a new yorker’s year in hawaii
Sarah sent me this flier for her boyfriend Steve’s monthly party. It looks fun. He says on his blog : Soul Clap is simply about “making people dance to music they never realized they liked.” I like that.
Vodpod videos no longer available.
I think we’re going to try a different yoga school next week. One is the Manoa Yoga Center and Sarah wrote to me about a place called Open Space.
Went to Kaneohe today for mac nuts and coffee. In comparison to Kailua, Kaneohe is musky, jungly, very very green. I don’t know that I’d like to live there but I love when we drive in. Even in the car you can smell the mossiness. It’s intoxicating.
Driving to Tropical Farm you pass cows, orchid farms, little wooden kiosks selling ice cold coconut, and acres and acres of trees. It takes us about 30 minutes to get there and that’s a long way to drive for coffee but it’s worth it.
When we got home there was a gift from Mary in the mail: a year subscription to Diner Journal. I totally forgot that she told me to keep an eye on the mail so it came as a lovely surprise.
Having dinner with Mary at Marlow and Sons is one of my favorite regular things. It’s funny, the issues they sent have probably been hanging in their restaurant all the way out in Williamsburg. They smell lovely like a catholic school classroom at 5PM. Love Mary! She’s so awesome.
Another awesome thing which I meant to mention yesterday though not on any kind of profound level like Mary is Spoonalicious Hawaiian Fudge for ice cream. It’s really good. It’s not even like fudge it’s more like pudding. Pudding to put on top of ice cream. For lunch the other day I started thinking about it and ended up scooping myself a big bowl of ice cream just to put spoonalicious on it for dessert after my lunch. This is meaningful for two reasons: I’m not that into ice cream and even when I am I’m not into fudge on top of it. So. There you are.
And here’s a picture of the people that take care of the trees and grass around our temporary home.Kinda weird to be Asian with Haoles fixing the yard. They all look like a version of Chris Atkins from the Blue Lagoon.
Next to the Foodland we shop at is a specialty food shop called RField. K and I were loitering outside their window today while we were eating our Baskin Robbins. There’s much more access to local products and produce here. It’s easily one of my favorite parts of being in Hawaii. Anywhere we go it isn’t hard to find a Made in Hawaii alternative.
In that context, I remembered today this Kombucha Gingerade that K and I had when were home. For New Years Eve we went to Wholefoods for organic frozen pizza and ice cream. Instead of soda we got the gingerade and it was delicious. It claims to cure many of life’s problems: cancer, obesity, etc etc. Too bad they don’t sell it here in Hawaii.
When we saw the Domingo’s before we left NY, Ron said that he thought I was a vegan in my heart. Something about that sounds right, except for my love of beef and good cheese. Who knows.
K got me a beautiful Clu dress for my birthday. I joked with Curtis that maybe he also got me a ghost best friend because I’m feeling lonesome. I’ve been cryptic in my writing here about a few recent events. Mostly because I have no idea who reads this. And I vacillate between wanting to share everything and nothing. My best friend died of pancreatic cancer a month and a couple of weeks ago. I miss her alot. She was a huge influence on me in pretty much every aspect of my life. She was my mom’s age but she was younger than me in soul and joy for the universe. I know that I’m mourning and it’s really my first time to do so for someone so close to me. Perhaps everyone feels this bad. I feel like big chunks of me are missing. Like in my stomach and my heart and mind. Sometimes I cry alot and sometimes I don’t feel anything at all.
On my birthday, as I’ve said, K left me a birthday ‘installation’ in the guest bedroom. He’s done it before. He likes to take my tchotkes and stuffed animals and arrange them in a little chorus then add streamers, confetti, signs etc along with a funny version of the Happy Birthday song. This year he had less to work with because we don’t have a lot of belongings here.
When he left for work in the morning he text messaged me and said to check the guest room for a surprise. I sprinted up the stairs and found he’d set it up in the guest bathroom. I got my camera and taped myself finding it again. When I played it back I was a little distracted and not really paying attention. All of a sudden I heard something that I hadn’t heard when I was taping it and I know I didn’t make the noise.
