Hawaii (weeks 2/77)

Sunday we were up at  7:00 so that we could get to Church at 8:00. After Church we had a quick lunch and then went for a walk out to La'ie Point, Weather was fantastic, the waves were crashing and sending spray everywhere. Four locals were fishing,  as we walked passed them they got a bite. We watched as they landed a rather large silver fish. It looked like about a 10 pounder. We chatted to several folks out there, learned that a lot on the point would run about $1.5 million.

Sunday night we were picked up by Mark James and taken to his home. Turned out he lives at the very last home on the La'ie Point, big, with a great view back to the beach, out to the sea and over to the mountains. The home sits on the edge of a lava flow 20 feet above the sea. Everything on the ocean rusts and is destroyed in one way or another. So much maintenance. The moon rose full as it rose over the water, what a place.

We are staying at Temple View Apartments. One bedroom, sitting room, Kitchen and a bathroom. If we get anything like this in Ulaan Baatar we will be very happy. The windows are the louvered type which reminds me of my youth in our early homes in Palo Alto. There is no heat or A/C, but we don't need either. We leave them open all day and night, glad they have screens.

Monday morning we met with Mark James. He has so many good ideas for us for teaching; I hope we took good notes. We had a short break and set up the apartment a bit more, we also took a walk to the Temple. It was closed early since it was Monday, but we visited with folks in the visitors center. We watched an overview film about the Church in Hawaii. It was quite nice. We also were shown several films, Katy saw Johnny Lingo for the very first time. It was funny, of course, but it was also annotated. Many funny things were disclosed. If you have not seen the annotated version you can find it on You Tube. We walked around the Temple, through the graveyard and up the hill to a small gazebo at the top of the hill. This is one of the few temples without Moroni standing atop it.

  Tuesday morning we met with Mark James again and talked teaching strategies. He escorted us over to President Wheelwright's office. We visited for an hour about Hawaii and Mongolia and what we could do to improve the bond that exists between BYUH and Mongolia. They have lots of Mongols here at BYUH and they really love them. Wheelwright knew HDT in Palo Alto when he was attending Stanford and also when he returned as a teacher. He also knows the Zengers, Robin Zenger Baker lives near his family's home in Belmont Mass.
Back to campus for another meeting in the afternoon and then a meet and greet with all the faculty and President Wheelwright. It was the faculty Christmas Party and we were able to meet lots of people.

The most common comeback, when we tell people where we are going, is that the people are fantastic. OK most folks just laugh, but when they finish... That night we just went to bed, just three hours difference, but still a little jet lagged.

Afterwards we were to meet with several Mongols in the Aloha Center. We got there late and no one was there. We sat and waited and we were rewarded by a late Mongol. We visited for a bit and then needed to take off for our next appointment. It had been a wonderful visit and he was a really nice fellow, his family comes from UB and I expect we will see him back in Mongolia.

We visited with the Hoopes' on the other side of the Temple. We enjoyed the walk from campus, everything is quite close. They told us of their time in Mongolia back in 2005-6. They even had a slide show that told of the history of the mission from the 1998 when the Russians loosened their grip.

Things have changed quite a bit since the time they were there. Part of me wished it was as rudimentary as it was back then, but the mining boom has brought in a lot of new goods and services. Since we have no choice in terms of timing, we will enjoy the time we have. They had good things to say about the living accommodations, good news.

They really felt that the place looked like Wyoming and Montana. The scenes from UB were not pretty, but the rural scenes were great. We made digital copies of their presentations. Might be useful.

Wednesday we met with Neil and talked about making the students and teachers more reflective about their experiences. We talked about how important English is to the Mongolians. We brain stormed about how to get the Missionaries more excited about teaching and the non-English Speaking missionaries more engaged in learning and helping to teach English. It would also be nice to get the LDS membership learning English. It will help them economically and increase their chances at education and jobs. We also met with Ellen Bunker the department head for ESL. She showed us some of the online resources developed by BYUH and available in Mongolia.

We then walked home and got ready for dinner with the Andersons. Neil picked us up at 6:00, we had a nice meal in their home, just one house off the beach. They have a small right of way path to the beach from their place. They are from Provo and have just been out since September. They really like it here. Neil is a runner and he loves running here.We went to lunch with the Andersons and Ellen at a farm just north along the highway. Great fresh food, salads and soups and a veggie Panini, they had wonderful smoothies. Everyone seems to have great fruit smoothies here, so much good fruit. Probably not have much in UB.

