which was very active from 1995 to 2003, and sort of half-active from 2003 to 2007.
Now it is gone.
The Tiki Bar Review Pages site was replaced by the book Tiki Road Trip (in 2003).
The second edition of TRT (2007) is available NOW.
See Tiki Road Trip (2007 edition) for the most up-to-date information.
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Columbus, Ohio
errr... if you haven't heard, the Kahiki is
gone.
Here's the old review pages regarding this
dearly
missed Tiki Temple.
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It was a great coincidence that Tiki Bar Review Pages contributors (and fellow Chicagoans) David Carter and Amy Flammang were planning a trip to Kahiki the same weekend I was. We arranged to meet there on a Friday evening that, as fate would have it, offered us a real-life monsoon which only served to increase the South Seas ambiance. Plowing through the rain-drenched streets of Columbus, after a seven hour drive, we finally arrived at the awe-inspiring Kahiki. In spite of the torrential downpour soaking everything in sight, the flames atop twin 15-foot high Moai burned mightily.
We made it inside without getting too soaked, and soon found
Amy
and
David waiting. As Amy and my companion got to know each other,
David
and I ran around like crazed children, snapping pictures of every
square
inch of the enormous Tiki paradise. Kahiki must be seen to be
believed.
It is huge, although not quite as huge as Jardin Tiki, but nothing can
compare to the 30-foot high Moai fireplace that stands at the back of
the
room, observing all festivities. I could fill volumes
gushing
on about of the wonderful Polynesian decor, but let me when your
appetite
by mentioning saltwater aquariums next to each booth along one wall,
and
a glass-enclosed waterfall/terrarium running along the opposite wall.
There
are fountains, there are Tikis, there are blowfish, lights, masks, and
anything else you might want to see, and barely an inch is left
uncovered
by some Polynesian relic. A three-piece band plays in the corner
consisting of marimba, steel drums and bass guitar.
We decided that the ambiance is worth paying for, and apparently the management agrees: finally sitting down to dinner, we found the prices to be a bit expensive. The food was good, but not great, and the portions were pretty small. We agreed that the food presented to us was pretty much identical to what one would be served in any inexpensive Chinese restaurant at one third the price. The drinks were also expensive, and really weak as well. Granted, several drinks come in mugs that you can keep, but the ones that don't are no less costly and no stronger. Our waitress was very friendly and gave us great service. She did her best to accomodate our every need. Her name was Beth. |
|
Summer, 1998
On the advice of Tiki Bar Review Pages corespondent Al Atchison, I tried a Smoking Eruption. The drink was served up with a cup of dry ice that soon engulfed our appetizers in a cloud of mist, slowly crawling across the table. We also sampled the Zombie, which comes in a skull-shaped mug that you may keep. The mug was cool, as was the drink, but for all their refreshing chill, both drinks were very weak. The Headhunter comes in a more traditionally styled Tiki Mug, and is no more potent. A moderate dinner (with three drinks split between the two of us), a 20% tip, and tax set us back almost $85. I imagine Amy and David's bill was similar.
 After
getting absolutely soaked while running to and from the car to
drop
off our booty, we then took more pictures and ended up at the bar for
further
libations. The local version of the Suffering Bastard is decent,
and when I lamented to our bartender that the drinks served to our
table
had barely any hootch in them, he attempted to make amends by giving us
a double dose of the cheap rum they use in their fruity
concoctions.
An improvement to be sure, but to really make these things swing, they
need to stop using Castillo and get with the Demarara or Myers
scene.
