One of my most favorite places to visit is Hawaii. It doesn’t even matter which island I’m on. What matters is you’re guaranteed sun, sand, water and perfect temperatures. I’m a sucker for the beach vacation and Hawaii is so easy. The flight is longer than I’d like, but it’s warm and tropical and I don’t have to worry about speaking another language or exchanging my money. I am familiar with the restaurants, grocery stores and who doesn’t love the plate lunch?
On my recent trip to Oahu, in addition to my many plate lunches, I also tried a number of things I have never eaten before. All based on the guarantee from my friend that she wasn’t going to try and sneakily trick me into eating something from the sea. We spent a couple hours walking around Chinatown, exploring the markets (which were insane!), stocking up on some Chinese treats like “lookfun” and some other stuff I don’t remember the name for and having dim sum. It was my first dim sum experience and it was delicious. Although I’m not sure I would have been nearly as brave if I had been doing it on my own instead of eating with people who knew what they were doing.
As with most of my tropical vacations, I love to spend as much time as possible on the beach. I came armed with massive amounts of sunscreen and a big floppy hat. One morning we were hanging out on the beach and there were these two younger girls in front of us, probably in their early twenties. They were clearly doing their best to get as dark as possible. I remember those days. When I was lifeguarding for a summer job and my sole goal of the summer was to have the best tan (aside from not having to actually save anyone). When wrinkles and sun damage, sun spots and melanomas were a thing of the future. It’s amazing how quickly the future sneaks up on you. There I sat on the beach with my religiously applied sunscreen and big floppy hat, realizing that somewhere along the line I got old. By the end of my visit, I’m pretty sure the family I was with was pretty darn sick of the beach. I can out-beach almost everyone I know.
While there, my friend introduced me to the wonder that is The Cheesecake Factory. I’d never eaten there before, having been turned off by the long lines to get a table and the fact that the majority of their menu is on the “not that” side of the “eat this, not that” articles I can’t help myself from scanning. Their food is average, but their cheesecake is amazing. And I don’t even normally care for cheesecake! We may or may not have found ourselves eating there multiple days in a row, just for the excuse of sharing some delicious cheesecake. I highly recommend the Godiva and the Adams Peanut Butter . . . . and the Red Velvet. Good thing I was on vacation.
Perhaps the funniest part of the trip was when we decided to have a girls night out to go to, you guessed it, the Cheesecake Factory. I got out my new maxi dress that took me a year to find (it’s hard when you’re short) and was so excited to wear it out. As I walked into the living room, my friends’ grandfather (who is the cutest 92-year old Chinese man you’ve ever seen) told me, “your mumu is very beautiful! Did you get it from Sears?” While trying not to laugh outright, because my maxi dress I had searched and hunted for had just been called a mumu, I informed him I got it at a store called Ann Taylor. His response was “Oh. That’s too expensive, next time you try Sears.” Despite being fairly confident that I wasn’t wearing a mumu, I did seek confirmation a few more times throughout the night.
I am at the age where a number of people in my life have children. When I visit the ones with small, impressionable children, I do my best to impart wisdom and knowledge and anything that will benefit them in life. This time I think I left them with the best knowledge nugget of all . . . steamroller. You know, where you all line up on the bed and the end person rolls over everyone else like they’re a steamroller? While it works best on unsuspecting people, the kids thought it was hysterical. We must have spent at least an hour playing steamroller. I also brought a copy of the Lady Gaga CD. While Pokerface is still the overall favorite with the kids, I did get them singing my personal favorite from that album, “Boys, Boys, Boys.”
Overall a wonderful beach filled vacation with good friends. It was great that I was able to do so many different things from my last trip to Oahu a year ago. And with the rain pouring down outside in dark and gloomy Oregon, I have to restrain myself from going to the Hawaiian Airlines website and booking another trip.
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