Walking Waikīkī – Art is Everywhere

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Walking the streets of a major city (or truly, almost anywhere) there are opportunities to see art of all sorts — commissioned sculptures, carvings and paintings at restaurants and other establishments, even street art, dusty with footprints. In the rush to get from here to there, it’s easy to pass and not see the interesting, the unusual, that which adds a bit of beauty, novelty, or unexpected information to your day.

I walked along the shore of the Pacific Ocean from Waikīkī to Diamond Head and had opportunity to see a variety of sculptures, mosaics, wood carvings, murals, even stencil art on the sidewalks. Not all of the art I stopped to see was museum quality art, but every piece added flavor and dimension to my visit, offering a perspective of the city through a different lens.

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The above sculpture – photographed on my way to Diamond Head, mid morning, without leis adorning the surfer and seal, and photographed again on my return, mid afternoon, adorned with the traditional leis. As a first time visitor to Hawaii, I remained fascinated at the frequency I saw leis used as a gesture of welcome – and not only to tourists as would be expected. Leis on business people, on people relaxing on the beach, and (photo proof) on sculptures.

The seal and surfer sculpture, titled Makua and Kila, is set into a rocky fountain on the beach promenade. It’s based on a children’s story by author Fred Van Dyke and weaves traditional Hawaiian values of respect for family and respect for the ocean into the story of friendship. (artist Holly Young)

Surf Board Inofrmation Plaque

Perhaps signage doesn’t qualify as art for many people, but when the sign includes a surf board, photography prints, and typography it goes on my list of that which is “interesting, unusual,  adds a bit of beauty, novelty, or unexpected information” to my day. Upon reading a short list of facts about surfing I learned more than if I hadn’t read the list. Obviously.

Did you know that Mark Twain tried surfing on his visit to the Hawaiian islands in 1866 – unsuccessfully? Or that by the 1900s surfing had nearly died out, partly because of opposition from missionaries who thought time should be spent in more upstanding activities? That Waikīkī means “spouting water”? Or that the longest ride on the surf was by Duke Kahanamoku in 1917 who caught a 35″ wave and rode it 1 1/4 miles to shore? (He was an Olympic champion and the “father of surfing…”)

That’s what the sign says.

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The statue of Mahatma Gandhi is located in Kapiolani Park in front of the Honolulu Zoo. It has a checkered past — or at least the donor of the statue has a checkered past — but the statue of Gandhi does catch your attention, located in the midst statues of Hawaiian kings, surfers, and dolphins.

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Here’s a more typical statue,  a preaching Saint Augustine standing near the church entrance that bears a longer name, St. Augustine by the Sea Catholic Church.

Incredibly, a (long) search through the halls of Google turned up exactly nothing about this specific statue. So…

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And then the less serious, but equally fun art — the wooden carving and another lei.

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And the hula dancer stenciled on the sidewalk and up a set of steps. I call it bread crumb art.

Follow the hula dancer and find breakfast!

Still in Honolulu – Exploring the Banyan Tree

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This towering banyan tree, complete with benches around its circumference, is located outside the Honolulu Zoo. I spent some quiet time bench sitting and people watching on a stroll from Waikiki to Diamond Head.

The banyan tree is a common botanical feature of Hawaii even though it is not native to the islands. Their canopies are vast, the larger ones spreading up to a hundred and fifty feet across.

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Banyan trees are characterized by their prop roots that grow to support the expansive limbs. Trees spread laterally and can cover wide areas. I love the look of the roots as they drip towards the earth, seeking a firm footing.

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The trees are native to the tropics and subtropics and were brought to the Hawaiian Islands in the late 1800s by missionaries from India.

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Amazing roots. They can eventually become as large as the original trunk. And they make perfect roosts for the local birds and greats nooks for a game of hide and seek.

 

 

Honolulu – Change is in the Air

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Sailboats and Surfers on Golden Seas

Mark Twain is famously quoted as saying “If you don’t like the weather in New England, wait five minutes.” I imagine this would be true in most of the United States, but I didn’t expect it to be quite so true in Hawaii. Hawaii, to this Midwestern born and raised woman’s way of thinking, meant sunshine. And true, I was blessed with sunny skies much of the time I was traveling the islands.

