Hawaii February 2013

Flower arrangement (live plants) in the lobby of our hotel in Hawaii was amazing.

We were routed through Hawaii on our way back to Kiribati after visiting the mission home and offices in Majuro, Marshall Islands.  We had about 4 days there, which was a nice time to refresh and renew.  We got there on a Friday morning at about 5:00 a.m. and made it to a doctor's appointment for me for a skin problem and have a look at my shoulder, which has been hurting for the last 8 -9 months.  We even squeezed in a chiropractic appointment for each of us.
We rented a car for just Saturday to go to the temple and the North Shore.  Sunday would be just church.  Monday was for shopping, and Tuesday morning we needed to go to the airport, for which we could take a shuttle.  Because it cost $20/day just to park at the hotel, we figured anything we couldn't walk to we could take a bus or a taxi.  It worked just fine.

An outrigger canoe in the lobby.

We went to the temple in Laie on Saturday.  Judy had been there when she had language training for Japanese before her mission back in the day, but I had never been in this temple.  The grounds are beautiful.  Around the top of the building, on the outside, are life-size sculptures of people in events during the history of the world in relation to the gospel of Jesus Christ.  It was interesting trying to figure out who the people were in each scene.  There is a smaller size depiction by the visitors center with explanations.

Sister missionaries at the temple visitor center wore matching moomoos.

A deptiction of scenes of island life posed questions about life  for discussion.

This globe rotates, showing copies of all the languages in which the Book of Mormon is published..  I took this view, though to show how much of the world is covered by the Pacific Ocean.  You can see New Zealand as a green streak on the far left and part of North America on the far right.  Kiribati is just above the middle.  Do you see it?  No, of course not.  It's a great big ocean, and we are merely atolls of very small size.

This is a dorm on campus of BYU-Hawaii, where Judy lived for 2 months when she studied Japanese.  The Polynesian Culture Center is just over the back wall and the temple is on this side of campus.

Entering BYU-H campus, you see flags of all the countries from which students come to attend the university.  

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Along the North Shore, there are lots of stands that serve shrimp.  We ate a nice little meal here for about $9 each.  We had a choice of several types of preparation, including coconut, curry, etc.  It was very good.

It was hart to get a picture of the kite surfer and his kite.  The sun was too bright for me to see the screen of my camera to see what I was capturing.  You can see the kite that a surfer was using to pull him across the waves and water at about 35-40 mph.  He was pretty skilled and could tack against the wind, going back and forth.

The Honolulu Stake center is in the city, but you don't feel like it because of the beautiful landscaping and long pool in front.  When we went in to go to church, we found a man playing a huge pipe organ with real style.  After the meeting, the wife came up and called us by name.  They were Bro. & Sister Anderson, who used to be in the Caldwell 10th Ward with us.  Judy had served in the YW with her.  They moved to Hawaii with her husband's job a few years ago.

You can see a high-rise on the right where office workers for the Hawaii mission live.  Their office and a distribution center are in the building to the left of the pool.

One of the senior missionaries from the Hawaii mission invited us up to their apartment and let us know about their mission assignment.  It was a lovely apartment and they were having a grand time in their service.

This is the view from the missionaries' apartment, looking to the north.  You can see the top of the stake center at the lower left of the photo.

This is the view from the hallway in front of the elevator on the 17th floor.

This Japanese garden in on the airport grounds.  This sure is unusual from what we have seen in the past and from what the airport is like in Kiribati.

The picture at the right is the bedroom we had in Fiji on the way back to Kiribati.  The hotel was called Raffles and was just a mile or less from the terminal.  That was nice because we had only a few hours to sleep before getting up at 3:00 a.m. to catch the plane for Kiribati, which left at 5:00 and arrived in Kiribati at 8:00 a.m.

It was a rejuvenating trip, but we were glad to get back to our assignments in Kiribati, especially since we had to finish learning from the Bonnemorts how to do all the things they had been doing.

 Nadi, Fiji aiport

Outdoor waiting area at the Bonriki International airport in Tarawa.  Many people here come just to see an airplane land.  Some even have relatives or friends that come or go.  It's a social event.

Life in Kiribati is simple, but the people are wonderful.