Thats what I was referring to in my previous posts. It scared the bejesus out of me. And even though K has convinced me that there’s a 50/50 chance that I made the sound myself while moving around. I’m not entirely convinced. And the thing is I haven’t been able to decide if telling people or showing people would help me feel better about it. In fact I haven’t really told anyone how much it scares me because then it might scare them and that’ll scare me even more.
My friend Curtis watched it and heard what I described to him. He’s being very lawyerly about it and insists that it is what it is and what is a ghost anyway. He said there are many unexplained things in the world and that he feels it happened because I’m sad about my friend and being alone on my birthday might have created some kind of energy or circumstances that resulted in my ‘ghost tape’.
Bottom line is that I’ve spent two days alone here in the house since then and 70% of the time I’m scared. Keeping it to myself isn’t helping because we have to live here for three more months. I decided I’ll just put it out there and be open about it. Maybe something that makes me feel better will emerge. I don’t want to embed it here because I don’t like watching it. But I uploaded it to youtube: see my ghost tape.
Two things perplex me this morning:
The oatmeal thing is like pancakes for me: I get the proportions of water to oats/batter wrong. Every time I make pancakes I have to ask K what’s half of 1 1/2 and yet I still get it wrong and the pancakes come out like manhole covers. With oatmeal, half the time it comes out like kindergarten paste while other times the oats are just floating in too much water.
The apple bananas: the only thing I found online about them are that they’re a favorite among Hawaiian kids. We bought them at the farmer’s market and no one volunteered any useful information other than you can only eat them raw if they’re really really yellow. Out of the bunch we bought, one turned yellow shortly after we got them. The rest are a very insistent non-changing shade of green. I tried to open one this morning and put it in my oatmeal. It took washing my hands 5 or 6 times to get the sap of my fingers.
The day after my birthday was much better than my birthday. Mainly because K was home and off from work. In the morning Sarah and I went to yoga class at Koa. I haven’t been to yoga in yeeearrrrrrs. I once was very consistent which brought me alot of joy. My former teacher in Manhattan put just as much emphasis on the meditation as the physical practice. The last class I took with him, he discussed how important it was to actively meditate on your presence in the world and not take being alive for granted.
To back track a little, my teacher Dharma was very amazing– in his 60s/70s his body looked like a 30 year old. He was the personification of profundity. The first time I took his class he told me to go into my handstand ‘with anger’ and for the first time in my life I flipped up into a handstand with no problem. His energy was just amazing–made you feel like you could do anything.
This is Sri Dharma Mittra:
Back to the day I took my last class with him: he was trying to illustrate his point about meditating on your presence and he said that some people die suddenly and if they haven’t been mindful of their existence they might not know they died–that they continue to walk the earth living their life and not knowing they’re dead. I took him very literally and after class I went up to him and asked earnestly ‘Dharma how do I know I’m not dead?’ He looked at me for a second then answered ‘you have to meditate on it’. As I’ve said I’m afflicted with intense fear of death so after that I never went back. After taking class with him longer than any other teacher I just never went back.
At Koa, there’s not as much focus on the spiritual side. I mean it exists, it’s just not like Dharma. The teacher Kate was very kind, firm, and intuitive about our capabilities. The school itself is intimate and comforting. I am definitely in bad shape. No doubt. I’ll go back but I also want to try other schools like Purple or an Iyengar school in Manoa.
Sarah and I had lunch at Aloha Salads and I picked up a copy of Nothing to be Frightened Of by Julian Barnes at Book Ends. I love talking to Sarah. We’re quite different but when she describes how she feels about things I recognize something familiar–being an only child is probably part of it.
In the evening K and I met the Lums, Wayne, Cora, and their friend Diane at Le Bistro for dinner. I had two glasses of wine and some seared ahi. My tolerance for alcohol has gone down the tubes. While I’m in the moment I feel in charge of all my faculties. But then the next day I remember things I said and I’m kind of befuddled by why I would say various things. Not like I say anything bad or rude just not anything that I can remember thinking to say.
