We went for a long walk yesterday. At the West end of the beach is a military reserve called Fort DeRusey. There is a hotel just for servicemen and their families. and acres of beautiful green parkland. The public can stroll around there as well. I saw, about nine feet in the air, this glorious white Bird of Paradise. I've never seen a white one before and had no idea it was such a tall plant. But on reflection, it may be that a bird of paradise plant has sprouted at the top of a dead palm tree. These fecund tropics promote things growing on other things. Ferns on tree branches and vines climbing out to the end of branches and bromeliads attachings where they will.

And as for tropics, see how they do Christmas? Fabric flowers in the synthetic fir wreath. Very bright and festive.

And the hotel gardens planted with impatiens and dwarf poinsettias. So pretty!

The International Marketplace is a landmark - an oasis in the midst of the high-rises. Several wandering acres of small vendors' kiosks and two-story plantation-style buildings that make way for the trees, rather than vice versa. I remember back in the fifties when there was a really neat restaurant under a huge banyon tree with a very exclusive, expensive, romantic diningroom for two like a small treehouse up in the branches.


We had lunch in a nice little cafe in one of the two-story buildings. In the open spaces between the vendors' carts, they have strung colorful awnings for shade. Soo pretty from above!

The vendors all sell pretty much the same things for pretty much the same prices, but you can, if you like, bargin with them. "If I buy two, will you give me discount? How about I get this and this, and you throw in that for half price?" If you start, the vendors jump for it. It's a game to them and enlivens their day. Lots of kukui nut and shell jewelry. Lots of identical aloha shirts and muumuus, refrigerator magnets and key chains and t-shirts. Some astonishingly tasteless t-shirts that you would have to be quite drunk to wear, let alone buy. And if - I - think they're tasteless . . you KNOW they're pretty offensive. One store had a selection that could insult every racial group in the world. They WERE equal opportunity, you had to give them that.

The weather has been warm and clear with a lovely breeze, but last night, the clouds rolled in and the rain started. DH and I walked down the street with out hats on, glorying in the 70 degree shower and chuckling at the folks who, as a matter of habit, skittered from awning to awning, trying to avoid getting wet. Wish I had gotten a photo of the young Asian couple huddled under an overhang, bodies pressed together trying to fit two people into a space not quite big enough for one, smoking their cigarettes and lost in love.

The hotel restaurants along the beach are all open air. During our beachwalk yesterday we passed one restaurant where I wanted to snap photos of every table. There was the one with one dapper elderly gent in white shirt, natty navy jacket, navy and red ascot at his throat and ramrod-straight back, and three stately wrinkled and be-hatted women, One white-haired, one grey-haired, and one - lavender-haired.

At the next table was an Asian family group with father in a quiet aloha shirt, mother in a dark red sleeveless silk dress, Auntie in a very pretty muumuu, and evidently Great Auntie in the old-fashioned full black and white nun's habit.

And the next table had a bouquet of 6 black-haired, almond-eyed, ageless beauties wearing artfully wrapped wisps of silky fabric over their swimsuits and three-inch spike-heeled sandals. A couple of them also had the best boobs that money can buy.

I wanted to take photos, but felt it would be too rude and intrusive. Funny how a low hedge and a bit of lattice can create a barrrier. I was perfectly happy to photograph the tan tourist gal on the beach, or to snap a shot of these cute keesters for the nephew that was supposed to accompany us. (The economy terminated their vacation plans right after we made the non-refundable deposit on the condo.)


But dignified persons trigger my sensibilities, and so you'll just have to make do with my word pictures.

Also, the camera was not able to capture the surfers at sunrise, with the water foaming creamy yellow in the golden light and the graceful, supple bodies balancing on their chips of fiberglass, riding the power of the waves like gods and goddesses. Smell the plumeria blooming over head. Feel the early morning breeze slide over your skin like warm silk. Savor that first cup of strong, hot, black tea. Feel the smooth, cool tile under your bare feet, and count your many, many blessings.