A Birthday Celebration in Waikiki

Happy Birthday, Tom!

Tom's birthday was last week and we went into Waikiki to celebrate in style. Tom chose The Cheesecake Factory for his place to celebrate his forty-something years. It's right in the heart of Waikiki, across the street from the famous International Marketplace. In other words, we were in tourist land.



We can't get him to pose for a picture without his normal Spidey salute.


The Christmas lights on the palm trees were pretty, but when it's in the low 80s it's hard to remember that it is the holiday season. It also confuses you when people are walking by you in their bikinis and surfboards. Can it really be December? Is the big guy in the red suit really coming in a couple of weeks? Maybe to Oahu by sea kayak, perhaps.

The Aloha Kelikimaka tree near
the famous Royal Hawaiian hotel

One way to know it's definitely the holidays is by looking at the frequency with which I have been posting to my blog. I haven't been posting as much lately. We are heading back to the mainland for Christmas and New Years. Everyone have a great holiday season! I will post when I get back in 2008!

The Aloha Stadium Swap Meet

Hordes of people swarm the swap meet

If you visit Oahu someday, one thing that you should put on your itinerary is a trip to the Aloha Stadium's Swap Meet. The other thing you should do when here is give us a call. Duh!

The swap meet is huge. It wraps all the way around the stadium, with booths facing each other to make the pathway for shoppers. Here you will find everything from t-shirts, aloha attire, jewelry, wind chimes, and local fruit. There is so much to see that you have to plan to spend a lot of time. And wear your comfortable shoes because you will do a lot of walking.

I went to the swap meet this past Wednesday to do some Christmas shopping. I had my list and yep, I was checking it twice and I'm not even Santa. I was looking for small gifts for Noah to give to all his friends and cousins back on the mainland. It's a great place to buy gifts for kids because there are a plethora of booths selling cheap jewelry, magnets, key chains, and some lead- infused toys from China. I'm not absolutely sure about the lead thing, but there are several booths filled with very cheap toys from Asia. I'm guilty of buying a couple of things from these booths. I figure that Noah's pretty much past the oral-fixation stage and won't be putting the deck of Spider-Man cards I bought in his mouth.

This Hawaiian man uses a machete
to whack off the end of a coconut.
Then he gives the customer the
ice-cold coconut with a straw so they
can drink the milk.


I've been to the swap meet three times, and I've always gone on a Wednesday. I'm always amazed at how many people are there on a weekday. I can't imagine how busy it must get on the weekend. It's funny to watch how much shopping people do at the swap meet. It's common to see people toting a suitcase on wheels to stash their goods. I saw a couple working together to try to zip up a suitcase that was way too full of white socks. There really is a booth that sells nothing but plain athletic white and black socks. I remember walking by it, as a matter of fact, wondering if the guy got much business. Apparently he did quite well with this couple that was going to break their suitcase because they bought 30 pair of socks.

Shoppers in search of the great bargain

When you are shopping on pavement there is one thing that is valuable more than anything for sell: trade winds. It can get so blasted hot. I took my mom to the swap meet when she was visiting in September and we were there in the morning. By the time we left, we were completely soaked in sweat. Gross, eh? Yes, it is. Welcome to our life. At least a couple of days ago it was cooler, but I still got sticky and gross. This is not what I envision as a Christmas shopping experience.

In Hawaii, they like to call food "grindz".

Speaking of a Christmas shopping experience...nothing says Christmas like holiday music. I was at a market in downtown Honolulu earlier in the week. I went downtown to buy a new calendar for my day planner and have lunch with Tom. After we ate I browsed through the open market. They had a lady singing Christmas songs with a man playing an electric keyboard. I couldn't help but snicker to myself when she sang "Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow". Right, lady, like that's going to happen.

Walking through the swap meet I heard various types of music -- rap, hip hop, and Hawaiian. But what really caught my attention was a booth that I walked by that was playing The Carpenters. Talk about a surreal moment. It's the holiday season, it's 80+ degrees outside, I'm walking in a football stadium parking lot, and Karen Carpenter's smooth voice is booming out of a middle-aged man's booth. It's all okay, though, because in my mind all I'm hearing is I'll Be Home for Christmas.

My 5 Seconds of Fame

The top of the tree fell down

It's been a weird and wacky week so far and it is only Thursday. It all started with Monday where it seemed like nothing was going right. From finding a pair of black dress pants covered in mold (see previous blog posting), to Noah coming home from school with his shirt cut up for the second time (thanks to an overzealous little boy who sits next to him), I thought for sure Tuesday would be a much better day.

Boy was I wrong. Well, actually, the day started out fine. I accomplished a lot while Noah was in school. It was another cloudy day, but the winds had really picked up. I had the tv on and they had one of those weather alerts come across the screens. You can't miss those, even when you are in the other room. Beek, beek beek - that annoying sound that precedes the weather service announcements sounds the same no matter what state you live in. We had a high wind warning for most of the day. I didn't really think anything of it other than to predict quite a few leaves in the street.

Noah and I went to the public library after school. I had finished picking out my last book to check out when a lady came over the intercom to make an announcement. It caught my attention because in all the time I've spent in the library, they have never done this. She said something like, "if you have a Toyota van with the license plates, blah, blah, blah, or a Honda blah-blah-blah, please come to the front desk. A tree has fallen on your car." My ears perked up when I heard Toyota van, but I couldn't remember my plate number to know if it matched. Then I remembered that when I parked I was next to another van. Uh, oh.

We went outside to see what happened and sure enough the entire front of our van was engulfed in a bushy tree. By the time we soaked in what had happened, a policewoman pulled up and asked for some information. Of course, what she needed was in the van, so I had to climb in through the back to get to the glove compartment. It was quite the experience to sit in the van and see a bunch of leaves and branches covering the windshield.

