Hawaii 2025: Epilogue

Every time we come to the Honolulu airport I see the circa 1960s roof of what I know is a church. I've taken pictures, I've used Google Maps, and I could never figure out what it is so that I can visit it. I've always known it would be cool. Just now, while writing that last post, I saw my latest photo of the building, which was surprisingly close up. I plopped it in Google Image Search and now I know:

This thing is:

First Southern Baptist Church of Pearl Harbor.

The architect is Ralph M. Buffington.

So happy to finally know. 

My Favorite Brick

I walk past this building every day at work, and I always look forward to seeing my favorite brick.

 

Hawaii 2022 Day 5

When nerds go on vacation they swim, eat, go to the library and look at newspapers on microfilm for 6 hours. If you're us, anyway.

During the beginning of the pandemic, a friend who grew up in Hawaii told me that his grandmother had written a column for a newspaper called the Pali Press. He didn't have copies of her work. I was dying to help. I looked up Pali Press on Worldcat and it turns out that the only library with holdings is the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Two of my favorite things are Hawaii and research, and we didn't go to Hawaii for almost three years. It was so frustrating! So when people asked what I was looking forward to doing in Hawaii they laughed when I said that my very specific plan was to go to the UH Manoa library.

The campus has some really cool sculptures and 60's and 70's architecture. And on a Sunday, the week before Thanksgiving, I would definitely go there *just* to hang out.

The library staff were suuuper helpful, and mrguy's has a keenly honed sense of where to find things that are eluding us in a library setting helped us home in on the right microfilm. Recall that although I went to library school, he's the only one of us that has actually *worked* in a library.

For the first few hours we were having a good time looking at vintage newspapers but not finding grandma's column. And we were going to starve, so we went to find some lunch. We had some yummy Mexican food at an outdoor spot near campus, where we were treated to some bawdy gossip by nearby elderly white ladies -- "You put it down and it goes 'wah, wah, wah'...You couldn't insert it if you tried, or at least I can't!" 

Oh. Vibrator talk! 

We went back to the library. I was looking at newspaper issues from the 1970s, and mrguy was in the 1960s. Just as we were ready to throw in the towel, he found grandma's first column! Now that we knew the years in which she wrote, we went to work and found a ton of them for our friend. Microfilm readers are so much fancier now, btw! You can email images to yourself. We were very happy to provide our friend with 40+ articles. That was so much fun.

In the meantime, things were blowing up at the forklift factory. The top guy toppled, and I got a text from a friend telling me the news. I texted her back: "Current view" (microfilm reader).

What a day! We scratched that itch, and went home. On the way out, the lights were on in Keller Hall, illuminating the stained glass from within. Love that font, too.

Cats and Architecture

Hawaii 2014 Days 5 - 8

This is where I'll stop the recreated vacation of 2014. We did amazing things on our last days, but mainly I took photos of architecture. You may not be as into that as I am ("and here's a building, and here's another building set against the sky, and rectangles I liked..."). We did do other stuff.

 

We bought laulau and took it to the North Shore to get our sand on.
We ate at the place near the convention center that specializes in green noodles. They stashed us in the back so the locals wouldn't see us, which is either a score or a diss, depending on your mind set.

We got up close and personal with the beautiful Barbara Hepworth sculptures in one of the parks. It was nice to be able to slow down and enjoy public art.

We saw Kupaoa play for free and we met Lihau's parents. We got to tell them how appreciative we are of her and Kellen, who was our olelo teacher.

And we finally went into the IBM Building, that Ossipof masterpiece, and saw the scale models of the plans for Kaka'ako.

Finally it was time to go home. We took the long way home (via Maui) and used our layover to have lunch with friends. All in all a great trip. I may post my photos elsewhere.

Hawaii 2014 Day 4

We started the day at the Koko Head Cafe in Kaimuki. The Eggs Haloa is a "hold the phone" sort of meal. Poi biscuit, coconut luau underneath the egg and local greens. So delicious.

