food concession with 2 Japanese items curry rice and okonomiyaki fries - we ordered one of each and both were super good but the fries was the winnah! Sorry no picture we were standing in sake line eating and drinking Caught some of the acts on stage and interesting to see true Japanese arts, but the best was seeing Crossing Rain on stage. Last we stopped at the Kyoto Marketplace, that was interesting, they only took script and could only buy in increments of $20, so no matter how wisely you shopped you would have a few tickets extra (which we saw people giving away so we gave our 2 extra away, can't buy anything with 2 tickets). Picked up rice crackers, shrimp chips and croquette (these were delish and warm). Finally stop, the front redemption booth, they have a scan code throughout the festival and if you scan all of it you get a a prize, then at the same booth there is a scan code to review the festival and after review you get a chance to spin for a prize, we won honolulu festival shirts from 2020 (the last festival here). Our highlight was seeing the nagaoka fireworks display, they had the actual firework on display and even the mega ball cut so you can see how many balls inside the mega ball. Never seen fireworks of that size and so nice to see how it looks before going into the sky! I can say we walked away with some amazing freebies at the festival. Will definitely go back next year it was a great way to spend a few hours. read more

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Went to watch this parade for the first time in Waikiki (I have only been in it with Taiko Center of the Pacific, never watched it from the street). We went early to get a good spot on Kalakaua Ave. My friend who has been many times said they usually have a bunch of huge high school dance groups from Japan but this time there were no high schools, only universities, and the groups were quite small. There were a few cultural groups from the Philippines, Taiwan, etc, but the parade groups were very spread out, some with long waits in between so people kept leaving. It was ok, hopefully once restrictions ease up in the future, Japan will be able to send more groups. read more

My mom is over 65 years old. She was charged with regular fee. I am disappointed about this. There were more samples last year. Pretty much you have to pay for the food. There is also an admission fee on top of that. It seems the event towards for the profit. read more

Like the swallows returning to Capistrano, so it is with the Honolulu Festival- it's da annual event for Oahu in early March. For 2015: There is a familiarity to the Honolulu Festival because much of it is a repeat of what has been shown in the past- but like Christmas , it is something to look forward to and enjoy. Many of the floats are the same, the timing, set-up, displays and vendors at the convention center are pretty much the same but they always bring some nice wrinkles to the fold to pique one's interest. The exhibitions and programs both inside the main hall and just outside of it are always fun. We lucked out this year and were able to take pictures with some of the parade lanterns. Lots of food items for sale- some food highlights included the "pipe" ice cream cone and the great popcorn flavors of Primo Pop Corn-yum! I have seen it several times before, but the booth showing the fireworks shells always amazes me and the video showing what the several hundred pound "bumboocha" shell can do is truly incredible (this is not the one used in Honolulu) They seemed to have a bigger anime area this year for the fans- lots of interest based on the space and booths devoted to this form of entertainment. Of course the highlight of the festivities is the parade that is held on Sunday late afternoon into the evening. A perfect way to cap a fun weekend in Honolulu. If you missed it this year not to worry, like the swallows, the Honolulu Festival will be back in 2016-yay! read more

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Honolulu Festival is definitely a great event for the whole family. Keiki Games - So many activities for the kids, coloring, water balloons, ring tossing, mini golf, you name it. Craft Fair - Over 100 booths from Japan and Hawaii vendors. This year, there was an exhibition that allows visitors to make fish bowls or chopstick holder. Food booths - Local shops show their stuff. Performances - Live performances of bon dance, hula, hip hop, taiko drumming and more. Parade - Hundreds of thousands people come from Japan to walk in this parade, wearing their cultural outfits and dancing through the streets of Waikiki. In addition, there are special appearances from local cultural groups. Fireworks - A good 15 minutes of fireworks display sponsored by Nagaoka City. read more

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The best festival you will ever go to. Free admission, so many free samples, and all of the vendors are the nicest people you will ever meet. Highly recommend read more