Me and the big microphone on tv

I talked to the library branch manager and a man from the parks & rec department before I had time to call Tom. I barely got a chance to tell him what had happened when a tv camera crew pulled up. They must have really been digging for something to put on the news if they were going to cover this story. I mean, there was no blood, no injuries, no significant damage to the vans. The other lady whose van was hit by the tree and her three kids along with Noah and I were gathered together and a reporter from the local Fox channel interviewed us. Well, I wouldn't exactly call it "interviewing" since all she said was, "so what went down?" and thrust the microphone out. The other lady spoke first, and then I piped in. I said quite a bit before the other lady's youngest boy exclaimed, "the tree fell on our car!" And he said it, and he said it and he said it...about 5 times. Put a precocious kid in front of a camera and you're asking for trouble. And the need for lots of film.


The tree fell on our car!

After this it seemed like we did a lot of standing around and waiting. The parks and rec department didn't have the right equipment to remove the tree so they had to contact a tree service company. Unfortunately, they were in Honolulu, in the process of working on another problem. It was almost two hours later by the time they got to the scene.

They had me pull the van out of the tree and park it so they could assess the damage. It was kind of hard to tell what the damage was among all the dirt and scuff marks. It looked like we might have had a couple of minor scratches. We really got lucky. The tree trunk snapped in half and the top just went straight down. Hooray for bushy trees.

As I stood there watching the crew dismember the poor tree, I was amused at how many people it took to work on the whole ordeal. It only took a couple of guys to actually do the hard stuff, but there were three people from parks & rec, the library branch manager and the security guy from the library surrounding me. Everyone wanted to look at the van and I must have given my name, address and phone number to at least four different people.

Since it was after 5:00 by the time we were cleared to leave, I treated Noah to McDonald's for dinner. It was only two blocks away and he was a real trooper through the whole ordeal. He didn't quite understand what was going on, but he went along with everything we had to do.

I was on the 10:00 news, but they took what I said and edited it down to about 5 seconds. It was me saying a couple of things and the blasted kid saying, "the tree fell on our car". At least they edited out the other four times he said it. I don't know what was more bizarre -- having a tree fall on the van or being on tv.

I wish I could say our bizarre week ended there, but it didn't. That night, I was awakened by a creepy howling noise that I thought was Noah crying. When I woke up I realized that the power had gone off. The next day (Wednesday), the schools were closed and it continued to rain and blow. The power didn't come back on until sometime in the middle of the afternoon. Since there was no electricity, I read a book to Noah that we checked out at the library, appropriately titled Henry and Mudge and the Wild Wind.

The Ill Effects of Humidity

What mold looks like when it attacks your pants

I know I've already written about some of the weird things that humidity does, like make your floor all gummy and your food sticky. After yesterday and today's findings, I couldn't help but add a little more to this topic.

Yesterday I scoured through the closet looking for empty hangars since I was doing laundry. I scooted my dress pants down the rod and something caught my eye. This "something" was on my linen pants, and not just on a little bit, but all over (see above picture - you can double click on it to enlarge). I pulled the pants out and gasped. Or at least I think I did, but I was the only one home so who knows. All I can say is I was horrified and not happy. Being the dedicated blogger that I have become, my first thought was (okay, not my first thought, but perhaps my second) that I needed to take a picture of this so everyone could see what we have to live with here in "paradise".

Let me insert a little disclaimer here. Not every part of the island has the extreme levels of humidity that we do. We live in one of the wettest parts of the island, which is why we have the lush backyard. It has been raining for days. Not continuously, but when it does, it makes you wonder who Mother Nature is so mad at because it's as if she's getting her frustrations out at us here in little 'ole Maunawili Estates.

Our repair man, Gary, came over to work on our bathroom sinks yesterday and since he's lived here for years I asked him what we could do about the humidity in the house. He suggested running the air conditioner, which dries things out. Or, we could invest in a dehumidifier. Who would have thought an Idaho native would ever have to purchase a piece of equipment to dry out the air? My brain has a hard time wrapping itself around that since all my life I've dealt with it being too dry.

Gary said he knows a man who has a room in his house that is used only for drying out his documents. Apparently the humidity has taken siege on his documents and he wanted to prevent them from becoming destroyed. Can you imagine? Sorry Mr. IRS auditor, the numbers on last year's tax returns have melted off the page.

A couple of weeks ago I was about to leave the house and thought my breath was in need of some help so I went to the drawer where I had stashed some Orbit gum. When I picked up the box of gum, it was completely oily and it had dissolved into mush, with a hint of wintergreen. I had to wash my hands. They were completely covered in sticky oil. It was so gross.

Poor little chicken. Its sucker took a leak on my desk.

This morning I was working in the office and grabbed my ruler off the top of the desk. My hand got sticky and when I turned over the ruler, there was a red substance on it. I thought maybe the glue used to adhere the cork on the back of the ruler was melting. Then I had one of those "aha" moments. I stood up and cleared out the clutter on the top of the desk and there was the culprit. My old sucker was surrounded in a red sticky pool. The stupid chicken that is holding the sucker in it's mouth wasn't smart enough to drop it and run. But, I guess since it's legs are tied together, that might be difficult. Oh, and the fact that it is a rubber chicken might have something to do with it also. Poor thing, just look at the horror on its face.

Surfin' USA

Two surfers catchin' a wave at Ali'i Beach

I had this blog entry almost completely finished when I made a big oops by trying to cut and paste a picture at the top. I lost everything I had written along with all the pictures I had embedded. I still don't know why this happened since cutting and pasting usually doesn't result in such disastrous results. Now I've learned to put all the pictures in first and then write at the end. Live and learn (my new favorite motto since moving here!!).

So, I will try my best to recreate what I had originally written, which may be hard since it it's been over a week since Heather and I went to the North Shore and I have short term memory loss at times. Some people blame it on age. I prefer to blame it on hormones (at least in my case).

The first of the three surfing competitions

We arrived at Ali'i Beach excited to watch some big waves and catch some of the fun, but Mother Nature had other plans for the day. Shortly after we got settled in the sand and put on our sunscreen, the rain started. We took coverage under the eaves of the bathrooms, standing among what I believe were surfers from all over. There we were - a couple of plains-clothed women among a small group of surfer dudes watching and hoping for a break in the rain. Every so often our thoughts were interrupted by the lovely background noise of toilets flushing. What a moment.