We parked in the lot nearby and had to feed the meter so we went back before shopping at Goodwill, which allowed us to have an interesting conversation with a guy who wanted to know if we were the owners of the tv on the curb in front of our rental car and then started telling us how he could pick it up (small man, large tv) and sprint to the next corner. That whole situation was worth the quarters we were plugging into the meter.

I have many things written in my notes, and I am filling in the gaps 5 years later, so here are the notes: Jelly's (record shopping), Pho 1 (must've been lunch), Ward Center, Antiques Alley (was this the time that the owner gave me a POG cap depicting Konishiki as Ozeki?).
What I really recall from this day, however, was going to Haili's to pass the time while we waited for Corner Kitchen to open. First off, the architecture and views on Kapahulu down there are really something to be appreciated while they still exist. Many of the buildings are from the 30's and 40's, and they're low enough that you can see Diamond Head. It's looked like this for years and won't always be this way. It's such a pleasure. Also at Haili's we learned that on Friday the poi is sour. Good to know.

 
Where the buildings aren't from the mid-20th century, they are often from the 60's. And even in little ways there are pay offs on ordinary buildings.

None of my photos from Corner Kitchen were worth using. I was glad that we made it there because it, also, was a specific place and moment in recent Hawaiian music. Waipuna and Kupaoa and other folks we've seen played there a lot while Corner Kitchen was still operating. When we got there, wouldn't you know, Uncle Herman (real name) from our crowd of older Hawaiian friends back home was there. I hope Uncle Herman is still there, somewhere in Hawaii, teaching feather lei making and waiting out our cold winters back home.

Live Better Electrically

For 11 years I have obsessed over a photo I took of the decorative cement brick facade of a local apartment house. The photo I took of the cement brick had a medallion in it. I wish I'd taken a closeup of the medallion. This, my friends, is what happens when you have too much time on your hands.

I knew that I'd taken the photo in the neighborhood of our car dealership, where I had an upcoming service appointment, so a few weeks back I used Google Street View to find the building. Took all of five minutes. After my service appointment I did a driveby and took better photos of the brick and the medallion. The brick is, as always, gorgeous.

I fully expected the medallion to refer to something about the external architecture, but it turns out that it's related to a post-war effort to use cleaner power in buildings. This was a Medallion Home, whose slogan at the time was "Live Better Electrically".

For more information, there is an entire website devoted to it.

Enjoy

Norway, Day 1

I had so many plans for Norway. In the end, we didn't do 95% of them. Planning is fun and the actual trip is fun and what you end up doing that you'd planned for is a teensy part of the Venn diagram.

Mrguy excelled at navigation and accommodation-picking. We got to 2 Døtre in the late afternoon and found a gift bag waiting for us, a present from my cousin. Chocolate, a book about the wooden houses of Bergen, and two rain ponchos. She is so thoughtful.

We looked around the neighborhood. This is the view down our street. Our apartment was just a few blocks from Greig Hall.

I loved the architecture, and how buildings were set at random angles next to one another.

After dinner we went to Garage, to see a band called Virkelig. I'd done my research beforehand, because I wanted to see some rock music by a band who performed in the norwegian language. The venue, The Garage, was great. Just the right blend of grubby and cool. The crowd was small -- maybe 50 people, mostly younger, and a few who might be the parents of the band. The band played as if for a stadium, and all the kids in the audience sang along. It was such a sweet scene.

So ends day 1 in Norway.

San Bernardino 2018, Part 3

We took a lot of photos while we were in San Bernardino.

We fell in love with Queens:

And from the archivists we learned that this strip club is also a dispensary, and that's why it's green. Almost all of our travels took us past Flesh Showgirls, sometimes three times a day:

 And mrguy really wanted a picture of Star Crab. It's a winner on so many levels:

So ends the signage tour of San Bernardino. Next, we go to the scene of the crime.