Dinner was great. I loved it. K met Wayne and Cora for the first time and he was charmed by them–particularly by a story of Wayne, his tendency for day dreaming, and a tree. We also learned that Cora, his wife, was a Hong Kong film star. I feel like a doofus for not having known that before. We’re looking forward to watching her films.
Wing Tek had a seating plan for dinner and he put Diane next to me who used to be the director of ACV. She was very very nice. She seems to have a very interesting family story. I look forward to seeing her again and hearing more about her aunties.
This week Wing Tek is hosting a dinner for Kimiko who’s coming to town. It’ll be nice to see her.
Despite this gorgeous picture from my three hour walk on the beach, my birthday stunk. The short story is that in the morning I videotaped a birthday ‘installation’ K left for me in the guest bedroom. When I played back the recording I heard something on the tape that sounded like a message from the non terrestrial world. It was most likely a sound I made myself while holding the camera but regardless I was freaked out all day and still feel a little wary of what I taped.
I was so freaked out that I wouldn’t go upstairs all day and ended up going to the beach in my nightgown (with a cardigan) to walk and take pictures. I was too spooked to go up and get my pants or change into proper beach clothes. But you know nightgowns, dresses, bathing suits…who can tell the difference anymore.
I walked and walked and talked to my friend Curtis on the phone while I took pictures. We talked about loved ones, death, relationships, pretty much everything…it was nice even though I was keeping him on the phone because I was kind of lonely. When K came home he watched my recording a few dozen times and decided that I’d made the noise myself.
In the evening we headed to Sassabune which was, until then, a guaranteed spectacular experience in the form of a meal. The food was delicious as usual but because it was a Saturday night and they were busier than any other time we’ve been there the waitstaff was not friendly or pleasant. Sassabune is what you could call the Sushi Nazi. You have to eat everything the way they tell you. They tell you this everytime you call for a reservation: ‘ is this your first time?’ and ‘ you do understand our rules?’ K and I ended up eating way too much and when it came to our last course I was so stuffed that I could only look at the handroll and feel sick to my stomach. I asked if I could take it home and was met with a very chilly response: ‘um, he doesn’t like that (he meaning the chef)’ and ‘he doesn’t like his food to be taken off the premises’.
All I have to say about that is ‘Sheesh’.
So all in all the day was not that great. But it leaves me feeling that as I begin my 36th year on this planet I have alot of contemplating to do.
Today was my last day being 34. And if I’m going by NY time, where I was born, I’m already 35. I was wary of spending my birthday in Hawaii seeing as most of the people dearest to me don’t live here, but it’s turning out alright– like being on a retreat. At least that’s how I’m trying to think of it.
My first trip back to NY was at the end of November. I went home because my best friend and mentor was dying of pancreatic cancer. I was able to spend the last two weeks of her life with her. It’s not easy to bring up or even think about. I felt that the holidays weren’t going to be festive or celebratory in light of this, and they weren’t. They were bittersweet and in a way it seems right that I spend my birthday far away from the city that I love and the comforts of home.
With that said, K has been sweet to me all day. We spent it eating good food and taking it very easy. Tomorrow he’s taking me to my favorite place for dinner: Sassabune. Can’t ask for much more than that.
I hoped we’d be able to go to the beach today because it had been weeks since we’ve gone swimming. Partly because of life issues but mostly because of the heavy rain. K and I ran errands in the morning and decided to see if the sun would come out in the afternoon.
We had some business at Long’s and while we were looking for envelopes we ended up in the Sanrio aisle. K pointed out a couple of cute characters and asked me if I’d like them as Birthday Friends. I quickly said Yes and now have two terribly cute companions highly appropriate for hugging (see photo above). Outside of Long’s we got a whiff of plate lunch and decided to try and find some. I mentioned the Indian truck by the post office and K said it looked shady ( I think that’s the unHawaiian in us). Then I remembered the little tent in the Kailua Shopping Center but when we got there it wasn’t up. So we settled on some Aloha Salads. I had the Ono Isalnd Ahi Salad and K had the Tiger Shrimp salad. My salad reminded me of the furakake at Nico’s. Not quite as good but very good anyway. We got smoothies at Lanikai Juice and we ate our lunch at one of the outdoor tables in the parking lot.