Eventually the rain subsided and we had a chance to watch the big waves. It turned out that the waves weren't cooperating and there was no competition that day. The sun brought out more people, which made for great entertainment as usual.



Ready to ride the waves, but no cooperation at sea


Heather informed me that Baywatch Hawaii was filmed on this beach. Now, I never saw that show, but it still set my mind into action. Anytime I hear the word Baywatch I think of Pamela Anderson. I could just see her running in the sand, her hair flowing in the wind, her, um, her uh, well...never mind.

The lifeguard station looked like the ones you see on tv shows and the movies. I kept waiting for him to come out so I could take a picture, but it never happened. However, what took place was a little bit like an episode of Baywatch without the drama and sprayed-on tans . The first thing I noticed was the lifeguard running in our direction with his kit. I turned to see who was hurt and a man was laying in the sand about fifteen yards in front of us with a look on his face that said he was in serious pain. The lifeguard first gave the man some oxygen, and then another man (a lifeguard?) assisted with cleaning what appeared to be a big gash in the man's ankle. It wasn't bleeding that much, but it must have been pretty painful as he looked like he was going to pass out.

I felt bad for the man. Can you imagine having an injury in a public place like the beach and two lifeguards, male nonetheless, taking care of you? To make matters worse, it started to rain again and they couldn't move him. They had to cover him with a yellow plastic tarp. At least he wasn't severely injured. I can't imagine seeing a shark victim, but surfers don't talk about sharks. You just don't bring that word up with them.

This part of the North Shore

reminds me of the Oregon coast,
minus the palm trees

Since there wasn't much surfing to watch, we opted to see the rest of Haleiwa. As you can imagine, most of the shops cater to the surfing crowd. It is a tourist mecca, but a good bargain can still be had at Matsumoto's, world famous for their shave ice. Note that is shave ice, not shaved ice. You don't call it shaved ice in Hawaii. Once you've had shave ice from Matsumoto's, nothing else will compare.

The famous place for shave ice

We got to Matsumoto's before lunch so we didn't have to wait in line. The first time I was there with Tom and Noah, the line was to the door and I've heard it can be go down the street at times.

You can get your shave ice with ice cream or azuki beans on the bottom. The beans come from the Far East and are boiled and sweetened. Shave ice and mushy beans don't sound like a good mix to me, so I usually opt for ice cream. The combination of the juice from the shave ice and the ice cream is ono (Hawaiian slang for delicious). You can also get sweetened condensed milk poured on top of the shave ice, but that, too, sounds like a good way to ruin a good thing.

You can get a large shave ice with ice cream for under $2.00, which is a bargain when you consider that I've paid $5 for a plain shave ice at other locations. You'd think that with all it's notoriety they would charge more, but I'm glad they don't.



Need a lift?

The surfboard directional will tell you
how far to other surfing destinations

A Crushing Defeat

The Tailgating Crew

It's the day after the big game (for those not into football, that means the BSU/Hawaii game) and we are officially depressed and licking our wounds like a momma cat. I don't know what's more frustrating, the fact that we lost or the fact that we played so poorly.

We started the day out early. Marty, Heather and Jordan arrived at our house so we could follow each other into the stadium. We pulled into Aloha stadium's parking lot around 11:45 and it was already packed. I had never seen so many tailgaters in my life. They didn't have anyone directing people into parking spots so we were on our own. I'm glad we got there early because I don't know how we would have found two spaces together. We ended up parking one in front of the other so we could make room between our cars for our chairs and table.

Too cool to smile, dude

We met a couple of Marines stationed in Kaneohe who were part of a big group next to us. They were all sporting Univ. of Hawaii t-shirts, but they admitted they weren't big fans as they were transplants from all over. They seemed rather amused by the fact that we were Boise State fans (at least half of our group were - Marty, Heather and Jordan are Kansas State fans).

It's a huge stadium

All around us was a sea of dark green and we were a little nervous at times, especially when we had to walk through a wall of Hawaii fans that were doing their best to get everyone revved up for the game. But, we found them to actually be on good behavior. They high-fived us and especially loved Noah, who was decked out in his BSU attire. Maybe if it wasn't for Noah we would have had obscenities hurled at us.

Hawaii attire anyone? Nah, we'll pass...

We sat in the north end zone with all the other BSU fans that made the flight over. We had pretty good seats, even though we were sitting among some Hawaii fans. During halftime I found a man I worked with at the Chamber of Commerce in Boise. It was good to see a familiar face and to do a little catching up. At this point in the game, we both thought BSU might still be able to pull it off. They've been known to work miracles before (Fiesta Bowl, anyone??).


Look at all that orange, and a little blue

Got to love that Buster.

He even knows how to shaka and he's not too proud to wear a grass skirt!

Oh, look, someone escaped from the
Polynesian Cultural Center and is
running on the field.
No, wait, it's Hawaii's mascot.

Let the game begin!

After being at the stadium for over four hours, we were ready for the game. It was fun to watch how Hawaii starts their games, with all of their players doing some kind of a Warrior chant. From what I could tell, it consisted of banging on the chest and chanting a bunch of incomprehensible words, but it made for a good show anyway. I can see how that chest pounding would get you geared up for the game. No wonder they won. Maybe BSU needs to start doing a little of that themselves, but maybe right before they head out to the field. Wouldn't want to look like idiots on national tv since we are Broncos and not Warriors.

The score before it got real ugly

A shot of some BSU fans before the sun went down,
before the rain, and before defeat.

Noah's Shot at Fame (no pun intended)

A picture from our lanai - from the vantage point of a 3'6", 5 year-old boy








On Saturday, November 3, Noah woke up earlier than I thought, and an artistic impulse drove him to take some pictures with Mom's camera. At least he told me later that morning that he had taken some pictures of his journal, otherwise I probably wouldn't have found out until we did a slide show on our flat-screen when company was over. I can just imagine it now..."And these pictures are of, um, well...who took these pictures?"

