Hawaii!

This is gonna be long, sorry. Maybe read it in two or three parts if you like because I won’t have a whole lot to update for a week or so. J
We pulled into Hilo on Monday and were up bright and early to depart. We had to march up to the faculty lounge at about 6 am to have our passports checked, and then waited until we got the all clear. After the ship was cleared at roughly 8, I met up with Carson and Simone, two girls from South Carolina, and we set out for town. We literally are given no direction which was an interesting surprise. We walk out of the pier and are standing there on a pretty busy and industrial street wondering where we go. We ended up walking about 2 miles until we got into town and then tried to figure out what to do. Hilo is on the big island of Hawaii, yet is actually a pretty small town. It was smaller than where I’m from in Kansas for sure, and way more relaxed. We then went to a surf shop and rented a board for a day. The owner hooked us up with directions to a local cove which turned out to be GORGEOUS. The weather was perfect and the scenery was awesome. Whenever I manage to find an internet café you will see pictures. Anyways the waves died like the second I got in the water, so I didn’t actually get to surf, but I’m happy to say I tried. The other two had a bit better luck, but overall the waves were too small. Probably for the better anyways, I would have embarrassed or hurt myself. We went back to downtown Hilo and returned the board, grabbed lunch as a local ethnic place called “Puka Puka” which was very legit and very delicious. After a bit of shopping around, we went to Rainbow Falls, a waterfall nearby. They were having a couple week drought so it wasn’t falling very hard, but we did find a cool tree to climb! You will have to wait for pictures of that too, it was a monster that was clearly hundreds of years old. After that we made a Wal-Mart run and got ready to go to dinner. We went to a place called Ken’s House of Pancakes for Carson’s 21^st birthday, which got great reviews from everyone, and we all ate a mountain of food. Afterwards some people headed off to a bar, and I tagged along but ended up bailing shortly after arriving because it definitely wasn’t my thing. That night I met up with two of my roommates and we hung out downtown which was fun.
The next day in Hilo a totally different group of people got together and we went to Rainbow Falls again. This turned out to be totally fine because we climbed the awesome tree again, and then hiked back a bit to a lake that was pretty stunning. Despite numerous warnings telling us not to cliff dive, pretty much everyone jumped into the lake off of a ledge that was 15-20 feet high. I wasn’t going to for fear of death, but watched about 20 people do it before me. I went and am definitely glad I did. It was a rush and it was totally free, the best kind of entertainment. Afterwards we went downtown and grabbed some fruit and mexican food which was great. There was a market with several local farmers selling their crops, and everyone bought and tried all kinds of exotic fruits. I had something that looked like an extremely small cantaloupe on the outside, and an eyeball on the inside. It tasted like cantaloupe and I was not a fan. I also had Lychee, which looks kind of like a soft sea urchin. I’ve seen it before at home, but never tried it. It’s meat also looked like an eyeball, but it tasted more like a good grape, so I was a bigger fan of that. Hawaii also has fantastic pineapple which should be noted. We then went to a black sand beach and chilled there for a while. A lifeguard came and talked to us for a while and loaned us a snorkel mask, so we were able to go snorkeling for a couple of minutes. The water there was rocky and filled with coral, so there were some cool fish, but painful on the feet. We also saw WHALES while we were there. Honestly not too far from where we were swimming we started seeing splashes. We kept watching and distinguished the tales of whales slapping the water. Not too long after one came probably ¾ out of the water for a jump and I was pumped. We went back to the ship and took off for Oahu that night.
We woke up in the morning to go to Honolulu and got off the ship at about 8 am. We took the bus to Pearl Harbor and got tickets, but had to wait until 11:45 to get in. To kill time we went to a flea market that surrounded the University of Hawaii’s football stadium. It was the most overpriced flea market I’ve ever seen, so I didn’t really buy anything. I did try enough free samples of crackers and sauce though to fill me up. Tolan, one of my roommates, bought a Ukulele for $65 and it seemed to be a good one. By the end of the day he knew probably 7 songs on it, he’s obviously a really talented musician. We went back to Pearl Harbor and saw the Arizona Memorial which I’m glad to have seen, but it wasn’t worth a 3 hour wait. We then waited for about a half hour to catch a city bus to head to the North Shore of the Island which is where Sunset and Pipeline, two of the more famous beaches in the world were. On the way we got off and grabbed some Korean food for lunch. I doubt they will ever read this, but I have to thank my roommates from last year at U.Va, Brian and Ray. I was able to talk to the waitress about all of the legitimate names of the Korean food, and so instead of saying “I want the clear noodle thing” I asked her “Is that Japchea”. She was really almost flattered that I took the time to learn the names of the food instead of just pointing, and I’m really glad to have been at least somewhat culturally sensitive instead of just a tourist. Other words I knew were bibimbap, galbi (which I ordered and was awesome), and mandu. For a really sketchy looking restaurant, the place was a pleasant surprise for all. Anyways we went to the north shore and saw some really big waves. They get up to 60 feet apparently but that day were only 15-20. Still way bigger than I had seen. We watched the sunset on “Shark Cove” which was a rock formation that had some really cool splashes going on. After waiting an hour for the bus, we caught it and rode the 2 hours home. We grabbed dinner really late at a pub that had exceptional burgers, played shuffleboard, and went back to the ship and crashed.
The final day in Hawaii I had no plans, but my friend Simone, from the first day, had an extra ticket to go on the “Oahu Grand Island Tour”. It was a $55 ticket that she gave me for free, and again, I am all about free, so I of course had to go. I had sprained my ankle pretty bad the day before as well, so it was nice to sit on a bus all day instead of walking. We saw a bunch of cool bays, all of the nice beach houses, the mountains, and more sights on the tour. It was like an 8 hour thing and we saw the entire island. We grabbed lunch at a tourist trap place, but I did feel adventurous and tried “Spam Wasubi’ which is basically spam sushi. It looked terrible but tasted really good. We went to Sunset/Pipeline beaches again and the waves were a big bigger. Plus there were surfers out today so we saw them for a bit. We ended with the Dole Pineapple plantation which was the mother of all tourist traps. It had every sort of pineapple paraphernalia you could possibly want, and a maze which they charged to get into. I had a leather necklace carved with the word “Koma” which is my name in Hawaiian, and then called home and talked to my parents for about 30 minutes. We got on the bus, drove back, got on the ship, and took off from Oahu about 2 hours later. I feel like I was REALLY productive in Hawaii and saw all of the sites. If I have any regrets it is not seeing the volcanoes on the big island flowing at night, not legitimately snorkeling at a snorkel place, and not just spending more time at the beach. I loved Hawaii though and would happily go back, it is definitely an awesome place.
So now we have about 11 days at sea with class pretty much every day so that will be a challenge. Reading is intense when you have classes everyday, but I’ll stay caught up somehow. I’ve continued to meet new people about everyday, and have found a lot of fun in playing games at night with the random groups that do so in the piano lounge. We are in the process of planning our trip around Japan, I’ll post something about it sometime between now and when we leave.
Anyways there is so much going on that I could type forever, but I know people can only read so much (probably way less than this), so I’ll let you go. The experience is unbelievable so far, truly a chance of a lifetime.
If anyone has any questions or just wants to chat please drop me an email. I’ve loved hearing from everyone, it helps pass the time and I feel connected to home while being around the world.

We may run, walk, stumble, drive of fly,

But let us never lose sight of the reason for the journey,

Or miss a chance to see a rainbow on the way.

-Gloria Gaither

Thomas
Tdmalinowsky@semesteratsea.net