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Setting Sun

Bright skies, glowing sunsets sliding below glowing horizons.

 

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After the Sunset

And circus colored remnants once the sun had set.

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Honolulu Gray Skies

But just as often I could turn around and see the nearby mountains cloaked in gray. I’d be walking along the streets under sunny skies, wondering where I’d misplaced my sunglasses, and then the sun would disappear above the clouds. I no longer needed sunglasses. Instead I needed an umbrella.

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Catch a Rainbow

And I really didn’t need an umbrella for long, only an awning to shelter from the rain. Within minutes, the skies lightened and the famous Hawaii rainbow appeared.

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Rainbow Reward

Five minutes was plenty of time for a change. Rain. Sun. Windy. Calm. Or a rainbow as reward.

Honolulu – First Impressions

Honolulu Skyline

Honolulu Skyline

To the arriving and leaving. To the journey
I wake to freshness. And do reverence.
~ Jack Gilbert

Circling the Hawaiian Islands – part family tradition, part pilgrimage, part challenge.

Family Tradition:

I’ve been traveling the United States – summer road trip! – for nearly 50 years; my husband and kids joined me in the annual camping/cross-country road trip over thirty years ago. By the time our three kids had graduated from high school, we had visited 46 states. My younger daughter and I explored Washington and a bit of Oregon in 2010 to increase our “states visited” number to 48. Our recent visit to Hawaii made the island state #49. With good fortune, Alaska will be #50 in 2016.

Almost a year ago Manda and I began planning a visit to Hawaii. To take best advantage of our short stay of 9 days, two of which were travel days, we planned to fly into Honolulu and then take a 7 day island cruise, with stops at Maui, the Big Island (day long stops at both Hilo and Kona) and then an overnight stop in Kauai before cruising back to Oahu. The plan worked well for us as first time visitors – it was a delicious taste of Hawaii. We now have a long list of new favorites to visit the next time we head (far) west.

St. Augustine Catholic Church and Waikiki Coastline

St. Augustine Catholic Church and Waikiki Coastline

Pilgrimage: a spirit-renewing ritual, a journey to find/see the sacred in the ordinary.

~ Bo Mackison

Part Pilgrimage:

We arrived in Honolulu a day early to get our land legs after our long flight, although in retrospect it wasn’t so much the land legs I needed as a stronger pair of sea legs…

The view from the hotel – iconic. Not only the golden Pacific, a sea of honey-hued waves aglow in the setting sun, but also a bit of the Waikiki coast, the iconic surfers (and surfing students) waiting to ride incoming waves, palm tree-lined streets. And this church, tucked into the hotel hustle and beach crowd – St. Augustine by the Sea. The modern church, built in 1962, replaced an older wooden structure built in 1901. The older church was well-known as the “church without windows” — latticework walls provided an open structure and ocean breezes provided ventilation. I hoped for time inside the church — a soothing place to sit with my thoughts and a place to rest my knees for a bit — but the building was locked.

Instead I found refuge sitting on a bench tucked under a banyan tree and watched the rhythm of the surfers and the waves.

Hotel Visitors, 26th Floor

Hotel Visitors, 26th Floor

“You wanna fly, you got to give up the shit that weighs you down.”

~Toni Morrison

Part Challenge:

This trip was on my maybe list for months. Though we’d made the reservations almost a year ago, 2015 was one of those challenging years, punctuated by way too many ups and downs. I’d had to cancel several greatly anticipated trips throughout the year, aware that in order to best care for myself I had to limit travel and other activities.

So it was with a mixture of concern and relief that I packed my luggage for Hawaii. I also packed a mental self-care list, acknowledging the need to balance the joys and frustrations of travel with my awareness of limitations and the willingness to practice extreme self-care when needed.

Challenge…but I wanted to fly.