Germany 2017 Post 17

It turns out that Easter Monday is a thing. So much so that they just shut stuff down and we couldn't really drive to Poland, which is 20 minutes away from where we were staying. But who needs passable roads when it's Easter Monday? You people should be home with your family. 

I was really looking forward to Poland. Instead, we visited the Schminke Haus in Lobau.

Although the descriptions on the property refer to it as "one of the four most important residences of the modernist movement worldwide", we'd not heard of it.

And it is super cool. I loved the built-ins in the kitchen.

You can rent this place for a night, which would be pretty interesting, I think:

Since the time when we visited, they began filming a music series on site. If you want to see Conchita sing the catalog of Cher, please follow this link.

Having been blocked from seeing Poland, we agreed that going back to the shack and hanging out was the perfect thing to do.

When we returned, the weather turned gorgeous, the apple trees were blossoming, the skylights filled our apartment with sun.

Germany 2017 Post 1

And now to embark on the tale of the epic trip to Germany in April! Why did it take so long for me to get to this? Because I wanted to savor it, I think.

As we left it in mrsguy around March, mrguy and I were looking forward to grünsoße, visiting with a friend in Frankfurt, going to see an ancestor's paintings in Halberstadt and experiencing Sorbian Easter in Bautzen. All of that happened and more.

We got to town (Frankfurt) in the early afternoon and checked in with mrpiston. He took us to Cafe Karin, and then around town. We had to step into this gorgeous mall just to see the interior, which is fabulous. More about this architectural landmark here.

Then we went to see where mrpiston works. His weekdays are spent in this building, which now houses the Goethe Institute:

When it was first constructed, however, it was a chemical company. They formulated Zyklon B there, which is deeply disturbing to know.

After WWII, it became an Allied headquarters (Western Command). We were able to see some rooms that were once command headquarters. The last photo, above, is of the library. When it was being updated they discovered a Medieval ice house on the property. Then they just incorporated it in the plans and kept building.

One of the features of this building is a type of elevator called a paternoster. Here is a video of the actual paternoster at this building. I was terrified to try it, but eventually I did. After roaming around the school, we walked around the city.

Mrpiston is the kind of person who is interested in everything and has a quick mind for facts. We kept him busy with many questions. Like, why is there a statue of two naked guys talking on the phone?

Turns out that this is a monument to the German inventor of the telephone, Philipp-Reis-Denkmal. That's his bust in the center of the monument, and the two men can't see each other and are talking on the phone buck naked, as they would have in Ancient Rome. Right? Anyhoo...

We walked around the city and eventually got to a place where we were to eat
grünsoße. This was my special request to mrpiston: I've heard about grünsoße. I hear it's a big deal in Frankfurt. Would you be able to tell us where to procure? We were just going to miss the grünsoße festival.

Here, at Proletariat, we finally had our soße:

Many lands have their own green sauce. If you look it up on Wikipedia there's a breakdown of the green sauces of many lands. And what arrived on my plate, in classic presentation, was a big puddle of thick, kinda bitter stuff with some eggs plopped in it and a side of potatoes. I love a few green sauces: green goddess, pesto. And I guess I was expecting a different flavor profile. If you don't like watercress, this is not the sauce for you. Maybe this was a one-off, as I hear that there are so many different recipes for Frankfurt's beloved green puddle.

We finished our dinner with a brandied mispelchen. What? Right. Even our host had a hard time telling us what it is. We ordered it precisely for that reason and finally figured out that they are loquats. Back home in suburbia, loquats are a common sight. Nobody really knows what to do with the harvest, which can be abrupt and prolific. In China they use the leaves to make a cough syrup. That is almost everything I know about loquats.

Turns out that they're delicious in brandy, but what isn't?

After dinner we said our goodbyes to mrpiston and went back to our nest at Hotel Adina, overlooking the Euro sign.