After he told me what he did, I turned on the camera to verify what he said. Afterall, I didn't even know he knew how to turn it on, let alone how to take pictures. Sure enough, our budding Ansel Adams had managed to snap 31 pictures within the distance of eight feet from it's original resting place, the desk.

So today's blog is in honor of our future photographer (shh...don't tell him, but I think Santa may be getting him his own camera for Christmas!). May he look back at this when he's 15 and laugh.

An old PTA flyer from school - one of six pictures

Noah's collage in crayon, plus left foot















Isn't a messy desk the sign of a genius?

Office floor.
Somehow, Noah thought our ugly carpet was picture-worthy

A Whirlwind Visit

A bunch of tourists aboard the Pineapple Express

Yesterday we played tour guides as my sister Beth and her husband, Robert, hopped over from their vacation on Maui to visit us for the day. Since they were only here for about 12 hours, we tried to pack in as much as we could in that short time.

Tom took the day off work to maximize his time with family, which turned out to be a very wise decision. Noah went to school so we could have a few hours of adult-time, which is the first for Tom and I since moving here.

After picking them up at the airport we showed them Tom's office, downtown (which they said looks like any big city), Waikiki, and Diamond Head. We ate in a sports bar called The Yard House in downtown Waikiki. The food was pretty good and the music was from the '70s, so all of us middle-age fogies recognized every song. The place was pretty dead, but according to Tom (our resident Waikiki "expert"), the place is hopping at night.

We then headed to Kailua to pick Noah up at school. It was nice that Robert and Beth could see Maunawili Elementary - home of the Menehunes (the little people). Once they walked onto the campus, I think they realized how hot it can get here. For some reason, the sun really beats down on you in the courtyard in front of his class and I find myself sweating like a pig in the short time it takes for me to pick him up.

We headed straight for the Dole Plantation, which is on the other side of the mountain, on the road that takes you to the North Shore. Walking up to the building is like stepping into Oz as everything is yellow. They have a full snack bar, but the hot-selling item is the whipped frozen pineapple (ice cream). Unfortunately, they don't have it in any other flavor for those of us (ahem, that's me) that don't like pineapple. Ok, I know I'm probably the only one on the planet that doesn't like pineapple. What can I say.

Our little Menehune strikes a Spidey pose
upon a rock at the Dole Plantation

The big attraction for us since we had Noah along was the train ride around part of the pineapple fields. We bought our tickets with plenty of time before the next departure, but found out we got relegated to the end of the line when a tour group showed up. Those darn tourists (I can talk like a local now that I am one). We ended up having to wait for the next train.

A Pineapple Plant

The train ride made a big loop around fields of pineapple and other tropical fruits. We saw banana trees, sugarcane, and mango and papaya trees to name a few. Like most people, I assumed pineapples grow in a tree, but they grow on a rather small plant. It's rather amazing how such a big and heavy fruit can grow on something that looks like a house plant.

Banana trees - look really close in the tree to the right of center

By the time we got back into Kailua, the sun was setting and it was too dark to show off the magnificent color of the water at the beach. So, for all of you who haven't seen any of our beach pictures, here is an old picture to whet your appetite:

Noah at Lanikai Beach
(which is in Kailua)

We grilled steaks back at our house while Noah and his Auntie Beth (they call Aunts Aunties in Hawaii) built a train in his bedroom. He loved showing Uncle Robert and Auntie Beth his bedroom, but it was too dark to show them the little frogs he likes to play with in the backyard. That will have to wait until next year's visit.

Driving in Hawaii - Part II

I wasn't planning to write two blogs about driving in Hawaii back-to-back, but that changed after a string of funny sites today. I told a friend of mine last week that if I can't think of anything to write for my blog, all I have to do is leave the house and take a drive. And that's exactly what I did.

I ran errands today in preparation of my sister and her husband's visit. They are flying in tomorrow for a one-day excursion from their trip on Maui. I noticed that with today being Veteran's Day, traffic was heavier than normal for a Monday. But, that's not what I'm writing about - traffic. Nope, this time, it's all about what I witnessed while driving in traffic.

The first run of errands took place in Kailua. I came to a stop at one of the busiest stoplights in town and noticed the bumper sticker on the four-door in front of me. It said, "If you don't get off my back, I'll give you a rubba slippa whack". I checked the distance between us and I must have been safe as I was never confronted by a rubba slippa (that's flip-flops for you mainlanders).

After stopping for some park action (I promised Noah), we headed to the other side of the mountain - the leeward side. There must be something about the Kamehemaha Highway (The Kam, for short) in Kaneohe that brings out the saltiest of the nuts. Either that or they somehow know that I'm coming and they pull out all the stops.

In the past I've seen moving trucks with the back door open and a bunch of guys hanging out on the exercise equipment in the back. This time, it was another moving truck, but it's door was only open half-way. Inside were two people. One was sitting on the right side, and the other was sitting right in the middle - in a hammock that was hung by hooks from each side of the truck. That was a first for me. I don't think I've seen a guy in a hammock going down a highway before.

You know, I have to say that was one of those sites where you blink your eyes a few times and wonder if you truly are seeing what you think you are. Well, I blinked and that guy in the hammock was still there. He must have had his feet planted firmly on the ground because he wasn't even swinging. I don't know about you, but I would have been lying in the hammock.

Poor Tom had to take the bus to work today because our van was in the shop. I'm sure he could write a few things in the blog about what he sees when riding the bus. Oh, but I digress. When he got home we headed right out to pick up the van. We were laughing (again) about all the people in the back of pickups we were seeing. Then, lo and behold, another new and strange site.

We were the first car stopped at a light at a big intersection. A pickup turned onto the Likelike Highway right in front of us. That's lee-kay, lee-kay not like-like, unless you want to like beef (see blog "Pidgeon English Spoken Here"). In the back of the pickup were a couple of guys, one which was shirtless and strumming on his ukelele. Hmm...there go the stereotypes running through my head. Shame, shame.