I absolutely love the Honolulu festival and sincerely hope that it's held every year. Hawaii is a multi-cultural place and it's only fitting that we have a multi-cultural festival! For me, born and raised here, it doesn't feel like a show of foreign cultures at all. Consider if you were attending or watching a similar parade in say, the middle of Iowa--for locals, it would feel like an exhibition, a showing of foreign cultures, and a treat in the sense that they get to see outside culture right at home. In comparison, for someone growing up in Hawaii who is of diverse ethnicity and cultures herself (Hawaiian, Chinese, Spanish, Portuguese, Filipino, Etc.), it feels like finally, there is an event that represents local culture in it's entirety. My friends and I try to attend Honolulu Festival every year in our Yukata, which is mainly our festival attire when we attend Japanese festivals. I love participating in bon dance and looking at all the exhibits and watching the parade afterward. Aside from food and crafts/merchants inside the Convention Center, everything else is free. You can get your fortune read in Taiwanese tradition, learn to paint kanji, watch live performances, participate in dances on stage and so much more. I look forward to this every year and just can't wait til the next one! read more

Awesome vent with all sorts of activities over the weekend and the most spectacular fireworks display to finish the weekend. Thankfully the fireworks can be seen from all over the shoreline, so if you have to make it back to your apt/hotel, make sure you have a view of Waikiki. :) read more

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Great Parade down here through Waikiki, I didn't think it would ever end. They had some large gaps in the middle of the parade though, I guess some people were not keeping up with those in front of them. read more

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Honolulu Festival was so nice in Waikiki! We only went for the fireworks, but next year I hope to see the parade. The fireworks were really nice! It's held by the pool at the Sheraton. Thank goodness that area was big, so it wasn't so crowded. We parked in the Royal hawaiian hotel.. which took about 45 mins to get out of there afterwards because we were on the 7th floor and everyone was trying to get out at the same time. Next time should come a lot earlier! read more

Honolulu Festival - Festival fireworks by people from Nagaoka, Japan! - Festivals Near Me

Every year I can't wait for the Honolulu festival. It Is a good way for Japanese people to visit Hawaii and good for our economy. I love their event at the convention center, lots of performances, crafts, and lots of games for the keiki to enjoy. I just wish they had more food selections to choose from. Also they had a parade in Waikiki and huge fireworks at night. Love that the workers all came from Japan, it felt like I was in Japan again. Can't wait for next year's event! read more

Firework festival was spectacular! The best fireworks show ever coming from this kama'aina!

Honolulu Festival Except for a few things- just about everything else is all totally free. There is the Honolulu Festival Friendship Gala that is a posh upscale music concert and rich pupu dinner event that can be pricey, but if you flew in from Tokyo - relative to that the dinner is extremely a good value of entertainment of well loved Hawaiian singers like Reita Helm and good chefs like Roys. Most of the main events of the Honolulu Festival are held at the Hawaii Convention Center. There are a good mix of people. Many Japanese visitors and many local families. It is easy to find- the taiko drums are kinda hard to miss as many people can hear them 1 or 2 blocks away. Inside the Convention Center- there are a few stages, usually some dance or entertainment like drums or hula. There is a keiki zone, bouncers, cotton candy, go fish games, and other games. There are tons of booths- many of them are aimed at Japanese tourists, Japanese culture or Japanese information in some way. Some of them include the counsel of Japan, Koi, Japanese Kimono dress dress up- (maybe you can see a few photos of this....) Japanese radio, and then other touristy booths like the Polynesian culture center dancers, airline, and food vendors. There are tons of concerts. Some names I would never recognize for 2 reasons- it's in Japanese and it is Japanese. I'm not current with J-Pop so the some popularity goes over my head- if the guy singing is active I figure he likes the song- not knowing if it is popular or not. But to others- they went crazy... ok must be popular. There was a dance competition this year to be able to get prizes like be the lead performer in the Sunday parade. The highlight of the night this year were the 2 lead acts which headlined- the judges three women that did an ocean themed set of dances and another group of women that had a huge costume change in a flash like magicians trick. The rest of the competition was similar to a think you can dance competition that has many high school groups competing. Really good though. In the back of the seating areas- they had 2 large turf like grass areas with many anime pillows that the keiki could run around with and play together. The kids had so much fun. When I first walked up to it- I thought it was odd that there were all of these slippers on the side like a doorway when things were just open - then I realized they took off their shoes to be able to walk on the turf grass. There are also outside events like showcases at the Ala Moana stage showing hula and music along with other dances. There is a Sunday Parade, if you like parades then you are in luck as we seem to have so many here in Waikiki. And Fireworks- everyone loves fireworks!!!!!!!!! Again- it appears that many of the events are targeted towards building better relations between America and Japan. Many of the volunteers and organizers want to bring peace between nations and this is their small step towards bringing world peace. I think song and dance are powerful tools to bring closer understanding between different peoples that speak different languages. In general - everyone seems very friendly and respectful- something I would expect at a mainly Japanese cultural event. I highly recommend taking the family as the dance and hula are wonderful when the Festival comes back to Honolulu next year. read more