I had a Kailua Monkey from Lanikai Juice which really hit the spot–basically a banana and peanut butter smoothie. It was a fantastic lunch and I enjoyed sitting outside with K despite the cars coming in and out and sitting next to an SUV. It’s funny the spaces people create for themselves. The outdoor tables at Kailua Shopping Center remind me of my old job. I used to work at a museum and the first time I visited it for my interview I thought, how do people exist here. It seemed like an alley way–not an office. But after going there everyday for two years you carve out a space for yourself and your perspective changes, I suppose in order to maintain your sanity. That’s what the outdoor tables are like: you look at them and you think how do people sit out here and eat when there are exhaust fumes everywhere and people walking by to get to their cars. Anyway, despite this I enjoyed it. It was nice to sit outside in the almost sun and eat a great salad.
After lunch we went to the beach to see if it was warm enough to swim. It wasn’t. We walked along the shore instead. At Kailua beach we normally go to one of two spots, both within a few hundred feet of each other. Today we walked way down the beach in the direction of Kalapawai Market. It was strange to see how much of the beach was washed away from the storms. I’m not sure if that’s normal–but the gnarly roots of gigantic trees were all exposed because of the lost sand bed.
We walked more than a mile down the beach. We got to the point where the beach curves and is lined with mostly private residences some of which had no trespassing signs. It was so quiet, smooth, and calm. I told Ken that it must be like living in a clamshell for those people. I thought we were going to go swimming so I didn’t bring my camera but tomorrow on my birthday I’ll go take a walk and update this with some pictures.
After being here for four months we FINALLY made it to the Kailua Farmer’s Market this evening. It was AWESOME. I was so excited. I was so impatient as K tried to find parking in the majorly packed parking lot. I was almost hyperventilating. K said we must be really pitiful if I’m so excited about going to a Farmer’s Market. He said I was never excited about the Union Square Farmer’s Market and it’s at least four or five times bigger than Kailua’s. And my response was does Union Square have this:
or THESE:
There was so much to buy. We ended up buying some vegan poke, organic veggies, a couple of plate dinners, flowers, coffee, taro mochi, apple bananas, lumpia, and chocolate syrup.
It was a great day. And tomorrow I’ll be 35.
When I got home from NY the first time, I developed a really bad ear infection in both ears. I think it migh thave been related to staying overnight at the hospital with my friend several nights. The days leading up to us flying back to NY slowly became torture. It turned out that my health insurance didn’t cver me on the island of Oahu. I told K that I would suck it up and wait until we arrived back in NY. I decided that I would sleep as much as I could and give my body a chance to heal. This turned out not only to be stupid but I could do little else. A couple of days before our flight I woke up from a nap and didn’t even have the energy to sit up for very long. I called K who was at work and he came home not long after and took me to the The Medical Corner in Kailua. His coworker who has lived in Kailua for a long time recommended it.
I mention all this because I was so scared about going to an emergency room in a place I wasn’t so familiar with. And I’m a little bit of a neurotic when it comes to choosing almost anything. I have this motivation to find the ‘best’ or at least know the back story for whatever person place or thing I’m getting involved with–especially doctors. The people at The Medical Corner were so nice and very fastidious. They gave me antibiotics and pain meds and asked me to come back the day we were flying to make sure I could fly. My ear was so swollen that they couldn’t see one of my ear drums. We came back on Saturday and the doctor on duty gave me more antibiotics, more pain killers, and gave me some advice about flying. She suggested I take Zyrtech to cut down on the production of mucus thus cutting down the pain and pressure of altitude change. It all worked. I got home in one piece and with very little pain. I even slept soundly because of the good drugs. I would definitely go back there for help if I needed it.
Three One Nine 