This all leads me to think of an old poster from the '70s: When Life Gives You Lemons, Make Lemonade. My version of the poster would be: When Life Sends You to Hawaii, Write a Blog.

Driving in Hawaii - Part I

I think I've put more miles on our van in the 3 months we've lived here than I did in six month's time in Idaho. Everything is so bloody far away, but a lot of that is due to the fact that we chose to live in the "country". That's "country" with 50,000 people and no farms, but hey, if that's what they want to call it, I can too.

The funny thing is that it seems like everywhere I want to go is about 30-35 minutes away. Tom's office? 30 minutes. Hawaii Kai (East side of island)? 30 minutes. Leeward side? 30-35 minutes. I guess there is something to be said about being centrally located.

Today, for instance, I went to Wal-Mart and Costco. They are both about 30 minutes away. I had never gone to both stores on the same trip, so I got some directions off Mapquest to help me get from Wal-Mart to Costco. I had a pretty good idea how to get to Costco since it's right off the interstate, but I didn't want to do too much guessing.

I looked at the directions that Mapquest gave me and none of the first three streets mentioned were anywhere around Wal-Mart. I don't know what the folks behind Mapquest were smoking when they designed the maps for Oahu, but it wasn't something you can buy at 7-11 (well, maybe in the parking lot). It ended up I didn't need the stupid directions anyway because the interstate access was off one of the main roads I took.

That wasn't the first time Mapquest screwed up directions for us. The first time I tried getting to this particular Wal-Mart I got the directions off the site. Now you can see Wal-Mart and Sam's Club right off the interstate, so you'd think you'd just take the exit closest to them. Well, not according to Mapquest. It was telling me to get off two exits past the exit I thought I should take. I read those directions and tossed them on the floor (along with wrappers, umbrella, wet wipes and magazines) because I knew there was no way they could be right. I managed to find my way to the store after a couple of U-turns. Driving in any new city isn't easy, but I happen to think they designed the streets around here like this to send us mainlanders screaming all the way back home.

On the mainland, if you take a wrong exit off the interstate, you don't sweat it too much because you know you can just get back on and keep going. Here, just because you get off the interstate, doesn't mean you'll be able to get back on. They have off-ramps but then there won't be any on-ramps at the same place. Then you have to drive around on side streets trying to figure out how the hell to get back on the interstate.

This explains why when we first moved here Tom told me you have to make sure you not only get directions to where you're going, but also for you to get back home. For example, a few weekends ago we were on some wild-goose chase, got in an area we weren't familiar with and got off the interstate. I told Tom, "Look on the other side! There's no way to get back on. Now what are we going to do?" After meandering through a residential area and stopping for gas (but not asking for directions), we finally found our way back on.

I think I'm finally learning the ropes around here. I give myself at least 35 minutes to get where I'm going, and I base a lot of my decisions on where to shop on how easy it is to get off and back on the interstate. Hey, if it makes my life easier, it makes me happy!

Food Challenges

Living in a humid and culturally diverse area has created challenges to us when it comes to cooking and shopping for food. Shortly after we moved here I wanted to make a pizza. Back in Idaho I bought Jiffy -- you know, the cheap little white and blue boxes -- pizza crust mix. You have no idea to what lengths I went to try to find it on this island. I went to at least five different grocery stores, and even in different towns. No such luck. I would have been happy with the little rotund Chef Boyardee man's crust mix, but nooooo that would have been asking for way too much. You see not only could I not find these two brands, bit I couldn't find any pizza crust mixes!

One day, in total desperation, I bought a premade crust. I paid something like $4.59 for it (can you even believe that!). In the store it wasn't refrigerated, so I didn't refrigerate it at home either. I planned to use it in two days. I told Tom one morning, "We are having homemade pizza tonight! Yippee!" That night, I pulled out the crust and it was completely green with mold on the back side. We were introduced to Mama's Island Pizza that night. And it was good.

Sensing my frustration and defeat, Tom said, "maybe Hawaiians don't make their own pizza." Hmm...he might be on to something. Being the problem solver that he is, he went online and found a whole case of Jiffy pizza crust mix (that's 24 boxes, in case you're wondering) on Amazon. Yep, we ordered it and they are on the shelf in our makeshift pantry -- the hall closet.

At this point, I was beginning to wonder what other food challenges I would face living here. Tonight I made tacos for dinner and was reminded once again of our little food problems. I went to shake on the Taco Bell seasoning and nothing would come out of the jar. I took the cap off and what was once a powdery substance was an orange rock stuck to the bottom of the container. I had to take a knife and whack off enough of the spices to get through this dinner.

A month ago we had the same problem with our onion powder. Tom tried to season some hamburgers for grilling and several globs had formed in the container. He had to shake it hard to get some powder loose. We ended up ditching it and started with a new jar. So far, so good.

Recently most of the stores in town stopped carrying Noah's favorite snack - Baked Cheetos. I tried all of the main stores and couldn't find it. So, Tom said, "no problem, we'll just order some!" Little bit of a problem this time, though. For some reason they won't ship them to Hawaii or Alaska. I guess we aren't worthy of such finer foods as dried corn things with fake cheese powder.

This time we had some luck on our side because the other day I happened to be at a store I hadn't been to in a long time. Out of habit, I checked to see if they had Baked Cheetos and lo and behold they did. And they were on sale, too! Ka-ching! Noah was so happy he was dancing in the aisle. Until the electricity went out. Like I've said before, life in Hawaii is, well...different.

Calm Before the Storm

Weather forecasters here have been predicting a storm that could hit some of the Hawaiian islands for a stretch of four days. They issued a flash flood watch for this period, then a day or so later they canceled the watch. Then the next day they changed their minds again.

Yesterday was incredibly hot and humid. You can always tell when it is extraordinarily humid here because your bare feet stick to the floor. As is Hawaiian custom, we don't wear our shoes in the house. Most of the flooring in our house is either a fake-wood laminate or tile. The only rooms with carpeting are the two bedrooms and office. You can also tell if it's an extra humid day by looking at the laminate floor. On humid days there is a cloudy film on it and you can see where you've stepped.

