Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Day 1: Welcome to Hawaii...wait, is this really America??


Today was the first official day being on the island.

The island is not exactly what I expected. On the “mainland” there is much more racial diversity. I feel sort of like the odd one out here. I don’t think that I’ve every received more honks, yells or stares in one day. Now, it may have been due to my impeccable beauty, but more than likely it was because I am white.

The day all started around 6:30a.m. Hello, Jetlag!
Breakfast was at 8a.m. After breakfast we met the staff, had a hilarious man from a Hawaii Baptists Convention come talk to us and we met with our professors. It was a laid-back orientation sort of day.

Once the orientation ended, the fun/cultural experiences began. Today, we took an adventure to the local military beach. There were about 12 girls including myself walking to the beach. To the locals this probably looked like a huge group of white girls.

The only other time in my life that I’ve been the odd one out is during the three years I lived in Germany. The difference there is that people only thought I was odd after I tried to talk to them. But that was a foreign country so I was expecting that.

This however, is not. This IS America, yet it is different than the America that I’m accustomed to.

Random Facts Learned Today:
1.     Aloha – a greeting
2.     The motion with your pinky and thumb pointed out with the other fingers in – is a sign of affirmation
3.     Flip-flops – are known as slippers
4.     Appetizers – poo-poo
5.     Island Time – about 15 minutes later than said time
6.     H1,H2,H3 – Hawaii only has three highways
7.     Locals – the people from the island
8.     Natives – the Hawains who dress traditional and live on a remote island
9.     There are no snakes
10. There are tons of mongoose on the island because they were brought over to prey on mice the problem is that they do not have a predator so they are a bigger problem now than mice
11. The cost of living is very high; most families need both parents to have full-time jobs

(picture above is from the sunset today)

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