It's Surreal

Ten days here, and I'm beginning to feel it's almost surreal. 

I kind of have this feeling of being far removed from reality. Everything is just so very different, and unlike anything I've known..... like all senses and even ones cognition, being overwhelmed by new experiences.

The people, the language, the landscape, the flora, the fauna, the volcanoes, the ocean.......and that there are no animals. I mean, with a backyard as lush green as this and no snakes, in fact no snakes anywhere on the island, like not even one....just no animals. There's only mongoose and rats and even those brought in through human contact, otherwise no animals on the islands at all.

For now, I felt this surrealism, at one level got represented in the botanical gardens we visited the other day. The board at the entrance reads 'A beautiful garden in a valley on the ocean' .

I hadn't read that before I walked in, and walking through that thick, luscious, tropical, landscape to suddenly reach the ocean.....was so unreal. Even the flowers, be it the orchids or the ferns, they just seem more alive.

It felt like out of 'Alice in Wonderland'.... after drinking the magic potion.

Here's pictures, and there's many of them :)

It's not anything like a garden....it's natural thick forest, paved through, and also planted with some exotic orchids and flowers.

There's these really tall trees, all with these other creepers growing on them....parasites, sargophytes.....whatever kind.....there's all kinds here.

Strange looking flowers huh

Look at these orchids

There were so many which seemed so not like flowers, look closely and its like they have animal features

Thick overgrowth there

Bablu and Sailesh as we were walking around

This flower inside looked like an alien, it's hard to tell in the picture but it sure was creepy looking

Bablu and me on the walk

More orchids. Sailesh said it best, he said "there's a different kind of consciousness that's manifesting in these plants...it's almost at a different stage of evolution kinds". That was beautifully put. He's a chiropractor by profession and guess he understands these things more intuitively.

How weird is this one....the middle was like thick rubber and two petals like pretty gauze paper

Mushrooms growing on the tree

Just green stuff

 A local god, and us

First sighting of the ocean

Proper view of the ocean

Us chilling by the ocean front

One of my favorite pictures, looking up at the sun through the palms, just see how tall they are

And another favorite where I caught a nice splash of wave

Spending time in the botanical garden was like a natural energizer... Diksha said it had become one of her favorite spots in Hilo...she's already been twice, and Bablu apparently goes there quite regularly. Can totally get why.....it seems to enable a natural deeper connect with yourself.

A beach near home

Nammu makes these lovely, spur of the moment plans...... like she'll out of the blue say "I'm off to the beach for a swim, whoever wants to come, jump in the car.... in the next five minutes". (slightly exaggerated, but she's really this super cute, super impetuous, super independent soul). Anyways, that's how we went to this beach. (I went once out of the three times it happened :)

While most beaches in Hawaii are of volcanic rocks, this one has a sandy bottom, because it forms a lagoon. You can see a really rough sea beyond and calm waters in the lagoon. It's also known to have a lot of turtles, which are so friendly they come and touch you. Only Jim saw one. And it's supposedly great for snorkeling too, as it's a shallow lagoon and forms a nice coral reef.

It was just so picturesque, I was happy to sit on the rocks and watch.

Deech, Jessa, Tejas and Aparna, who got in, but thought the water too cold to swim.

Nammu, Jim, Isaac and Maya went right in...... those little heads almost near the island is them. 

Nammu got a bad gash on her leg though, either from a coral or a lava rock, a cut which went way deeper than it seemed, and as of today looks scary. Hopefully it'll heal soon.

What lovely shades of blue

A signboard I found super cute

An earthquake experience

It's about 9 in the morning. Uncle, Nammu and I are in the dining room.......something happens.....and we turn to each other with this unsure feeling...... and uncle says "did you feel that earthquake?"

And Nammu and I were both like "oh, my god.... that's what that was " "what..that was an earthquake" !

It was just a couple of seconds, and it's hard to describe how it felt.  It was like a wave, a wave that passed through the body, a couple of seconds of something pretty disorienting, and before you even begin to understand it, it's gone...yet it's very distinctive, nothing like I've ever felt before.

And I'm telling uncle "really, is that what an earthquake feels like...that was just so strange" and he's like "this must be 2.4 on the richter, it's only when it goes above 3.5 that you'll hear objects shake". With Kilauea, they've been having over 700 earthquakes a day and by now he even knows how much each might measure just from how it feels.

And it was so cute to hear him say "the big ones can be scary, but these little ones can actually be a nice feeling, don't you think?"

Well, talk of having new experiences.....this ones hard to beat :)

Akaka Falls, Kahuna Falls & Rainbow Falls

There's lots of waterfalls in the neighborhood, what with daily rainfall and lava rocks creating these really steep cliffs, guess it just has to happen. Some really big and tall ones, one that's even said to be the highest in the US. 

While they're really pretty and so high energy, as they have this really steep and free fall, creating some brilliant caverns by sheer pressure of fall, we also heard stories which told just how treacherous the falls can be too. 

