Wow, it’s been a long time since I’ve done this. Well, only two weeks but it feels like a lifetime ago. I almost don’t remember how….oh yes, now I remember!
1) Don’t go to Hawaii for the food
By far the most disappointing aspect of Hawaii was the food. To put it shortly, it was awful. Not “this makes me want to throw up” awful, but “are you seriously charging $30 for this overcooked fish” awful. If you live in the San Francisco Bay Area and you don’t love bread and cheese or fish or steak, you are taking for granted one of the best areas in the country for food. The cheese they pawned off as great in Hawaii would be sold in Berkeley for a punch in the face. Nobody in Hawaii apparently knows how to cook fish properly. The only good things were the sweets – smoothies, jam, and anything with macadamia nuts in it.
2) White people love Hawaii
On the plane and at the hotel, Aki and I were the only non-white people visiting Hawaii. A couple members of the staff looked a bit confused about our stay too. Aki’s theory is that Asians can’t appreciate the simple joy of reading on the beach; they don’t see the point. Asians prefer to sample the local activities and run around seeing stuff, rather than lounging around. I’m not sure I agree with her theory, but the proof is in the pudding. Not only was everyone at the hotel white, they all loved sitting around the pool or on the beach reading. I was the only person who swam for exercise and we were the only ones who used the tennis courts. Unfortunately for stereotypes, all of the white Americans were also fat. All of the skinny white people we saw were Europeans.
3) Hawaiians are not very smart
The combination of being a small town and a tropical paradise means life in Hawaii moves very slowly, and consequently the people were pretty stupid, probably the dumbest we’ve seen on our vacations (although Phoenix would give them a run). They were also the nicest and the most obedient. Nobody from Hawaii speeds on the road, which is pretty painful since all the roads are also two lanes and speed limits hover around 25-30 mph in most places. So it’s a great tourist location for a week, but if you’re at all intelligent, you would never want to live here. You’d have to bombard your brain with marijuana to slow yourself down to local speed.
4) I’ve become soft
As a newlywed, Aki and I talked a lot on the honeymoon about future plans and such, and the conclusion of it was that I realized that I’ve grown very soft, in all aspects. From my mind to my fitness to my discipline, I need to forge myself into a stronger and tougher individual and become accustomed to a harsher lifestyle. The grain of steel is still inside, but the outside is not sharp. It’s something to work on for the rest of the year.
The thing I love most about Aki can be told in an anecdote. When discussing my struggles with tests, in particular the fact that the CFA exam and my black belt test are on the same day and I might do one half-heartedly for “experience”, Aki gave me a pat on the arm and asked “Well, why don’t you just pass? Why not just work your ass off and just do it? Pass both of them!”
5) Never open your mouth until you know what the shot is
At the start of the honeymoon, I panicked a little bit about my finances because I paid a lot of unexpected expenses right around the wedding. I worried that my account was going to go negative, so I prematurely shot my mouth off (well, my cell phone). I ended up having to eat a lot of crow and worst of all, I panicked for nothing. My account was fine and my finances were a lot healthier than I thought. It was hard to pull myself together with all the latent stress, and I fouled it up pretty badly by being impatient about things.