Honeymoon at 70 in Hawaii
“Amma-Appa, I have found a good a five-day-package deal to Honolulu. Shall I book it for you?” Uma sprung a surprise. We were both engaged in our respective post-dinner pursuits on our laptops – Amma with Bhagavatam discourse update, and I checking for the Nth time for a possible mail. It is at this session that both Sridhar and Uma catch up with their unfinished office tasks. So this quiet extraneous search by Uma came as a bolt from the blue.
The ‘Eveready’ that Amma is, she side-glanced me for my reaction to the offer. No less keen but only a little pretentious, I signaled my approval. “Go ahead Uma,“ Amma said, “but avoid 8 to 16 October for Navaratri and also the 17th - Archana’s Seemantham”.
“Okay. Amma. But Sridhar leaves on the 18th for China for a week; so shall I make it 3 to 7 October?” Uma asked, and before we could nod, she clicked the button and booked.
“Caprios, three-fourth lengths of pants, will be comfortable for long and beach walks, Amma,” suggested Uma moving on to the next task. “We will buy some tomorrow.”
“I too shall have a couple of them,” I said not to be left behind.
“Appa, men don’t wear them.”
“I know, I know,” I said, but I didn’t. “I meant knickers,” I added as a last straw.
“List Master’, as Amma nicknames me (not as a compliment but as a complaint), I readied a Hawaii List in a few minutes. The next morning we set about checking out the items, one by one.
We rang up Shankar and Sunita to inform them. Sunita picked up, “So your second honeymoon? Enjoy fully, Amma-Appa.” In the evening, driving back home Shankar rang us up. “So Appa, all set? “ “Yes, we bought Ready to Eat packets of Mutter Paneer, Aloo Gobi, Pineappla Curry, Upma, Maggi. . .”
“Wait a minute Appa. Aap khane keliye jaa rahe ho, or to see places?” he caught me off guard.
“No, no, I am coming to that. We have our IDs, printouts of air and hotel reservations, sufficient cash and clothes including our swim suits.”
“Appa, you don’t get to visit these places everyday. So spend liberally. Look at the product, not the price. Carry minimum cash. Use either of the add-on credit cards that Sridhar and I have given you both,” he reinforced what Sridhar had insisted on us separately. Sridhar’s briefing, inter alia, included a practical demonstration on how to focus, zoom and click the camera, so that at the end of the trip the snaps are not Appa, Appa and APPA all the way; Amma does feature in some of them.
In Honolulu, whenever we were free we walked to the beach, seven minutes from our hotel, and spent hours at waist deep water. And each time the tides swept us to the shore, Amma’s joy and excitement would beat hollow those of Ashwin, Rishi and Rohan had they been present. The tourist agency had drawn the schedule in such a way that they would take the group half-day every day, either forenoons or afternoons, so that the visitors had ample time to be on their own.
On the first day it was to Pearl Harbor. During the World War II, the Japanese army made an unprovoked air attack Pearl Harbor and destroyed many US warships. Japan’s original plan was to take over the Indo China region for their rich mines. But Japan knew that if they attached Indo China on its North, from the West the US would repel it with a heavy naval attack from Pearl Harbor. The US had a strong naval base there, including submarines. So the Japanese army chief convinced the powers that be to destroy first the US ships in Pearl Harbor, disable them totally, before mounting an attack on the Indo China side. And he did it in December 1941. A ship-shaped memorial has been erected close to the sunken ships USS Arizona and a few others where we could still see the remnants. This Japanese attack took about 2400 lives including civilians.
At the end of the day’s trip, Sam, the Guide, said that as a memento one should take from Hawaii not pineapples, papayas, or mangos that the island abounds in, but pearls and gems, and drove us to a designated Chinese shop with the photo of Jackie Chan with the owner decorating the entrance. About 6 to 7 from our group of 15 did buy. Unfortunately the guy attending on us mistook us for the uncle and aunt of the Ambani brothers. He showed us pieces in the range of $ 2500-3500. When he saw us move on, he announced impromptu a 50% discount. A small world, the same sales gimmicks.
Terry was the Guide on day two; he was matter of fact in his English presentation, but regaled his audience in the Chinese (Mandarin) version. Later I requested him to make the English version also equally humorous. He did it with considerable success. But jokes in one’s own mother tongue carry a special flavour, after all.
Terry drove us past one beautiful beach after the other, asking us to guess how much the house facing these beaches would cost. Each one shouted his own price, as though bidding in an auction. But everyone was far off the mark. Pointing to a house that was a replica of a submarine he said that was owned by the person who manufactured submarines for the country – the filthy rich only could afford, in other words.
