Now onto the real Hawaii--Maui

Time is pressing for me to wrap up this Hawaii journey as I'm leaving for NZ in 3 weeks and more likely than not I'll just never get to it when I'm back! This time, let's move on to Maui!

So after 5 happy goofy days with our friends Ashley and Yuting, we parted at the airport and Paul and I headed for Maui. So I read this great tour book "Maui Revealed" and the most valuable lesson I learn from it was to make a stop at Costco as soon as you landed Maui. Seeing how expensive things were at the centrally located metropolitan Waikiki, we cannot afford to miss our chance so Paul wasted no time to approach the help desk at airport. Deterred by Paul's eagerness, the guy at the help desk rolled his eyes and replied in a monotone "right off the airport, you'll see it next to the Big K on your left"--these boring, cheap mainlanders...

Once stepping inside Costco, I saw a whole row of "Maui Revealed" in piles selling for $10.99....I am just never tired of getting tricked into these gimmicks of these Hawaiians!! But the pineapples was selling for $2.99 so I guess it's all good.

We headed to Paia for lunch. It was a complete opposite of Waikiki--they have a whole shop selling nothing but "hemp" products just to give you an idea (although they claim that hemp is not exactly marijuana and you can't get high from hemp, but seriously why else would I want to wear hemp shirts or wash in hemp shampoo and burn hemp incense?!)

I had an okay mahi burger at Paia Fish Market (I'm being critical here for my own future reference--the food's really not that bad for a quick bite--my trip planning to NZ reminds me how I have no recollection of restaurants at all, I may have an awsome/awful meal but I don't recall the name or where it's located, my memory is pretty useless when it comes down to such preciseness, so now you know the real reason why I keep this blog), and we couldn't wait to try the crepe at Cafe Des Amis--Paul and I are huge fans of crepe, although it really is just the French pancake--and what a disappointment!! the crepe was really dull and the service was crap! The waitress saw the soft drinks we carried from Paia Fish Market and she just grabbed the cups and put it on the floor!! And you make crappy crepe?! That is just unacceptable!!

And when I asked for our check, she tried to grab the dish before I put tips on it. I told her to hold for a second, and I dugged our all the pennies and nickles and gave her $0.26 tips for her service. I probably should have left her none, but hopefully this was more insulting.

Service wasn't all that bad after this unhappy incidence. We checked into our hotel Diamond Resort at Wailea, the guy started apologizing for the weather as it starts to rain. But in fact, it was the best weather I had for the whole time I was in Hawaii, as my face was for once not soaked in my own sweat but in rain. So we wasted no time and head out south to La Perouse Bay.

(La Perouse Bay, the beach behind us is covered by lava rocks)

(On the road to La Perouse Bay, this is probably not the Hawaii in our dream, but so pretty nonetheless, you may see the lava rocks on both sides of the road)

The first night of Maui finished with a fine touch at the Pupu Lounge. Personally, I would never go to a restaurant that calls itself "pupu" no matter what language you're speaking. But it was THE best food and service we had for the whole trip!! Paul had a mahi steak and I had some local fish called walu (don't know what it is but really delicious) and the waiter was smoking hot! Even Paul was smitten although he would never admit it.

I'm afraid I cannot top it off with anything else, all other Maui stuff will have to wait until the next blog....

Identity Crisis of the Hawaiian

I'd better start writing soon about my Hawaiian trip coz it's already been a month and my memories are starting to fade quickly...

So back to the driver from airport. This dude is pretty friendly, being a veteran, he's traveled around the states, but he was obviously annoyed when the other riders casually said "back in the states..." and he said "that's what you all say, back in the states, back in the states... you know we are part of the states, right?"

Paul the nice guy tried to change the subject, and pointed to a union jack flag hanging on the street and asked him what it is. "Oh, we paid the British to design the flag" "Lie!", I whispered to Paul, obviously didn't have the guts to say it out loud. Apparently, Hawaii wanted to join the Great Britain as part of the common wealth. Don't know what the British guy was smoking, but they cordially declined the offer. The British are probably kicking themselves right now. I would.

So the Hawaiians are definitely Americans now, at least for the record, but one certainly wouldn't feel that way when one's in Waikiki. To me, Waikiki is more like a tropical Tokyo more than anything. Cheap and abundant Japanese food, (totally tanned) Japanese tourists in group, all the high end stores selling fur (that's right, fur, under the blazing sun in Hawaii!!!) I wonder if it annoys any Hawaiians like the invasion has never stopped, and most people I've talked to certainly hated Waikiki. But I absolutely love it!! Where else can you find such cultural dynamics anywhere in the world? Sure, it is touristy but aren't we tourists after all? And the delicious Japanese food (including Japanese version of Chinese food "ramen" & "gyoza" at Oh Sho Ramen, and Japanese version of Italian food at Paradiso Bar & Grill, bravo!!) more than made up for the touristy atmosphere.
But once you get outside of Waikiki, you're going to experience all the natural beauty of these tropical islands. hope I'll get to it before the memory fades, but I'll stop here as I have a wedding to go to tomorrow~
Until next time~