Yeah, I know, that runs into more scratch, and these things are
expensive
already.In closing, all I can say is that I plan to make Kaihiki a
regular
detour
on my bi-annual trips to Cleveland. I guess the best endorsement
I can give it is to say that it is well worth a three-hour detour (a
three
hour detour - and the weather started getting rough). Thanks to David and Amy for meeting us out there and for providing some of the pics! More Kahiki Pics |
|
We had occasion to return to Kahiki about six weeks later. Although the service wasn't nearly as good, that was about the only real difference. Oh, and we sat on the "fountain side" rather than the "aquarium side", and were bummed to find the fountains out of order. Anyway, you've gotta love this place. Go there! You will pay, but it is worth it! Rick Bratt writes: A point of note is that I live here in Columbus and the Kahiki was recently accepted into the National Register of Historic Places as an exception (usually places have to be fifty years old) due to its being the penultimate example of Tiki culture. Date: Fri, 13 Jul 2001 Mike Manges writes: I just heard from a reliable source that the owners of the late, great Kahiki have broken ground for the next incarnation of the restaurant near downtown Columbus, Ohio, as promised when they sold off the original building last year. Hate to sound cynical, but I'll believe it when I see it. One thing's for sure, though: summers in Ohio aren't the same without the Kahiki (and its stiff Zombies!) For the record, Kahiki Frozen Food egg rolls and TV dinners are selling like hotcakes in the Akron, area. Buy a pack, pop it in the microwave, pour yourself a cool drink, put some Arthur Lyman on the hi-fi, crank up the A/C, plop down in an easy chair, prop your feet up and - voila! - you're sailing to Tahiti, "Rubber City" style. January, 2002: Don Browne writes: I used to play marimba and timbales in the house band back in 1967 while I was a music student at OSU and later a music teacher in New Albany. A great place and one of my favorite jobs of all time. Great food back in those days and we got one free every night as members of the three-piece band...marimba, guitar, piano. The guitarist of whom I now forget the name was the best guitarist I've ever heard and later got out of music and taught electrical engineering at OSU the last time I heard! Thoughts on theFinal Days of Kahiki Autumn 2000 Thoughts on the Final Days of the Kahiki
Our great friend Otto was having a big blow-out on the final night (Saturday, August 26), but the ten of us had pretty much agreed unanimously that we would rather enjoy the Kahiki on a ‘normal’ night so as not to taint our fond memories of the place. So with warm wishes of success for his shindig, all but one member of the Chitown Tiki Posse passed on Otto’s offer, and we had our own little economical and bittersweet party earlier in the week. Joe Blundo from the Columbus Dispatch had been in touch with me ever since the news of the Kahiki’s closing broke early in 2000. I finally had a chance to meet Joe in person when he and a photographer met us at our large table in the back of the restaurant. Photoman snapped dozens of pictures of all of the members of our party, while Joe interviewed me about the importance of the Kahiki in Tiki culture. |
|
It
was a Monday night when the Chicago Bamboo Crew made our final
pilgrimage
to the Kahiki in Columbus. The following Saturday - a mere six
days
away - the Kahiki would be closing it’s doors for good after 39
years.
Ten of us made the trek - mostly from Chicago, but a few Ohioans joined
us too. |
I ordered the flaming sword for dinner; this was my last chance to do so, thus I might as well. The waitress brought my chicken to the table impaled on a big flaming sabre, much to the delight of the photographer. We ordered one last Mystery Drink. The gong sounded far away on the other side of the room, and soon the lovely Mystery Girl brought out a very large and potent scorpion bowl. The party rolled on until all ten of us were fat from food and dizzy from drink. We were trying to relish every moment we were spending there, trying to soak in the vibes as much as possible before we were banished forever when closing time came around. We spoke to Michael Tsao, owner of the Kahiki. He insists that a new location will open up soon, with all of the original decor. Two things lead me to believe that we should not hold our breath. First, there was an auction to liquidate a lot of the Kahiki decor, which was held shortly after the closing of the restaurant. This auction was not made known to any Tikiphile who I am aware of. Rather, pro dealers were invited, and after buying up all they could, treasures from the Kahiki started appearing on Ebay at inflated prices. This kind of annoys me. I am positive that Tsao knows that people like Myself, Duke and Amy Carter, Nels, Mark, Pat, Dave and Colbie, and Lorrie and Doug here in Chicago would ALL have come down to Columbus to try to get a piece of the Kahiki at a fair price. I can speculate that some of the large West Coast Tiki faction would have made the trek to the midwest as well for a shot at one of those life sized moai. But NONE of us were informed of the auction. Surely Tsao knows we exist; Tsao and Otto worked closely to plan Otto's closing night party, and Tsao has met most of ‘us’ (the Chicago Bamboo Crew) personally as well. Why were none of us informed?
I can almost guarantee that we would have scored many, many items for ourselves, and made Tsao more money than he already made, if we were included. The logic works like this: Say an item is worth $100 on open market. |
|
We
also ran into two girls who recognized me as having been a member of
the
band Pigface. This was the first time that had happened in almost
four years. I was their keyboard player from 1993-1995, but left
after a final show at the Metro in Chicago in July of ‘95. I
don’t
get pegged for that gig too much anymore. I’d much rather people
know me for my own musical/multimedia project, Left Orbit Temple; in my
Pigface era, I was essentially an employee of a record company, but
Left
Orbit Temple is all mine! 
The
result of this is that rather than being able to bid on these items at
a fair and reasonable price, and rather than being shown respect for
our
loyal and dedicated patronage, we are forced into the indignity of
having
to grovel to greedy professional Ebay dealers and pay a grossly
inflated
rate, far more than what these dealers paid Tsao for these items.
