After the longest day in my life, I found myself in Honolulu for a few days to recharge my batteries. I considered it my longest day because it started in Levuka, Fiji, when I flew back to Suva and then on to Nadi where I had to wait for my departing flight to Honolulu at 11PM. Of course, due to the International Dateline, I arrived in Hawaii at 7AM the same day — giving me the opportunity to live through October 22nd twice — and in two different countries.
I checked into a hostel near the university where I found two roommates waiting for me in my dorm room. Oddly enough, one was from Perth, Australia and the other was from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Talk about weird! It was funny to see the contrast in people between the two places I’ve spent most of my life. The Philadelphian, who was probably 15 years older than me, seemed to be primarily interested in pegging where I was on the class hierarchy that plays such a prominent role in the eastern U.S. by asking me lots of probing questions about what neighborhoods I lived in and what schools I attended. The Australian guy, who was about 15 years younger than me, just seemed to want to be friends (not seeming to care anything about me other than the fact that I was from Perth). I didn’t feel I had a whole lot in common with either of them, but ended up spending most of my time with the Perth guy.
We visited the Pearl Harbor Memorial one day, which stuck me as a previous generation’s World Trade Center, and we did the popular hike to the top of Diamond Head the next morning. The Pearl Harbor Memorial was very interesting and a bit sobering. There was about a 2 hour wait to get out of the memorial, which is positioned on top of the sunken U.S.S. Arizona — which still contains the bodies of the sailors who died in the attack and still visibly leaks oil to this day. While you waited for the boat ride, there were exhibits you could go through.
Diamond Head is a non-active volcano which housed a defense fort for Honolulu (which was active during the Pearl Harbor attack), and it also happens to have a spectacular view of Waikiki from its top. It’s a pretty grueling climb, but that didn’t seem to stop too many out-of-shape people.
Afterwards we visited the Waikiki Aquarium, which was full of beautiful tropical fish (just like I’ve been viewing by snorkeling in Fiji and Australia) and lots of cool hard and soft coral. Then we had a nice lunch in a cafe with a nice view to watch the world go by.