Heading home

On of our last days in Sydney, we visited the Australia museum -- a kind of natural history museum and the oldest museum in the country. Since the first people to arrive in Australia were the Aborigines (as they are now called) there were lots of exhibits around their way of life, relics, and survival techniques. Like the first people to arrive in North America, the Aborigines were treated terribly by the Europeans who traveled the world killing the native people, destroying their cultures then claiming the land. People my age in Australia were not taught that history (as I wasn't) but Australian children are now taught what actually happened (lessons my children are also learning).

There is one really big difference between the way our governments have dealt with this history.

9 years ago, the Australian government apologized for the horrible treatment of these people.  Today, every public ceremony is started by giving thanks to their native people. I am sure there is a German word to describe laughing from despair .. laughing because of the impossibility of a thing due to a lack of a virtue. Humility is not part of the American character. My culture has many great traits but I would never describe our culture as humble. We don't do humble. I cannot even imagine the American government apologizing for pain it has caused other peoples.

So I left Australia not really understanding them. Beautiful place though.

We left for Honolulu in the evening. Because I somehow ended up buying premium economy seats on Air New Zealand ( I bought the cheapest ticket possible.. I thought), our seats had foot rests that you could raise to be level with the seat. Sonia and I could lay down because no one sat next to us in the row. However, Sonia took up all the space.

notice the "cuddle belt" -- that's the Air New Zealand name for the seatbelt two people must wear while lying down.

After leaving Australia late afternoon Christmas day, we arrived in Honolulu at 6am Christmas morning.

The kids only slept a few hours and we slept none. So we were all tired. We went to a grocery store for food (Thank you Safeway for being open on Christmas day as everything else here was closed). We drove to the North Shore and hung out at Shark's cove waiting for night to come so we could go to bed.

I was too tired to take pictures so here is one from the web. Shark's cove. You can't drown here.

Ryan did not make it until night to fall asleep.


We vowed to stay awake until 8pm so no one would wake up at 3. Turned out this was not a problem as Ryan and I woke up at 830 the next morning (12 hours of sleep) and the kids woke up at 10 (14 hours). I did not know I was capable of sleeping for that much time.

The next day was cloudy so we headed to the Dole plantation nearby. You learn a bit about the history of Dole in Hawaii. They grow pineapples, coffee, chocolate, bananas, and sugar. Mostly this plantation exists to sell tourists shit they do not need. Still, we had fun on their little train.

The weather cleared up and we went to Matsumoto's famous shaved ice place.

They've been in business since 1951 so we are willing to wait in a really long line for shaved ice.

Today, Ryan surfed waves that were too dangerous for anyone else to go into. The beaches around the north shore are pretty dangerous for kids because the waves are so big. We went to a lagoon and rented a stand-up paddle board. We wandered around .. saw some turtles .. watched the sun set.

We'll go home tomorrow. I am so grateful for this trip. It's really been great fun for all of us.