The sky looked strange yesterday, too. The clouds were not puffy and white or gray like they normally are. They were white, but they seemed thin and translucent. They reminded me of the clouds I'd seen in Maryland when it was 100 degrees with 100% humidity. To make matters worse, there were no tradewinds. I should have known then that it was the calm before the storm.

The fury started to unleash itself late last night. Tom was still up at midnight and he said the lightening started then. I woke up to the thunder about an hour after this, not realizing he had only been to bed for an hour. I kept nudging him and saying, "you've got to see the lightening. It's amazing!" He kept ignoring me. Finally he mumbled, "there was lightening when I came to bed." Then he went right back to sleep.

I, on the other hand, couldn't sleep with all this action going on. We had a lightening show that lasted for at least two hours. I watched as it illuminated our backyard jungle. I listened as the thunder boomed across the sky. And I listened to the rain hitting all the leaves. Then I waited for Noah to come to our bed, but he never did.

It poured down rain off and on throughout the night, waking us up several times. It was raining when we got up and rained all morning. A steady rain like this is not normal. Usually it only lasts up to ten minutes and then quits.

View from our kitchen window

There are several waterfalls streaming down the mountains outside our house. You can see them from the kitchen window and the lanai. The runoff stream in the backyard is so full of water that it sounds like a river. It just adds to the other various sounds we hear.

Now we can add thunder and lightening to our list of things that wake us up in Hawaii.

Pidgin English Spoken Here

Before moving to Hawaii the only time I had heard the term Pidgin English was in reference to a type of sign language (I've taken sign language courses). Since Hawaii is a true melting pot of different cultures, you can only imagine how many languages you might hear when you are out and about.

Yesterday I was shopping in a Hallmark at the Windward Mall, the closest one to our house. They had a selection of Hawaiia cards and they caught my eye. Not because of the colorful pictures, but because I could tell they were written in Pidgin. Some of them were so hard to read that I couldn't even make any sense out of them. Some I figured I haven't lived here long enough to understand the humor.

The day we moved into our house, I noticed some of the guys from the moving company talking to each other in a strange language. I thought it was Hawaiian, but it had a lot of slang because I could pick up "da" and "fo" and sort of assimilate that they were meant to be saying "the" and "for". Now I know they were talking Pidgin.

If you stay in Hawaii long enough and talk to long-time locals, you'll hear a little bit of this Pidgin creeping into their normal conversation. The biggest thing I've noticed is how they like to say "yeah" at the end of a sentence. What would be a normal sentence will sound like a question after they say "yeah". Here's an example:

Da Spam musubi ono, yeah?

Translation: The Spam musubi is delicious. (no need for "yeah" on end).

There is even a website called "How to Talk Conversational Pidgin" (http://www.extreme-hawaii.com/pidgin/vocab/). Here are some funny samples from that website:


Aznuts
(that is insane)

Brok' da mout
(tastes delicious, yummy)

Like beef?
(want to fight?)

Panty
(wimp, weakling)

Fut
(passing gas Hawaiian style)

Futsetta
(Boogie Man's mother - I am not making this up!)

And what I would call Hawaiian's signature phrase...(drumroll please)...

Bumbye
(When we get around to it, after awhile)

Halloween - Hawaii Style (2007 Edition)

Artist's rendering of Jack, as illustrated in pencil by Noah Cordery, Age 5












Non-artist's interpretation.









Our one and only pumpkin was carved after school on Halloween. I believe it was a Hawaiian-grown pumpkin and it was one of those easier ones to carve. Have you ever cut open the top of a pumpkin and tried to scoop out the inside and it's been so gooey you thought you'd never get it all out? I hate those kinds of pumpkins. Luckily, our pumpkin was drier and easy to carve.

Noah wanted a scary pumpkin. I told him to draw a picture of what he wanted it to look like and I'd carve it. If you look closely at his picture you'll see a line through it's teeth. Apparently, Jack was supposed to be wearing braces. I couldn't figure out how to do that in my limited time devoted to the carving. It doesn't really matter because my target audience (that would be Noah) was thrilled with the results.

With Tom out of town in Vegas (lucky dog), Marty and Heather invited Noah and I to their house so Noah could trick-or-treat with their daughter, Jordan. They live on the leeward side of the island in Mililani Mauka.

I must have eaten too much candy before we left and my brain was in a sugar freeze because we left our house allowing only 40 minutes to get there. In normal circumstances you can get to their house in about 30 minutes. Driving to their house during rush hour on a very rainy Halloween night was definitely not "normal circumstances". It took us an hour. We were late and our chicken nuggets and fries were a little cold when we got there. But, not too cold to eat, of course!

Marty and Heather's house is referred to as an "upside down" house and one of roughly 20 on the island. The master bedroom is downstairs and the rest of the house is on the second floor. Yep, the kitchen is on the second floor. Marty thought he'd hang out and relax in the bedroom by the front door so he could be ready when the doorbell rang. Problem was the ring could only be heard upstairs. This led to lots of running up and down the stairs while trying to scarf down some McD's.

Their neighborhood was a perfect place to trick-or-treat. The streets are narrow and most of the arteries off their street are cul-de-sacs. Many of the homes had someone sitting out either by the front door or in the garage handing out the goods. Homes are so compact and space is so scarce here that the garage is sometimes used as another room in the house. It is not uncommon to find the garage used as a family or rec room. One house we went to was having a huge family gathering in their garage and the kids were handing out the candy. It was loud and crazy.

It poured on us on and off and Heather and I had umbrellas. Still, it was hard to keep everyone covered while holding onto everything. We all ended up wet to some degree. Noah's Black Spiderman costume was soaking wet as were the clothes he had on underneath. Jordan was a wet Belle of the ball, but she was still pretty in her yellow gown and her yellow shoes that lit up as she walked.