Just look at the gorge it's created.... and the noise it makes as it falls is simply thunderous

Kamlesh aunty and Diksha, as we walked down to the area of the falls....a decent trek in there, about a mile and half long ( trying to switch to thinking in miles and pounds...takes too much effort to convert each time :)

The three of us at the falls, another tourist there was sweet enough to offer to take the picture

That's Rainbow falls

There's a walkway up to the top of the drop, and the waters there are so deceptively quiet and pretty that many end up swimming, not heeding the warning signs. And that's where treacherous.... there's been four deaths here in six months.

Marion Joe, Diksha and me near Rainbow Falls

And these deaths from falling off the waterfall have a more personal impact....  the bodies float through the river in the back yard before they reach the ocean. Apparently, two months back the mother of a victim sat in aunty's backyard watching the river while the helicopters were searching for her body. Sad and morbid, huh?

And you figure how appropriately the river is named......... Wailuku translated is 'waters of destruction'.

Rain, Rivers, Waterfalls & Ocean

I'm understanding what 'tropical' means in a whole new way...a fully experiential way.

We've been here four days now and we've seen rain each of those days, the grass always wet, clean, shiny....a bright and fresh shade of green.....and I believe it's like that through the year.

Plus there's no dust in Hawai'i.  It's volcanic mountains, so ground is just volcanic rock, and soil anywhere has green cover, so there's just no scope for dust at all, and it's just an abundance of water in every possible form.

Okay...to get to pictures.

Wailuku river that flows in their backyard

The river joining with other tributaries a short walk from home

Kamlesh aunty explaining to Diksha, how the river splits to form a little island in which their neighborhood sits, and how it meets again before joining the ocean.

Just before it joins the ocean

Where it actually merges into the ocean

The pacific ocean, a rainy morning

Aunty and Deech watching the ocean from across the road

Other side of that road

Another day, aunty and me by the little lighthouse at Kaipalaoa park by the ocean

Guess the waterfalls need another post...see what I mean by so much water :)

"They gravitate here"

There's a beauty to Hilo, not just in landscape and climate and flora and fauna....but also in it's people, a certain gentleness, friendliness and genuineness that clearly makes itself felt.

I'm wondering if being on an island, away from the crowded, competitive, structured urbanization enables this facet of people, when aunty says "It's also the other way round I think, it's people like this, who will gravitate to places like this".

That was a really interesting insight, especially as I've met atleast five people over the last couple of days who've made the decision to break away from mainland life, not just in the US but even beyond, and have found their way here.....to live a life of their choice. 

Hilo

This trip, I'd consciously done no reading up on Hawaii....none at all. It was after all, a long, three week visit and I was happy to stay open to being surprised.

And so much to be surprised by. It's got a mix of such different climates and landscapes and terrain. It's at one time the greenest ever, and then the volcano rocks are never far off, the dark sullen powerful black, literally creation......sunny and humid and rainy in quick succession.... houses so pretty.... people from everywhere....actually it's best I take that a bit at a time.

The newness and amazement hit right at the airport. Hilo airport is so small, that we get off the flight, walk down a flight of stairs and before we could make ourselves presentable, there they were...aunty and Bablu. Forget restrooms,  even the baggage pick up is after you meet them, the conveyor belt runs outside the airport building. So quaint and cute. 

Airport to home was a ten minute drive, and everything Bablu was saying about Hilo seemed amazing. I was like, so how big is Hilo....and he says it has a population of 40,000 (that's less even than Jangareddigudem), and of ethnicity from across the globe (in fact it has only 17% white).

Day 1, we were up early and aunty, diksha and I did a lovely early morning walk to the ocean which is just five minutes from home. And then we walked to a supermarket to pick up some croissants for breakfast, and I see this shelf of doughnuts....both my favourites, and aunty's like "no, no, no...you look good, you're not getting doughnuts, or maybe just one the day you walk :)"

Actually let me do it through pictures, no not of doughnuts.

That's their house from up front:

The backyard, with diksha peeping out the door

Another view of the backyard

They actually have a river running through their backyard, and the bright patch at the far end of the picture is the ocean

Bablu and uncle, showing Sailesh and Marion Joe the cocoa pods from their trees. Sailesh and Marion came down from Phoenix for the week. And it's so wonderful how he can't stop talking about Grammar school, and Johns bakery, and ganne ka ras and pani puri and mirchi bajji, his house in Sanjeev Reddy Nagar, even the bus numbers he used.... he hasn't been to India in 29 years, and thats the last I met him.....it's so wonderful to hear him go down the nostalgia lane.

Aunty harvesting ladies finger from her garden for today's lunch

Uncle getting the karepak

The palm trees that forms a border between them and their neighbors....the trees seem to redefine tall

Inside....uncle and diksha, deep in conversation

Marion Joe, Sailesh and aunty at dinner

Me at the porch, it's one of my favouritest places in the house, especially when it's raining

That's the backyard when it was raining, and it rains a real lot. It's right now around 10 at night and I can hear the rain outside, not to talk of the frogs ofcourse :)

And if I thought this was a beautiful house, which I fully do and love, Bablu's house is like a piece of art....multi leveled, a huge lava rock on one side, stilts on the other, vines and tall palm trees, a river with a natural pool, two goats as pets....... quite amazing.