 

Searching for Clarity on the Tumbled Rock Trail

Trail ©2015 Bo Mackison

… that is what learning is.
You suddenly understand
something you’ve understood all your life,
but in a new way.  ~ Doris Lessing

Searching for Understanding

Tumbled Rocks Trail, a meandering mile long trail through a lower bluffs talus field of gray, purple and pale green quartz, offers niches for studying tiny grottoes of splendor and lake views to the consider the expansive glacial landscapes. The trail is only a few feet above lake level, perfect for an intimate shoreline experience, always a thin place where land meets water.

Step by step, I slowly wander the rocky path, then find a spot to sit in this jumble of quartzite boulders. The lake, a  spring fed lake created by the damming of the valley in the last Glacial period, turns cold in autumn. I set up my temporary work space amidst the ancient boulders – a place where I can write, photograph, sketch, day-dream.

As I do most days, I draw a card from my deck of Desert Wisdom Cards  which I created while living in southern Arizona’s Sonoran Desert. (Each of 52 cards offers a desert photograph and a single word for reflection.)

Today’s card is CLARITY.

Desert Wisdom Card - Clarity Notice how your clarity helps you see others more clearly. Notice how that clarity feels within you and how you respond (or don't). ©2014 Bo Mackison

Desert Wisdom Card – Clarity  ©2014 Bo Mackison

While sitting on glacial boulders in Wisconsin, I pull a card that depicts granite and sandstone boulders in the desert, a sacred place which holds ancient wisdom. Coincidence? Maybe not..

Contemplating Desert Wisdom

Deep in a desert canyon, the cliff walls and boulders are etched with petroglyphs — a wilderness gallery of primitive art. The symbols – pecked into the black varnish of many desert boulders and canyon cliffs? Perhaps they are astronomical markers. Tribal symbols of belonging. The art of a story-teller.

Wisdom in the constancy of the heavens,
wisdom in community,
wisdom in the telling of the story.

I scribble a few notes, then wander through the rocks, take photos, explore a crevice filled with mosses and lichens. Daydream, stand in awe of the beauty that surrounds me, reflect on “clarity” and settle in to write.

A timed, free write on clarity:

It is impossible to find clarity in what is to come. There is only clarity in the here and now. Working from shadows to light. Reflections in light. A primitive understanding. There is a slow loosening, I am becoming more understanding, more content to be who I am. As I feel stronger, I gain more clarity and I can see my wondrous life-path unfolding in deep and mysterious ways. Yes. There will be delicious discoveries, painful heartaches, unexpected change, the ups and downs of living a life, fully aware. Clarity.

Much writing, thinking, and art  — all as guides to find ways of re-seeing and redefining the terms of old beliefs. Messages of “it’s all your fault”, “not good enough” and “you’re so sensitive” have played on an unending loop for too long. How to deal with the anger that surfaces — knowing that feeling is necessary and healthy and messy and time-consuming. All a big messy soup of raw emotions, memories and thoughts. Straining through this soup will take time and it will also add much clarity.

A quote and questions…

Anger can bring clarity and strength. When we let ourselves feel the full force of our anger, the clarity we receive can be amazing. When we recognize, “this is what ticks me off, this is why, and this is how I need things to be different!” we can experience the relief that such clarity can bring. A good relationship with our angry feelings can give us the determination to forge ahead, the strength to “stand our own ground,” the energy and focus to let the world around us know what is and is not okay.

~ From Eating in the Light of the Moon, by Anita Johnston, Ph.D.

  • How does increased clarity about myself, my plans, my dreams, my relationships affect my day-to-day…?
  • What does clarity on an issue bring to my life, to my work, dreams, hopes, to my relationships with others?
  • How will I choose to respond to new awareness?

What messages and further reflections on clarity might I take from symbols in my daily life?

  • things are not always as they seem
  • in the mystery of the slowly unfolding question lies the unexpected, a course of action, perhaps even an answer
  • symbols? incorporate symbols and metaphors as meaning in my life, clarity appears in bursts of connections.

There are always more questions than answers. Always more to explore, consider, assimilate.

~~~~~~~

My mantra:  “I believe nature offers opportunities for connection, the arts offer opportunities for self-expression, and life offers continual opportunities for growth and self-discovery.”  ~ Bo Mackison