  After lunch we went to the Temple. It is a really nice temple. We moved from room to room, but it was a film presentation. The murals were really nice. The artist who painted the murals must have been from Utah. All of them looked like scenes from the mountain west rather that like Hawaii. The Temple was built in 1919 and it is very Arts and Crafts in the look and feel.

We then went over to the PCC. There was a bit of rain with a chance more. We came across a shuttle, which ran from Temple to PCC, so we hopped on. It dropped us off at the rear entry to the PCC, so we walked through the "not ready for prime time" areas before encountering the nicer areas.

Once inside we saw the parade of islands, each island had a few dancers on a boat to perform on a platform supported between two canoes. One very muscular lad was really making a show of pushing the boat around the lagoon with his pole, suddenly he lost his footing and bam, down he went into the water. It was only up to his chest, but I'm sure it will be a memory for years to come. My brother Brad worked at PCC 30 years ago, after a fall from a boat he was moved to a more land based job.

We walked around to several of the "villages" from the different countries represented. First up Samoa, nice presentation that included coconut husking and cracking open the nut, drinking the water then scraping the meat and squeezing the milk from the nut using the fibers from the husk. They sang songs and talked tapa cloth. Nice show.

New Zealand was next called by its native name, lots of singing and dancing, wiggly hands to show lively spirit and eye flashes for emphasis and to look cool in general. They went from music of the pre-Christian era to the Christian colonization. Some of the performers had real tattoos some sported temporary paintings. One woman had a face painting that made her look as though black ink had dribbled down her chin. Not attractive, but it kept me looking at her. The presentation made me think of Uncle Tony and the time he spent in New Zealand on a mission. He really felt a kinship with those people. I think he fueled his interest of the native peoples of the western US. Katy recently visited the U of U museum, which accepted his large collection. It now forms the center of their native collection and has elements of his collection permanently on display.

After a few more islands it was dinnertime. We went to the main hall. A pair of senior missionaries greeted us and gave us each a lei and then passed us off to a youngling to seat us. We were seated on the back row, but the tables were tiered and everyone had a great view. The host was really good. Each island had a host and they were OK, but this fellow could speak well and sing, he had real stage presence.

The luau had lots of nice food, I stuck to the Kailua pork and some of the barbeque. We did order two of the fancy pineapple drinks; they came in the actual pineapple skin that the fruit was from. Mine had been nicked and most of the liquid leaked out. I pointed this out to a helper who offered to bring a bigger bowl to catch the spilling liquid. Fortunately they realized that would not make it quite right. They brought another drink and it was great.

After dinner we saw the IMAX movie of Hawaii, it was very nice. They had a few special features, there was a misting, the seats would rock, lean forward or back. It was an interesting trick, but I would have been fine without the special effects. The movie was only 15 minutes long, but seemed much longer, nice aerial photography.

The big finally was HA the Breath of Life, the stage was great, audience indoor and most of the stage was outdoor, 3-4 storey high cliff with trails and caves. lots of flames and bright costumes. It began with a real story and then it just became a variety show of the different islands, would have been better had they chosen to go one way or another, but it was really the dancing we came to see and we did.

We walked home via the rear entry, the way we came in. Warm evenings, light breeze. What a place.

Thursday we met with Neil Anderson for the last time.

After lunch we returned to PCC to see some of the villages we had missed the first time around. It was fun to see some of the new villages, we also went back to New Zealand and Samoa. Samoa was different, one fellow, Kap, was the whole show this time. Dinner was being served and I think many of the performers were getting ready for the big show. He did a good job, very funny and entertaining.

We had heard that the Christmas boat ride was starting that night. It will be the last year that they will be doing this. Evidently it is losing money, not sure how, does not seem an expensive gig. We went to buy a ticket to see this cool feature, we got free tickets for being missionaries, another $20 saved. The line was long but Katy got us a good place and stayed while I got the tickets.

It was a nice little show. We went along the canal and saw different scenes from the Biblical Christmas story. It was a long ride with not that many scenes, but they were nice. Toward the end they had Christmas celebrations from around the world. The last one was bizarre, it had dancing kids and two Yetis with glowing blue bubble eyes. Just weird.