Secondly, and more importantly, Duke and I walked around and took a close and hard look at the detailed decor of the Kahiki, and determined that there is just no way that a comparable place could be opened for a realistic amount of money. The proof is in the details. We found vintage tapa cloth covering the walls next to some of the booths. This stuff was a lot cheaper in 1960 than it is now, and people were a lot more interested in spending money on decor back then than they are now. Recreating this effect would be prohibitively expensive. I can promise you that you won’t see it in the new Kahiki. And what of some of the mosaic work - that can’t be brought to the new place. It will be demolished. The paintings on the front of the building, the fountains... the hand-painted detailing all over the building... these are things you just don’t see anymore. The artisans that used to routinely create these things for theme restaurants of all type (Tiki or otherwise) just don’t exist anymore. When was the last time you saw a NEW restaurant (or ANY building) that had the sort of artistry and detail put into it that you see in places like the Kahiki? Sure, the giant flaming moai outside of the place (not to mention the fireplace inside) are striking and iconic, but a careful examination of the place will reveal little touches of artistry in every corner that might go unnoticed to the casual visitor. These details are what made the Kahiki the architectural masterpiece it was. It wasn’t the big, in your face Tiki Gods that set the Kahiki apart, but rather it was the little Maori motifs painted along the edges of a doorway, or the detail on the painted turtle shell that hung on the wall above the staircase leading to the basement. It was the quality of the black velvet paintings in the room off to the left as you walk into the main dining room. Sure, the turtle shell and the velvet wahines might make it over to the new Kahiki (if they aren’t on Ebay already), but those Maori inspired motifs are history, and the odds of finding someone to do new ones of the same quality at a reasonable price are pretty nil. The more we poked into corners, the more things we found that could not be moved, and could not be recreated. I hate regurgitating clichés, but they just don’t build them like that anymore. The new Kahiki (if it ever exists) might have the big Moai outside, and perhaps a lot of the Oceanic Arts Tikis that populated the old Kahiki, but I just can't realistically comprehend anyone going to the ridiculous expense of putting up a place with the detail and craftsmanship that the old Kahiki exhibited. It just isn't feasible. Tsao is a businessman first and foremost. We need to remember that. The modern restaurant business doesn't have room for the type of exotic theme restaurants that the 1950’s and 1960’s brought us. Few members of the general public care about stuff like that, and when Tsao sees the projected bill, I am sure he will opt for a more modern and boring restaurant. Remember - most of the people come out for the food, not the blowfish lamps!
Sure, I’ll be there for the grand opening party, but I don’t expect to be impressed. So this is my fond farewell to one of the greatest Tiki Bars in history, and my skeptical opinion on the future. With House of Tiki also dying this year, and Kona Kai closing it’s doors at the end of 1998, we are living in dangerous times for Tiki Bars. Just as Tiki reaches a new height of popularity in mainstream retro pop culture, all of the places that had survived through the 1970’s and 1980’s - when very few people cared about such things - are collapsing. Go to your local Tiki Bar RIGHT NOW, and make sure you let them know that you are not there just because you want a drink, or to see your friends, but because it is - specifically - a TIKI BAR, and that you'd be somewhere else if it wasn't. Before it isn't. View the Columbus Dispatch article Archive of correspondance preceeding the closing of the Kahiki |
|
So,
Tsao could have done better for himself, and made us happy, if he had
let
us know about the auction. 
People
saw the old Kahiki as a cool and fun relic from 1961. Putting up
a new building in that style might appeal to readers of this page, but
we are a pretty darned small minority. Trying to build a 1961
restaurant
in 2001 would be a disaster. Very few restaurant-goers really
care
about the detail and the architecture, and so at best, I visualize the
new Kahiki as being a modern, sterile, typical boring building,
containing
a moderate number of the major relics from the old Kahiki strategically
placed to provide us with a reminder of the old location’s grandeur. More Pictures!
The Smoking Eruption in action!
photo: James
A wall panel confirming a link we've suspected all along: Oceanic
culture
and "Grey" aliens!
photo: James
Fountain in the foyer.
Photo: David Carter.
Vintage Kahiki Menu, front and inside views
scans: James
another shot of the front entrance by David Carter
| I
have
maintained
this web site since
1995. I write and create photos because I enjoy it. People tell me they enjoy reading this site, so I keep it going. However... This site has cost me a lot of hours, and a lot of money. And, unlike my writing for magazines or books, there is no publisher sending me checks for the work I do on this site. So... |
Tydirium
Multimedia
Left Orbit Temple Tiki Road Trip Big Stone Head Send e-mail to James Last updated on July 12, 2007 |
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