#325 Bits from Hawaii

Just a few little things to comment on.

TV on the ship
My stateroom on the ship had a TV, and the TV had TNT, CNN, one movie channel showing relatively new movies and one showing older (but not classic) movies, one for "ship news" which was mostly commercials for their stores, shops, and tours, and one channel which showed the view from the bridge, which was incredibly boring.  Every time I left the room and returned, the TV was on, set to the ship news channel.  Loudly!  I had the volume set at 3, but the steward always left it at like 14, which could be heard in the hall and I assume in the next room.  Since I was out of the room all day every day and most of the evening, I was embarrassed that my neighbors might think I was terribly noisy and inconsiderate.

I did watch a few of the current movies that I had thought about seeing when they were in the theaters, and I rediscovered why I'm not particularly interested in movies these days.  "Hitchhikers' Guide" was very disappointing.  It looked cheaply made, a high school theater group could do it better, it was in fact done better a decade or two ago.  And they left out or glossed over some of the best parts.  Signature lines were delivered as if they were throwaway lines.  "Monster-in-law" was shallow and pointless.  Another movie concerning the crusades was so bad I can't even remember the name.  Plots seem so simple and predictable these days.  I expect a movie to leave me with something to think about.

Sunglasses
I wore a hat every day, because I can't put sunblock on my face, and even if I could, my hair is transparent and my scalp would burn.  Also, I needed to shade my eyes.  Time before last that I got a new prescription I also got prescription sunglasses, but not the last time.  I guess I should do that again next time.  Clip-ons or those huge things that fit over glasses just don't work with my frames.  When I asked for the prescription sunglasses, I asked that they be bifocals, like my regular glasses.  The people in the shop acted like I was crazy.  "We don't make bifocal sunglasses!  Nobody wears bifocal sunglasses!"  I ended up talking to the guy who was going to actually make the lenses, and he asked why I needed bifocal sunglasses, and I said "Because I'd like to see both the road and the gauges on the dashboard when I drive."   He had no answer to that.  Like nobody had ever thought of that before.  I don't understand....

Tanning
I don't much tan.  I burn, and it fades quickly, then I burn some more, and it fades.  I need to get some sun every day, really work at it, to get anything that looks like a tan.  My legs are the worst - even if I do manage to get a little "color", it's so shallow that the first time I shave my legs it all comes off.  In Hawaii, I was out in the sun most of every day.  I used SPF 15 sunblock on my back, chest, and arms (30 will make me break out worse than 15 already does) and nothing on my face.  Always the hat in the sun to protect my face, eyes, and scalp.  My arms browned a little, but after four days, it's already fading away.  The really weird part is my face.  I did tan some, and it's evenly tan all over my face - even where the hat covered my forehead!  I wore the hat always, even when I was in the water.  If anything, I would have expected the "farmer forehead" stripe.  I don't understand....

Fishy hat
Hawaiians will take a palm or ti leaf, tear it into strips, fold and weave it, and end up with a fish or bird that they then fasten to the end of the leaf spine, so it bobs and flutters when you hold it.  The driver on one of our tour buses made a fish and gave it to me.  I stuck the end of the spine in the side crown of my hat, so that it arched over my head, and the fish bobbed and "swam" all around the brim of my hat whenever I moved my head or the breeze blew.  Everywhere I went that day, I heard women I passed say to their male companions "I want one of those!"  I was in a store, and a woman walked up to me with a fluffy red feather she had found on the floor.  She wanted to add it to my hat.  So we stuck it into the tail of the fish, and then I had a parrot fish!  I had more plain fun that day than any other, because I amused people, and amused myself, and people noticed me and talked to me.

Economic Issues in Hawaii
Nah, I'm not going to discuss the economy.  But almost every single one of our drivers and tour guides did.  They expressed three great concerns.  The pineapple and sugar cane plantations have been the backbone of the economy, and one byone, the growers have been leaving the islands, saying that the cost of production was too high, leaving the people with no jobs.  Real estate prices are being pushed through the roof by rich mainlanders, so that even if residents have a job, they still can't afford a home.  And developers are buying up the land and siphoning off the water for houses and hotels, so that the lush valleys fed by mountain runoff, where many of the old longtime Hawaiians have lived and farmed for generations, are drying up. 

They said that once upon a time, the sugar was processed on the island, but the sugar mills closed and the raw sugar was sent to California to be processed.  So the Hawaiians had to buy their own sugar back, at mainland prices, plus the cost to ship it back to the islands.  Many blamed "outsourcing".  The cost of producing sugar and pineapples is much lower in Asia or the Philippines.

In 2000, we were given leis almost everywhere we went, and always fresh flower leis.  This trip,  we also got leis at every turn, but they were made of shells, not flowers.  I was amused to find a "Made in the Philippines" tag on most of them.

Sigh.  I don't understand.

Airline Travel
I shall never again sit more more than two hours in tourist class.  From now on I will spring for an upgrade to at least business.  The seats are so close together that if the person in front reclines their seatback, if you drop a plumb line from the back edge of their seat, it drops about three inches beyond the edge of your seat.  Which means it is impossible for you to get up, or to lean over to reach anything in your carryon "under the seat in front of you".  Especially if your arms are short.  Anything dropped is gone forever.

Also, footrests are gone, and the seats have become very hard.  My feet don't touch the floor, so it is difficult for me to shift my weight in the seat.  I ended the return trip (11 hours on planes) with a real live black-and-blue bruise on my left sit-me-down.

Isn't it odd that business class was invented about the same time tourist got nastier?  If they took back the space they gave to business class and spread it around tourist, it might be tolerable.  But then, they wouldn't be able to demand a higher price for that few cubic feet.  Eventually, the plane will be mostly business class, and tourist class will be a few closely spaced hammocks in the tail.  With hobble chains.

Body Image
I learned something about my body on this trip.  When Jay died, I was in terrific shape, from lifting and exercising him, and so on.  Immediately after he died I started putting on weight.  I am now very unhappy with my body.  It's not just the excess weight everywhere, it's also the excess skin.  It's like my skin somehow got too big for me.  It wobbles under my upper arms and droops over my elbows when my arm is down.  My thighs are doing the same thing.  My jowls and (aaaagh!) wattles will soon hide my drapey neck.  When I sit down, I form a triangle from chin to knee.  Bleck.  I was having a hard time accepting this body as mine.  About the only thing I still like is the superstructure.

Well, I've discovered that my main problem is that I've been comparing myself to the wrong people.  I don't have much exposure to women my own age.  Everyone I spend any time with these days is either at least 20 to 30 years younger than I, or a decade or more older.  Those are the ones whose ages I know.  I am very poor at judging the age of people I don't already know.   On this trip, although there was no one from my college class, the group included alumni from many Pennsylvania schools, so there were many women from other schools who graduated about the same time I did.  So although you could never ask a new acquaintance "How old are you?", it was perfectly acceptable to ask "What year did you graduate?"   There were a whole bunch of women within a year or two of my age, and you know what?  I look pretty darn good, comparatively speaking!  I'm certainly younger in spirit and outlook than most.

So I bought a bathing suit, and I wore it.

~~Silk