A couple of rain-soaked trick-or-treaters

Once the rain really hit Noah kept saying, "I want to go home". Coming from drought-ridden Idaho, he's not used to moisture. Any bit of water and he's an unhappy camper. We pushed him on, reminding him that he was making great memories of his first time trick-or-treating in Hawaii. Ahhh....

The kids ended up with so much candy that we had to keep unloading their treat buckets into grocery bags. They both ended up with plastic grocery bags completely full of candy and various "treats". I guess some house we visited thought it was their duty to get the kids ready for college as they handed out Top Ramen. That was a riot. I guess now all they need is a hot plate and they'll be all set.

Parties and Pumpkins

Noah at the pumpkin toss. He made 2 of 3 tosses --
left-handed, too!

It was the weekend of Halloween parties. We had a school party on Friday night, sponsored by the PTA and a Treat Street party in downtown Kailua on Saturday night. We even had a third one that we could have gone to on Sunday night, but we decided two was enough.

The Kailua party was well organized and we felt more at home at this party. They had live music, games for kids, food booths, and a costume parade. The parade was led by the founder of Famous Amos cookies (and Kailua resident), Wally Amos. He owns a local cookie shop in town called Chip N Cookie. Wally sold his company to Keebler and now focuses most of his energy on literacy and writing.



Waiting our turn at one of the games in Kailua




Tuesday Night
It's the night before Halloween (oooo, sounds like the beginning of a scarey story) and I finally bought a pumpkin today. Noah's been begging for one every day for the last few weeks. I tried to explain to him that in Hawaii you have to buy a pumpkin right before Halloween or it will go bad. After awhile it must have sunk in because he stopped asking. Either that or his mind was onto something else.

One of the stores in town was selling pumpkins for $.39/lb, which seemed like a decent price. By the time I got there they had three left. Two were in sad shape and the third was so heavy I couldn't pick it up. I went to another store and they had a ton of them. No wonder -- they were $.69/lb!! As I looked at the pumpkins I kept hearing Noah's little voice in my head saying, "Mom, can I have a big pumpkin? Mom, can I have a big pumpkin?" It was like a broken record. I knew I had to buy one, even at the ridiculous price.

So, I left the store with one, nicely round, mid-sized pumpkin. It set me back $9.17. I am guessing that same pumpkin would have been roughly half that price back in Idaho. I started to miss our Jack-Be-Little pumpkin patch that we grew in our garden last year.

I commented to Tom the other night how no one around here decorates their front door area (porch, step, whatever) for Halloween like we were used to seeing back home. You don't drive through a neighborhood and see a few pumpkins nicely arranged by the front door. You don't really see any Halloween decorations, either. Since it's so hot and humid here I can understand why they don't put the pumpkins by the front door. A few days later it could be an orange jello substance quivering in the corner. There's enough of a bug problem around here without inadvertently making a delicious pumpkin dinner to entice them.

The pumpkin is sitting on our kitchen counter, ready to be carved. The poor thing went from a nicely air-conditioned store to a warm house. I thought about putting it in the refrigerator, but that seemed silly to me. I couldn't imagine putting one in the fridge, especially since we don't have room for one anyway. I plan to carve it on Halloween afternoon. I hope it holds up when I go to cut it. I can just imagine trying to cut out an eye and the entire thing collapses into a pool of mush. I guess if that happens, I'll be making some pumpkin pies!

Strange sightings on a Saturday

We decided that today was Project Van day. Our van was so filthy you couldn't tell what color the carpet was and the back of it was black. I usually don't let it get this dirty, but it is hard to keep the thing clean when you don't have a fully enclosed garage. Our garage is rather weird. The so-called walls only go up about 3/4 of the way and they don't even start at the bottom. Furthermore, they aren't complete walls. They are wood slats that are at a 45 degree angle. When it rains and the trade winds start blowing, leaves and miscellaneous stuff ends up in our garage. Once a week a group of four guys come to the house to mow, even though I'm not exactly sure why. Our grass is putting-green short. When they are here, they use one of those obnoxiously loud blowers and stir up the black soil. Of course, the black dirt makes its way over and under our garage "walls". And whose car does it end up on? Yep, mine.

I was finished cleaning the outside of the van when Noah pointed down the slope of the side of our yard and said, "Mom! The roosters are here!" Next thing I knew, they were in our next-door neighbors yard, all 7 of them. Tom wanted to know what you call of group of roosters & hens. I told him I didn't know, but I call them a gang. I ran inside to get the camera so I could take a picture of all of them together, but when I came out they got scared and went berserk. Five of them scurried into our neighbor's backyard and two (Rudy being one of them) stayed in the front and hid behind some bushes. I think they were plotting their escape plan because shortly after this I saw them fly on the roof of the neighbor's house and walk over it into the backside. It would have made a funny picture, but those darn things move too fast.

EARLIER PICTURE OF RUDY AND THE GANG IN OUR DRIVEWAY...



Later I was thinking about how none of the locals pay any attention to the chickens around here. I think it's kind of odd that no one thinks to capture one. A few eggs for a week's worth of breakfast. Fried chicken for Sunday dinner. And Hawaiians really love to eat chicken. Maybe it's that they have some kind of a reverence for chickens, kind of like the people of India do for cows. I don't know. It seems like there's so many of them roaming the island, no one would notice if one went missing. Hmmm.....

After we spiffed up the van, we decided we would treat ourselves to a nice hearty meal. We were thinking of going to the Macaroni Grill, which is in the biggest mall in Hawaii. I looked for it in the white pages, but couldn't find it. But I did find a pretty funny name...Celso Macadangdang. And no, I am not making this up!!

We ended up going to a different part of the island, sort of near Pearl Harbor. We went to a place called Anna Miller's. We had read that it served what most people refer to as stick-to-your-ribs food. We were so excited to finally find a local restaurant that serves the kind of food we like. I had to smirk when I saw Spam and rice on their list of side orders for breakfast.

