Hawaii Happenings

Here I sit in Hawaii missing Telstra. Sarah, I hope you are reading this to know that we think Telstra rocks. You won't hear any grumbling from us.

I haven't found a cafe here where I can use my own netbook - of course, I haven't exactly looked - so I am on an ordinary computer and, hence, I can't post photos. That could be a run-on sentence. Once upon a time, I was an English teacher and I would put red corrections on such a sentence.

Anyhoo ... (and, yes, in a past life, I would correct that slangy expression.) ... anyhoo ...

We aren't exactly having downtime in Hawaii. Since we arrived on Saturday, I have been to the beach three times. Bob and I went to a 700-vendor flea market at Aloha Stadium. Unfortunately 650 of the booths were the same stuff you can buy at the International Market and the other 50 were packing up to go home. I preferred the market in Australia. We went to a luau last night and it was great fun.

Today we went on an 11.5 hour tour of the island which included Pearl Harbor. The tour was a terrific way to see a lot in one day. I took so many photos of the ocean that my "ocean photo collection" now rivals my "Sydney Opera House photo collection."

We leave here tomorrow evening and I am sure we will pack a lot into our last day. We have resisted shopping here since we have a whole suitcase of shopping (including the suitcase) from Australia. Our only purchase so far is macadamia nuts.

I meant to make a few observations about our last days in Australia whilst we were still there, but time got away from me. Let me tell you them now:

(1) There is only one grumpy person in all of Australia. He told me in the harshest terms to "get to the left" when I was walking on the right side of the sidewalk. Everyone else was kind, friendly, and personable.

(2) We were in the CBD of Sydney the last few days and I observed that Sydneysiders love pantyhose, leggings, and boots way more than cold Canadians do. What's that about?

(3) All of Australia is immaculately clean. It's a country full of non-litterers and we appreciated that.

(4) On the other hand, graffiti "artists" seem to be rampant. I'm surprised they haven't used Uluru as a canvas yet; they seem to have used all other areas of the country. Most disappointing too is that a lot of the beautiful trees in their parks are covered in carved names. Yuck!

(5) Oh, and all food in Australia is excellent except for in one dinky stall at one mall.

Aloha, Brenda