After a few miles, we were in the midst of volcanic mountains on one side, and natural sea beaches on the other. The lava remains still stood testimony to the volcanic havocs. The legend has it that bad luck would befall if one took these lavas home, Regardless of this warning, when we were let loose the Iranian lady collected lava stones from left, right and centre. When asked how she still dared, she said that if one went by Terry, all Iranian homes should be struck with bad luck, because to keep their heels soft all Iranian ladies used lava stone. Emboldened by this analogy, I handpicked two and asked Amma if we could carry them. She didn’t buy the argument.
“Do you wish to own a house and live near this natural beach?” Terry asked us as we passed through yet another breathtaking natural beach. “Yes,” many responded spontaneously, as though it was an offer. “I am afraid you can’t, because only those who have no income can stay in this vicinity, and the State provides subsidy to them,” he clarified.
“Because of poverty,” he continued, “there is a lot of stealing. Many tourists had lost their camcods, cameras or handbags.” Involuntarily everyone checked his belongings thoroughly, and held on to their backpacks a little more firmly and close to their chests. What an anomaly that only fifteen minutes earlier the Guide drove us past a beach where he said only the ultra rich could afford a house, and here the pre-condition was poverty.
Beach on one side, charcoal grey volcanic mountain on the other, we continued our journey. A turn to the left, two miles straight, and another left, and we were in a totally different world - two lush green forest-mountains on either side. These were responsible for a significant percentage of rainfall, he added. (In fact he specified the percentage, but I don’t remember it.)
The next day another Guide took charge. We couldn’t get his name. At our request he repeated it thrice, each time increasing the decibel. “It is better not to be dubbed a deaf, than persist with getting his name correct,” I mumbled. He was gold at heart, but somehow his voice and expression did not cooperate with him. None of us could benefit by his elaborate explanations on the way, and the tourists started talking among one other, having by now become ‘friends’ of a sort. Undaunted, he switched over from prose to verse, humming his favourite tunes as he drove.
He took us to the pineapple plantation where different varieties from almost all Polynesian countries were grown. It was founded in 1900 on a modest scale. Now his descendents own almost all of the vast areas around that we could see with our eyes. It reminded me of Alexander Selkirk’s poem that I studied in my higher secondary class, “I am the monarch of all I survey.” The visit included a mandatory visit to their Department Store. It was a surprise that one could open a full-fledged department store stocking so many different items all made from pineapple. This visit was followed by a drive to the Outlet malls – the last item on their itinerary. Here, for the first time we never felt we were away from either Phoenix or San Jose.
Every evening there was a Hawaiian song and dance programme at an open place in the shopping complex. To set the stage and to remind us of how the native Hawaii inhabitants enjoyed their late evenings in the good old days (pre-electricity to be precise), the streets were lit up with something similar to what we see during the temple-festival processions in Kerala where the big oil-soaked cloth balls burn stuck on top of long trident rods. (I don’t get the right word for it, but it is called “Thee Pandham” in Tamil or Malayalam, or both).
Back home, Sridhar and Uma got down to brass tacks. “Appa, I will be in China on the 22nd, your birthday. And next weekend we will be busy with the last days of Navaratri. On Sunday we have to attend Archana’s Seemantham. So shall we celebrate your birthday this week? They took us to Bombay Gardens for a buffet lunch, which the restaurant claimed had 35-40 items. Amma and I, being first-timers to that restaurant, decided to taste, and not have a go at, all of those that was vegetarian. After a sumptuous lunch, Sridhar wanted to visualize his Dad sporting jeans (at 70, and all set to get past it next week), a plea that Shankar had been making for long, and Kannan Mama since our last visit to Bangalore.
All along I thought that Shankar, like his grandpa Murthy Thatha, is patience-incarnate. But Sridhar is no less. He and Uma together picked at least eight pairs of jeans for me to select from. He patiently watched me try them out one after the other, and some of them over and over again. I shortlisted two: one for its brand name and shade, and the other for its comfort. “Go for the comfortable one, forget the other piece,” he gave his verdict, and rushed out of the fitting room. I wondered why. Before I had put on my original trousers back, he came up with six T-shirts to select from, to go with the jeans. I sternly refused. They both insisted, and Amma was only happy to see me wear, for once, something that fitted me to a T, and not something loose that she was accustomed to see me wear. The one finally selected was a high-end variety, which only the professional golfers sport.
On reaching home, I rang up Phoenix. Sunita picked up. She lost no time add: “Appa, don’t buy sunglasses, postpone it for the Phoenix visit. She doesn’t probably recollect that I already have in Phoenix a pair of brand new, un-inaugurated, sturdy hiking shoes they bought a day or two before our departure to India.
At bed, sleep still eluding me, I told Amma, “I think our children, SSSU, are taking very good care of us, aren’t they? Although this particular purchase in no way added to her wardrobe, “Yes, no doubt about it,” she responded, the never-disagree lady that she is.
15 October 2010
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