Honolulu Festival - dress up look at the blossoms - Festivals Near Me

The Honolulu Festival is a great series of cultural events that showcase cultures from across the Pacific rim. It's a great venue to learn about different art, dance, music, and much more in an effort to promote harmony. You also have a chance to meet people that you might come to find out was your father's brother's cousin's former roommate, which ultimately means nothing, but I needed to add a bit of humor to my opening. Back to the festival. The festival is typically held in early March and features a series of events and workshops at the Hawaii Convention Center, the infamous Friendship Gala, a parade, and of course a closing fireworks show over Waikiki beach. Be sure to check out the schedule to find something that might be of interest, or simply go. Most of the events are free, except for the friendship gala which is a great showcase of local chefs supporting a great cause. Be sure to see their annual parade on Sunday and the closing fireworks show. It is really quite a sight to see and all of the entertainers and various groups that participate in the parade are always interesting and entertaining. It is truly something unique and local to Hawaii that just makes you glad you live here (or visiting when going on). read more

The Honolulu Festival is an cultural annual event held at the Hawaii Convention Center that celebrates Pacific-Asian cultures. The festival has a ton of activities for the family. Games for the children, international vendors to shop from, good food (from the convention center and from vendors), and other events. Friday is a special day where they hold events for schools to attend. Then there's the friendship gala. Restaurants around Hawaii come and let attendees try out their selections. Also there are special musical acts and other events run at the gala. Sunday, the festival isn't over! There is a parade in Waikiki and then a fireworks show! It's pretty amazing to see such cultural references and it's such an enjoyment. I recommend this for many people to come and check out the festival every year. read more

Not sure if this is the right Honolul Festival, but my review is for the Honolulu Festival for 2012 at the Hawaii Convention Center. Went today with the family to check it out. Since we went to Ala Moana, we left our car at the shopping center and walked over to the convention center. That saved us $5! Entrance was free to go in. Inside, there were tables from different cultures around the world. It showcased a lot of products from their country as well as arts and crafts. We watched a guy demonstrate pottery techniques, the boys played some kids games to win prizes, we bought some garlic peas from a Taiwan vendor, bought some hot sauce from Kilauea Fire, and walked around a LOT! My boys like seeing other cultures traditions and styles. It was fun. We'll go again next year. read more

They have entertainment, games, food booths, exhibits. Entrance is free. We took the bus so didn't have to worry about parking. We go to play the free kids games that my son likes. They gave a card and you play all the games on the list. Once done you can redeem for a prize or for bouncer tickets. The bouncer tickets were also available to purchase by donation. Got there around 10:30am so the lines for games weren't that long. My son played two rounds of games and we spent about 2 hours there. My son got a yo-yo balloon and won a fish. Didn't get to see the parade or fireworks. read more

Is a great international festival and has grown over the years to include countries from the Pacific rim as well as even a performance troupe from Italy. There are several stages during the four-day event that draws thousands of tourists from Japan, Korea, Taiwan many small Pacific islands and surprises American tourists who had no idea the Event existed. there are probably 40 groups the parade through Waikiki to highlight the Sunday finale... With a Kalakaua street closedown dancers, hula groups, indigenous islanders, Taiko drummers Chinese dragons all the lighting tourists and locals alike. The highlight the million-dollar the Nagoya firework show staged by professionals from Japan that is bigger than any fireworks you see on the Fourth of July. I saw Japanese girls cry. read more

Honolulu Festival - Huge fireworks - Festivals Near Me

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It was my first Honolulu Festival, but came to very unpleasant experience. Although the parade itself was great, the basic manners of spectators was horrible. We were sitting down along the street, but we could barely see it. I never imagined many people were standing in front of us--with a small child-- like a wall. What worse, the festival coordinators didn't control, or even ignored the people that had immoral and impolite manners. It seems people in this state don't know how they should behave in public. I was so disappointed. read more

