Surfing Up & Diving Down

Maui, Hawaii - November 15, 2012

Today we first walked down to the beach.  My hair was down loose. I was in my bathing suit and ready to surf.  The man from the beach said there could be sharks, so I decided to do an activity closer to shore and on bigger waves. 

I took a boogie board and went to the spot with the biggest and largest waves. I'm not going to lie ... the truth is that I stink.  A man came to help me and soon enough I was on my own surfing up.  Sadly one of the waves went to high and knocked me off.  I was under the water for what seemed like 2 minutes.  I felt like I was drowning. But I did not give up

It was smart not to give up because I soon made a friend.  Her name was Abbey. Together we became really good. I'm not scared any more and I'm definitely going back tomorrow. 

Next we hopped in the car and were on our way to our next adventure. We saw many things including sugar cane and wing meals. The view of the mountain was incredible too. The mountains looked like glaciers.  They were so steep.  Finally opening my eyes I saw a submarine store. We waited in line and hopped on a boat. 

The boat was white and big. The man on the boat showed us some gears encase fires on the submarine. Then there it was ... rising from underwater ... a submarine. The submarine  came up like and airplane it started from the back. 

We hopped on from the roof and took stairs down. 

The submarine was so cool under water at first we only saw water but that's because we were only 5 feet deep,  The next minute I turned my head and we were 130 feet deep. Under the water we saw many fish from puffer fish and many schools of fish. We also saw trumpet fish, yellow fish, black fish. And what seemed like rocks to me were actually coral. Some pieces of coral even looked like mash potatoes. 

We even saw a humuhumunukunukuapua'a, the state fish of Hawaii.  How is that for a funny name?

Now it's time for me to tell you my favorite. When we got really deep everything changed colors. Pink was purple and skin was blue and teeth were pink. 

Sadly the ship went back up to the top and our adventure was over.

Understanding Pearl Harbor

Honolulu, Hawai'i - November 13, 2012

Today we went to Pearl Harbor.  Pearl Harbor is as a small harbor next to the city - Pearl City.  Pearl Harbor got a surprise attack from Japan.  But that was a long time ago.  

Japan attacked on December 7, 1941.  Thousands of people died and many battleships sunk.  The United States Navy was able to recover all the battleships that were bombed and rebuild them, except for three. 

The three that were not recovered were Oklahoma, Utah and Arizona. There are more than 800 people who are still inside the ship of Arizona.  In total more than 2400 people died. 

There is now a memorial on top of where the ship sank. Sadly, the ship sank with the people inside. Those people were heroes for risking their lives. 

Learning all this made me feel sad. 

Aloha from the Polynesian Center

Honolulu, Hawai'i - November 12, 2012

Today we went to the Polynesian center.  The Polynesia center is a center were they build small replicas of each of the major Polynesian islands. 

The first island we went to was Aotearoa.   Aotearoa is the Maori was to say New Zealand.  In Aotearoa their main culture is Maori.

The Maoris play with sticks and toss them back and forth for there brain muscles. We even got to try playing with the bamboo sticks it was very fun and hard at the same time.  

 

Next we played with Poi Balls. Poi balls are Maori instruments that are used for dancing and are balls on strings filled with rocks. I apparently was not so good with poi balls. 

The next Polynesian culture we went to visit was Samoa.  Samoa was my favorite.  The Samoan people have very strong feet.  One Samoan stepped on fire. OUCH!

In Samoa, the man cooks all the meals. The men cook many different ways. The way they get coconut milk is by squeezing the coconut meat.  They shred the white coconut meat with a knife and then they squeeze until milk comes out.  But first they have to climb a tree to get the coconut.

Now you might be wondering what the women do, the women weave and sew. The women sew but all out of nature they use leaves and sticks. 

After we went to Fiji. The people in Fiji usually wear sarongs and play bamboo instruments. 

Next we went to Tonga.  In Tonga, houses are made from mats.  In Tonga when the boy is 16 they are kicked out and the girls bet there own room. In Tonga the parents are most respected. In Tonga the more mats you have the more rich you are. 

Finally we went to is Hawaii. Hawaii is well spirited and there traditional word aloha which means greetings, hello and goodbye.  It's a little like shalom in Hebrew. We also learned the hula dance.  It was fun.

Well I think it's time to go. 

Aloha