Hawaiian Adventure: Evening Sky and Oddities Found in Hawaii

Hey there, everyone!

Remember me?  Yeah, it's been awhile.  I was absent from the world of blogging because my wife and I were on a cruise in Hawaii from the 29th of September through October 6th.  I've been recuperating and getting things back in order ever since.

The first day and night was, during our adventure, September 28th, and all about flying for 10 hours on two different flights to Hawaii and staying at the Marriott Hotel in Honolulu.  Our first flight was from Cincinnati.  The flights going to Hawaii weren't as bad as I thought they were going to be.  I watched two and a half movies on the biggest plane that had seven seats going across each row (one of them was Prometheus- which I liked) while my wife read a book on Steven Tyler.  The 2nd plane, on our second flight we had to take, was in Utah.  The Salt Lake City airport is tiny compared to the airports in Honolulu and Cincinnati, where we joyously we ended up, with only a little turbulence, experienced, during the long flights.

The Marriott Hotel offered us some great views of Waikiki beach in Honolulu.  We stayed there our first day and night before boarding our cruise ship, Pride of America, the next day. Staying at this 4 star hotel on the 19th floor gave us a breather and a chance to look around Honolulu before we started our 7 day cruise, the next day.  There was an incredible 33 floors to this hotel.  It was pretty friggin' big but some buildings in Honolulu stood taller.

Honolulu is a very busy place with a lot to see.  Tattoo parlors, bars, malls, small mom and pop stores, crazy traffic, a melting pot of people, surfers carrying surfboards and a beach that makes you feel as if you're dreaming.  My wife and I loved it.

We took walks along Waikiki beach, enjoying the water and talking to people and being invigorated by the beautiful scenery.

We had an awesome, entertaining time on our cruise and on five different islands in Hawaii.  I will be doing a series of posts of our time spent in Hawaii and on our cruise ship.  Events and places I write about won't be in any particular order.  I'll just be talking about this or that.  I'll be mixing it up and going crazy with it.  Lol.

Note:  I spent my birthday in Hawaii, during our cruise and island time.  How cool and great is that for a gift?

I'd like to show you this poem.  I wrote this during our time spent at the airport, in Honolulu, before coming back home.  I was almost completely exhausted, beyond repair, when I wrote this, but I was inspired by a particular picture I took during our cruise.  I took it as I stood on our balcony, outside our stateroom cabin on the ship.  I felt at such magnificent peace.

This poem is called "Evening Sky"

EVENING SKY

Hello
Goodbye
I say to the evening sky
Tomorrow will come
With what it decides

Some will make what
Seems to be mistakes
While others will see and take lessons
That they might embrace

I see and feel the peace that affects anyone of us
The Hawaiian atmosphere offers locales, beauty and kind people
You can't help but feel blessed

Walk
Run
Or be still

Take in the nature
That surrounds you in joyous or troubled times
Embrace the peace that takes care of you
While you stand, walk, run or hide
For a time

Meanwhile, say hello and goodbye
To that unbiased night sky
Tomorrow still comes
As you let those thoughts fly

I took this shot while standing on the top deck of our cruise ship

Going over the mountains to land in Salt Lake City

Taken from our room at the Marriott hotel in Honolulu.  You can see the ocean and beach from where we stayed.

Waikiki beach, as evening comes

Oddity #1- While we were on one of the Hawaii islands, we found out that there were numerous locations where people were being overrun and annoyed by numerous random chickens and roosters and if you happened to run over one, you had to get out of your vehicle, pick up the chicken, barely alive or dead, to throw it away or eat it.  No joke.  We were told this by a native Hawaiian man.  It was a law or something.

Oddity #2- My wife and I, almost continuously, encountered an elderly couple, strangers, that actually lived a few small towns away from our own town, back home, in the mainland.  They were nice and we enjoyed talking to them.  We found it to be such a coincidence that we were staying at the same hotel, going on the same cruise and we had lived so close by to each other in our home state.  That's nearly 4,300 miles away.

Even on the last flight home, we bumped into them again.  His name was John and her name was Connie.  Sometimes we would help each other locate where we had to be or where we wanted to go on the island or on the cruise or at the hotel.  I think we gave each other a sense of comfort and a feeling of contentedness, knowing we were around, off and on, people that were from our home state.  They were likable, helpful, interesting, conversational neighbors during our entire adventure.

Oddity #3- We learned that a lot of their highways on the islands are made partially from lava rock that has been mixed with asphalt.  They make good use of any lava that erupts and pours from volcanoes to build roads, walls that separate the ocean at beaches or property of any kind.

The lava creates new land, in Hawaii, eventually, but it is also used to build roads and walls on many of the islands.

Oddity #4- The Hawaiian word, mahalo, means "thank you" in the English language.  a lot of people will say this word to you if they witness you doing something thoughtful or nice to them or for another reason.  If you mix up the letters of this word just a bit, you can get "malaho", which our native Hawaiian shuttle bus driver, said at one point, meant a male body part (a man's genitals).  I've tried looking this up on the internet, for the hell of it, but can't find it.  Maybe I don't have the exact spelling of it right but that's what he told us.

Probably just fucking around with the tourists that we all were- but it gave us a chuckle, anyway.  A lot of people laughed.  We found everyone, on any of the islands or on the cruise ship, itself, to be friendly.  We talked to people from all around the world.  There especially seemed to be a lot of folks from Australia, the UK or the continent of Asia.  We enjoyed conversing with them about almost anything and learning about their culture and what they were paying for gas for their cars these days.  :)

In conclusion, I don't know if the shuttle bus driver was yanking my 'malaho' or what- but he sternly warned us not to say that dirty word to anyone on the streets on any of the Hawaiian islands or you would get a dirty look.  And maybe even a punch to the nutsack or coochie.  He didn't say that last part but I thought I would, because I care about your safety if you should go to Hawaii for a visit.  :)

Say, "Mahalo, Kelly!"

I'll be continuing this series of blog posts about our time in Hawaii for a short time.  I have posted all the pictures I took (around 530 pics- yeah, I know- WOW, huh?) during our Hawaiian adventure on Facebook, if you're interested.  I will be posting, in the future, more Hawaiian pictures on this blog and on my photo blog, Pics for Kicks, when I have more time.

We're taking over this island.  If you wanna get past me, you're gonna have to kill me and eat my corpse, damn it!

I'll be checking out and commenting on your blogs when I get the time.  It seems my birthday of October 3rd is being celebrated, off and on, this month, with friends and family.  I'll also be spending time with the wife and I'm still trying to put things in order and working on getting things fixed that happened right before our trip. I couldn't do things before our trip because we were busy and financially strapped.  For one thing, we had to buy a new, used car.  The old car broke down for good.  That put a huge dent into our spending money for the trip.

Later, someone ran into the back of our newly purchased car two weeks later where my wife worked.  Nope... no one saw what happened and nope... there are no security cameras aimed at the employee parking lot (how convenient and stupid) and yes, our insurance company will pay for getting it worked on but we still have to pay a five hundred dollar deductible.  Please don't ask any questions about the damage to the "new" car.  I'd rather not talk about it.  It's a thorn in my side or in my mind, actually.

I have a lot of those, of course.  Most are caused by people.  God, I wish I was back in Hawaii, already.  :) I try to picture myself there, nowadays.

Well, guys, that's all I can stand to write- for now.  See ya later, folks!  More fun and craziness to come!