Always a fun annual event to attend as there are a variety of vendor booths, shows and art exhibits. You get a mix of everything from different cultures. HIGHLY recommend to bring your kids as they have FREE games for them where they can win prizes! Plus they get to take home a balloon and goldfish. There are long lines but what do you expect as its free. I enjoy the origami craft area and how some of the vendors have free tastings for their product. Although I didn't make it down to Waikiki to see the fireworks, the hubby and I are lucky enough to see it from the comforts of our home as they shoot quite a few of them pretty high. I think it's one of the best fireworks shows in Honolulu. I will be definitely taking my family back again next year as she will be able to participate in the kid's games as she will be much older (was only 9 months) read more

I'm still not sure what Honolulu Festival is but I had a great time going! The events in the Hawai'i Convention Center were really interesting. Performers on the stages, bon dance in the ballroom, booths selling crafts, foods, and knicknacks. A mixed bag indeed. I voted on my favorite aloha shirt, took pictures with Doraemon statues, and ate Tanioka's bentos. Sunday afternoon I enjoyed the parade, especially with the huge dragon balloon and the dragon float with the guys on the roof lighting super duty sparklers. The fireworks show that took place after on Waikiki beach was spectacular. I actually am looking forward to going to next years festival for sure :) read more

The Honolulu Festival is pretty much a big international and intercultural gathering for the state of Hawaii, specifically for the island of Oahu. I think the entire Festival itself is about a week long celebration targeting a weekend full of international and intercultural events held at the convention center and the Ala Moana area. It seems that most of the highlights, sponsors, coordinators, and organizers are from the Japanese and Japanese themed side. At the Convention Center, there are lots of things from international and intercultural exhibits, booths, entertainment, food, demonstrations, interactions, and many more. It is a fun event and cultural awareness learning and educational experience for peoples of all ages, from kids, adults, and especially the older generation, our elderly, who carry on and pass down the knowledge of tradition and culture. The big culmination event is on Sunday afternoon at Kalakaua Ave. Waikiki where they have the real Honolulu Festival with a big parade showcasing many countries and cultures being represented by different organizers and organizations. I've participated in the festival for two years back in 2008 and 2009 with my Philippine folk dance crew and it was really fun. I kinda wish they would invite us again to but maybe we are just too modern for the likes of the festival which is heavily dominated and which revolves around the Asian demographic and cultures of the Pacific Rim. Overall, a really good event that plays good timing to the celebration of inter-nationality in Hawaii from March to April. Yelp 365 Challenge #355/365 read more

The Honolulu Festival is held annually in Waikiki. It showcases the diversity of Waikiki's residents and the visitor community. The week long event starts with low key ceremonies and ends with a bang with the best fireworks show in Hawaii. . The weekend is an extravaganza in the Honolulu Convention Center. Literally hundreds of booths and exhibits pack the Center. All areas of the Pacific Rim from Alaska to Okinawa to Taiwan are represented. The booths are manned by experts who share information with all who are interested. If you are interested in the multitude of cultures in the Pacific Rim, the Honolulu Festival allows you to live vicariously. In addition to information sharing there are games and educational activities for children of all ages . One of the best values at the Convention Center is the Festival T-shirt table. Surplus T-shirts from past Festivals are sold for US$2. Quality 100% cotton T-shirts in all sizes for US$2. That is a deal you not can pass up. Why pay ten times more for cheap shirts with a printed cliche when you can buy a genuine Honolulu souvenir? Buy a dozen for gifts, I did! . Sunday's activities include a parade thru the heat of Waikiki. It commences at 4:30PM at Ft. Fort DeRussy Beach Park and ends at Kuhio Beach Park. The parade has multilingual announcements and features over 50 performances by organization from all over the Pacific Rim. . At 8:30PM theNagaota show fireworks commences. Nagaoka Fireworks is well known for their large fireworks display originating from Niigata Prefecture on the Sea of Japan coast. The show is synched with music on Hawaiian 105 KINE radio. . This event symbolizes what make Honolulu and Waikiki special, family enrichment provided for no charge by lovely local people. read more