Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Aloha, Honolulu!

I'm in Hawaii for the week! When I left for the airport Monday morning, I was under the impression that it would take maybe five hours on a plane to get here. I was mistaken, of course. Apparently it requires ten hours of flight time to get to the Aloha State, complete with $3 chips and overly curious toddlers. Nevertheless, Koala and I found our entertainment in rereading one of the greatest plays ever ...


I went through a phase this year when pretty much the only literary references I ever made were to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, to the point where my friend asked me if I'd ever read any other work in my life. And yes, sadly, making literary references is an integral part of most conversations with me.

Anyway! My mom and her fiance picked me up at the airport, and as we were driving back to his place, I counted no fewer than six rainbows. I don't even remember the last time I saw a rainbow in Alpharetta, much less a double-ended rainbow like this one:


My mom also presented me with a freshly fallen plumeria (the flower of love!), which Hawaiian girls wear behind their ears. The custom is to place it on the left if you're married and the right if you're single.


(Forget Facebook relationship statuses. This is how it's done.)

This next picture is the view from the apartment, taken during a light rain. I didn't realize it would rain so much, but I haven't been properly dry since I got here. But it doesn't matter, because it's so pretty and warm ...


And today we visited the Dole Plantation, which was home to the world's largest maze! It was here that I discovered my sense of direction really is as bad as my mom makes it out to be, because even with a map of the gigantic maze I still managed to get hopelessly lost every few minutes. I always thought the most intimidating part of the Triwizard Tournament was trying to get to the center of dark maze ... not fighting dragons, or saving hostages from hostile mermen, or battling giant spiders. Just maze navigation. There was also a pineapple garden, which showcased pineapples plants from around the world. Little ones, big ones, dark green ones, and RED ONES!


(While we were visiting, I vaguely remembered something from U.S. History about Dole taking over Hawaii from its queen. Turns out that Sanford B. Dole led the provisional government of Hawaii, which was set up after Queen Liluokalani and the Kingdom of Hawaii were overthrown — but it was his cousin, James Dole, who became the pineapple magnate and founded Dole Plantation. So the only thing I remember from Ms. Waldman's class, I was actually completely wrong about. Unsurprising.)

While we were driving home, our car inexplicably broke down on the side of the highway (Likelike Highway, pronounced lee-kay-lee-kay, or maybe it was Kamehameha?) ... so, with our source of transportation gone, we settled back down at the apartment for a siesta. Afterward, my mom somehow managed to convince me to walk two miles to go see a Chinese cemetery. I complained a lot (as always!), but it was well worth the walk — I got to see so many beautiful Hawaiian houses on the way, all of which inspired me to buy a home on this beautiful island someday with my husband and three children. We'll have plumerias out front, huge windows, and Japanese grass. Yeah, I have it all planned out.

Plus, the cemetery was curiously built on the best piece of real estate ever. I didn't get to take a picture because the lighting at sundown was terrible, but it was in the center of a valley looking towards the sea, slightly raised up above all the neighboring houses on either side. Doug, my mom's fiance, observed that the dead people of Manoa (the town we were in) are so much better off than the living. It's true! Apparently, the founder of the cemetery was an astronomer-geologist who, after extensive calculations, decided that the spot was "the pulse of the watchful dragon of the valley." And it seems that only the dead are allowed an extended stay in the dragon's pulse with such a gorgeous view.

I'm usually creeped out by cemeteries, but this one looked peaceful and pretty enough to explore. One headstone stood out to me in particular, mostly because of the father's name ...


... and I'm not entirely sure what this sculpture is supposed to be, but it looks like a person in great distress!


The cemetery was also home to a really fantastic tree. Or two trees. Or many trees? Either way, don't worry. I've got the job of making a path through the branches covered:


And that's all for now! Hopefully tomorrow the car will be fixed and the weather slightly less rainy so that we can do what I've really been looking forward to — take a trip to the beach! It's imperative that I get a tan before summer ends, after all, and I only have about two weeks left before shipping up north ...

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