Heading home we saw another humorous, yet very Hawaiian site. We were going down the Kamahemaha highway following a local moving truck that had the back door open. Three guys were standing on the lowered platform. One was sitting on a piece of weight lifting equipment, hugging the padded arms as if it were a teddy bear. In the left lane right next to it was a pimped out blue pickup with a guy in a beach chair sitting in the back and a full-size Hawaiian flag propped into the tailgate. There was another tricked out white pickup in front of it with a guy sitting in the back. Which leads me to the next topic...

HAWAIIANS IN THE BACK OF PICKUPS

Apparently, there is no state law that prohibits people from riding in the back of pickups around here. Drive for more than five minutes in any direction and you are bound to see a loaded pickup truck. I don't know why, but Tom and I find it rather amusing. There's just something about the sight of six Hawaiians sitting in the back of a pickup. Last month we went into Honolulu to watch the Thunderbirds fly over Waikiki. We got stuck in a traffic jam after the show and in the lane next to us we saw a bunch of cops in the back of a pickup. Now that was funny, but it would have been even funnier if they had been eating donuts. As Noah would say, "What the ?"

Tonight we went into town for Kailua's Treat Street Halloween party. As we were were getting ready to go home, a pickup with two guys in the back drove by. But these two knew how to ride in style. They had a couch in the back to sit on. What's next? A flat-screen, high-definition tv?

Where the Streets Have No (Pronounceable) Name

Navigating around a new place is hard enough. Try throwing in streets that have names that you can't even pronounce. Or can pronounce if you want to take one minute sounding out the four vowels that are strung together, like in Ke'eaumoku St. Doesn't quite roll of the tongue, does it?

We live on the northeastern part of Oahu, in the "country" as they say here. We don't have a WalMart, or any store like that in Kailua, so driving to one takes at least 30 minutes. It seems like most of the places where I shop take about 30 minutes to get to. My destination today was the WalMart in downtown Honolulu. And what street is this on? Ke'eaumoku. I can type it, just can't say it.

I haven't even bothered trying to pronounce it. I knew when I'd run into this street simply by memorizing the "Ke'ea" part. When I saw the street sign with a long word with a bunch of vowels on it, I figured it must be the one. My guess was correct and for once, I was in the right lane.

It was only my 2nd time visiting this particular WalMart. The first time was days after we moved here. All three of us went to this Walmart to buy a bunch of things for the house. It was like throwing us into the middle of another country, but somehow they spoke what appeared to be English. We were there in the middle of the day on a weekday. Not usually considered a busy time, right? Ha!

We made the mistake of getting two carts. I don't know what we were thinking because I couldn't even get my cart down the aisle. It reminded me of WalMart in Meridian on the day after Thanksgiving. It was insane. By the time we left the store, I was so frazzled and stressed out that I swore I would never set foot in that store again. Well, as I say, "never say never". I made the mistake of saying it and today I ate my words...again.

One of the weirdest things about this location is that Walmart is on the 1st floor and Sam's Club is on the 3rd. When you want to enter Walmart, you enter the parking lot on one street (you know the one...the one I can't pronounce), and to enter Sam's Club, you just go around the block and enter from the other side. You can also take an elevator from the parking lot of WalMart up to Sam's Club. Strange.

It wasn't as busy as the first time we went in July, but that's probably because unbeknownst to us, we were there the week before the first day of school. We had no clue. I have come to the conclusion after today's experience that this store is always extremely busy. It is like shopping during the Christmas season in Boise. I can only imagine what it will look like in there in December. I shudder at the thought.

I've done my own study and it appears to me that only 10% of the street names are English. The rest are Hawaiian. As I headed back home, I passed street after street with more vowels than letters. Imagine my relief when I finally got to a street I could pronounce...Ward Avenue.

If it weren't for the ocean and the mountains, I probably would get lost. I know that to get home I need to head toward the mountains. And I know the Pali Highway will get me there. It must work because I'm home now on Aloha Oe. That's 5 vowels and 2 consonants. Not that anyone's counting.

70 Spamtastic years

If Hawaiians could change the food pyramid, they would include rice in the fruits and vegetable tier. They love their rice so much here they devote almost an entire aisle of it in the grocery store. If you looked at Noah's school lunch menu, most days they have rice for lunch and even for breakfast. Back in Idaho, if they were serving chicken nuggets, it would come with something like fries or tater tots. Not here. Nope, you rarely see potatoes on the school lunch menu. Anywhere you'd think "potatoes", insert "rice" instead.

Tom was a big rice eater when I met him so at least I ate rice before moving here. Marty and Heather (the couple that moved here from Kansas, he's Tom's right-hand man) weren't rice eaters, but they delved right into the custom and bought a rice cooker. I cook it the 'ole fashion way- in a pot.

They like it so much here they put it with about anything. It's kind of funny, but since we've been here we've been to a few outdoor activities and they always have a booth that sells chili & rice -- a big Styrofoam bowl of chili with rice on the bottom. They also have what's call Spam Musubi (moo-soo-bee), which consists of a slice of fried Spam pressed on a small block of rice and wrapped in a strip of nori (seaweed). You can even buy Spam Musubi in the 7-Elevens throughout the state.

Mainlanders cringe and laugh at the mere mention of the word Spam. Hawaiians take it quite seriously. After all, Hawaii has the highest consumption of Spam per capita than any other state. They love the stuff. They love it so much that in 2002, McDonald's started test-marketing Spam on it's breakfast menu. They started serving an egg, rice (see!) and Spam meal. Tom and I laughed once when we saw a big banner hanging from a McDonald's window promoting a Spam sandwich for breakfast.

Hawaiians don't understand why mainlanders don't like Spam. Maybe it's because mainlanders associate Spam as a substitute for bologna (equally gellous meatious food). Hawaiians never eat Spam cold. They prefer it fried.

Earlier this month one of the daily newspapers ran an article titled "70 Spamtastic Years". Not only do they love eating it here, they like writing about it! I read the article and found out that there is a man who lives in Alabama who loves Spam. He loves it so much that he eats it at least three times a week, has made a Christmas tree out of Spam cans, and even has a Spam Halloween costume. I'm surprised there wasn't an outcry by Hawaiians. What? He doesn't live in Hawaii?