Zippy's, Hula class, and pretty pictures

June 28, 2012

Aloha ahiahi, (Good evening)

I had a very interesting day. I woke and went to work - arriving at 7:30. I worked on the DVFR for a bit till Ann was free to come look at some data and answer some questions. She then gave me a side project to work on for her, doing some easy percentages for a childhood obesity project of hers. She has meetings to go to so I worked on my own for most of the day. That all went well and I got a lot done. I also had brought the Blue Monday candy bars that Scott sent and shared pieces of those with people at work. I'd brought in one Ale-8 and shared that as well. I can bring more Ale-8's in, but only wanted to carry just so much this morning! People thought they were both pretty good. They especially liked the Ale-8, ginger in cookies, candy, and ginger ale is very popular here. It was nice to have some more Kentucky edibles (and drinkables) to share.

Lisa called and was going to pick me and Ann up for a late lunch when she got out of her morning meeting, before their mutual meeting that afternoon. So Lisa called and I went down to meet her. I was this brochure on the wall as I walked down. Little things remind me that I'm not at home - this is a prime example. This is in Marshallese. I had never even HEARD of Marshallese until I came here.

Ann had already left so Lisa and I went to Zippy's. Last time we went I got the Zip pack so I wanted to try something different. I have been told the chili is good, and the meat sauce for the spaghetti. I have also never had Portuguese bean soup. So Lisa and I split a chili cheese fry (so I could try the chili), and we got the combo package with our meals. The combo added a small drink, soup or salad, and dessert. I tried the Portuguese bean soup (it came with the super thick saltine type crackers that are so great!) and the soup was delicious! I like it a lot. The only thing I didn't care for is they obviously added a thickener to the soup, I'd have liked it better with it just being a normal thin consistency. However, it was very tasty.

My meal was spaghetti with meat sauce, the small size order. The meat sauce is good, but doesn't top my homemade. I didn't take a picture, I was hungry and ate it all and then remembered I hadn't taken a picture. However, it's just spaghetti so it really wasn't exciting to look at anyway. The chili is quite good, especially on the fries.

For dessert I had the lemon dream cake. It was a light sponge type cake with a light fluffy lemon filling and a lemon buttercream type frosing. The fancy curly things on the top are shaved white chocolate (BLEAH! I don't like white chocolate at all) which I promptly scraped off. Without the white chocolate fancy schmantzy thingies the cake was delicious!

I also took a couple of picture of the menu, just because the offerings are so very different from home. they also have sushi in a variety of ways, but I didn't photo those pages.

I like to stop and look in the viewing cases at bakeries. Here are some of the offerings that I didn't get that were on display:

After we left Lisa thought she would be too late to go to the meeting but Ann told her to come anyway. However, by the time she could have dropped me off and then gotten downtown it would have been over so she just took me with her to the meeting. She and I figured it wouldn't hurt anything for me to see where the State Public Health building is and some of their conferences are held. It wasn't long till the end of my day and I was planning to take the bus downtown after work anyway so I went with her. This is the building the meeting was in as well as two interesting paintings that were on the walls in the lobby.

After the meeting we walked back to the car and I got a picture of the building that is where all the state covernment accounting is done. It has some neat decorations, I hope you can see them well in the picture.

The workday was over at this point so Lisa drove me over to Ward center Warehouse and dropped me off. This is where the free hula class is held from 5-6. Honestly though it is Hawaiian language till :30 then hula from 5:30-6:30. Hula is telling a story through music and body language in dance. Each movement of feet, hands, and where you look tells something. The class was great though it was way too hard on my ankle. The instructor let me keep my shoes on instead of going barefoot so I'd have some more support for my Achilles tendon and my ankle. I did buy the hula class CD so I can have it to take home. Also, the class afterwards started with a hula called "The Awakening" which is a dance for greeting or saying goodbye. They had lost a friend and did the dance as a memorial to the deceased. I videoed the dance. It is about 5 minutes long. It is quite beautiful. The woman in the second row is the instructor Germaine.

After class I went to the pet store by the class area and petted kittens. I got some kitten licks and nibbles. I miss my babies at home :( After a few minutes of that i went back out into the lanai area and Susan was checking on bus routes for us to get home. I saw this sign by the escalator and thought it was hilarious. Read the second line. No bare feet, slippers, sneakers... so... what footwear ARE you allowed to wear? I guess boots, galoshes, and heels? you can wear flippers but not sneakers!!!!! Craziness.

We went to the bus stop right by the marina. I took this gorgeous picture while we waited for the bus.

Possibly a plan for the holiday coming up?

These are of the evening sky and buildings.

So the bus came, we waves at it to stop and the driver went right on by! So Susan waved down a cab, we jumped in and went to near Ala Moana where we could catch the #3 bus home. She paid for the cab (which I feel guilty about and need to remember to give her money tomorrow). Ho`oponopono (To set things right, rectify). She knew my ankle was killing me. She said goodnight because she needed to go do a bit of shopping and I got on the bus (it showed up about 3 minutes after we arrived so perfect timing!) and went on home. It started sprinkling right as I was a house away from home. So I made it in, showered and now have my leg propped up with ice. My ankle FREAKING HURTS. It was worth it though. Susan called to be sure I got home ok which was super nice. I am very lucky to know the wonderful folks here.

Now I am going to get off this computer and get my exhausted self to bed. Some pain patches (thank God for SalonPas and MAHALO (thank you) Scott for sending me some), some tylenol and some soft music and I'm going to sleep. I want to go in extra early tomorrow morning to get some more work done since I had my work time shortened the past 2 days. I am listening to the soft sound of rain falling outside my window, and feeling the breeze from the fan. Life is good.

Me ka aloha pumehana, (With kindest regards, warm aloha)
~Melissa eha wawae (pronounces ay-ha va-vay) (sore foot) HEHEHE