{"id":355639,"date":"2021-11-11T06:06:12","date_gmt":"2021-11-10T20:06:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=355639"},"modified":"2021-11-11T06:06:12","modified_gmt":"2021-11-10T20:06:12","slug":"doram-tops-underwater-pumpkin-carving-contest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/doram-tops-underwater-pumpkin-carving-contest\/","title":{"rendered":"Doram tops underwater pumpkin carving contest"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Judges evaluate the\u00a0originality, visual impact, craftsmanship, and quality of the carved pumpkins. (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Aumen Doram\u2019s underwater creation\u2014a jack-o-lantern covered in stiches and a bow\u2014romped off with this year\u2019s top prize in the Underwater Pumpkin Carving contest that was held last Oct. 30 at Lau Lau Bay.<\/p>\n

There was also a Best in Costume contest, which Ron Snyder handily won after participating in the contest dressed as Elsa in Walt Disney\u2019s Frozen.<\/p>\n

With 16 entries in all that made sure to impress the judges, the Underwater Pumpkin Carving contest\u2019s second place title went to Karie Comstock, who turned in a giant squid gourd eating a submarine, while third place went to Jessica Williams with her scary, heavily toothed, jack-o-lantern.<\/p>\n

In the Best in Costume feature, second place was a tie between JD Herndon and Emilie Kohler who went as a pair of octopuses.<\/p>\n

Two-time judge Yogi Singh said that every year comes with a lot of surprises. \u201cIt\u2019s a fun competition and people get to hang out with friends and make new ones. \u2026The precision of the carving this year was pretty awesome. Some were too close to call that scoring became a bit difficult,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were also some cool costumes and this year was far more creative with people even coming up with a COVID-19 theme. Without a doubt, the underwater pumpkin carving contest will be a blast,\u201d he added. Singh was joined on the judges\u2019 panel by Eric O\u2019Malley and Albert Flores.<\/p>\n

Now on its third year, the contest is the brainchild of local dive shop Green Flash Dive Inc. Participants are expected to carve their pumpkins underwater and the event is always looked forward to by the scuba diving community.<\/p>\n

According to GFD owner Rhea McDoulett, there were originally 21 entries. \u201cThe last-minute community spread cut our entries to 16, which is still one more than last year. The level of interest grows each year and all of those who participate are very enthusiastic about the event,\u201d she said. \u201cThe third year was still fun despite the last-minute withdrawals. The competitors are so creative and focused in their creations. Plus, everybody loves to have a good time and see what other people are up to underwater. It never gets old.\u201d<\/p>\n

McDoulett said the awarding was held at the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Garapan and that they are always happy to see annual competitors. \u201cKarie Comstock has won a prize in every competition so far. They are always excited and filled with new ideas. The old-timers also like to see new competitors who bring a different style and an element of the unknown to the competition,\u201d she said. \u201cWe are always considering adjustments to the rules or themes for the next carve. The formula is pretty good so far. We don\u2019t want depart too much from the central idea to enjoy each other\u2019s company. There has been talk of adding a championship belt to the mix, which would be passed from champion to champion year to year.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aumen Doram\u2019s underwater creation\u2014a jack-o-lantern covered in stiches and a bow\u2014romped off with this year\u2019s…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":355645,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-355639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=355639"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355639\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/355645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=355639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=355639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=355639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}