From Allie Kabbes

July 5th...

Today we all woke up and went to mass in the chapel next to where we are staying. Then we left to go to a swap meet, which had tons of different things for very cheap prices. I got a Hawaii t-shirt for $3... :) Taylor Oltman and I looked around for about 2 hours, and didn't even see half of the stores. There were so many there!! I got a new purse and some necklaces, while Taylor got a traditional Hawaiian dress, which can be worn many different ways.

After that, we left and went to Dole place. This is where they grow pineapples. Did you know they grow in the ground? They had a huge souvenir shop including pineapple ice cream. I did not try this, but I heard it was very good!! There was also a 3 mile maze. Most of the boys went on it, but did not think it was worth it. Barb Konrad bought a uekele (spelling?). It looks really cool and I learned to play a couple chords.

From here, we split up to go to a luau and the North Shore. All of the girls went to the luau accompanied by boys, Fr. Chris and Andy Guinnip. We took a bus to the place. We had an "escort" who was kind of like an emcee for our bus, and was very funny. He kept us laughing the whole way there. He also somehow memorized everyone's name on the bus. Once we got there, we saw a Kalua Pig. (Which is when you cook a pig in the ground!) We saw them pull the pig out of the ground (GROSS!!!). Then we got to try and eat traditional Hawaiian food. There was something there that looked like clear noodles. I didn't want to try that, but everyone else said it tasted like chicken noodles. After we ate, we saw a lot of dancers. We also got to learn to dance ourself. A few of the girls from our group (me, Taylor, Kaitlyn, and Melissa) went on stage and danced a traditional dance. Afterwards we were given "honi honi" by a row of boys. This is where the give you a kiss on the cheek. Very interesting! We also saw people juggling fire and many dances. They were really amazing. I didn't know people could dance like that. :)

The rest of the boys went to the North Shore. Well, almost all the way there. From October to January, the North Shore has very large waves; 10-20 feet high. At this time of the year, the waves are only about 5 feet high. They also found other people jumping off cliffs and decided to join them. Father Daren came back in an extremely giddy mood and was laughing hysterically at something. I'm not really quite sure. But the boys had a great time doing this and have many stories to tell. Something about a "basketball man". You may want to check out You-tube!!

Now we are just relaxing in the common area, listening to Fr. Daren keel over laughing. Who knew? Well, that's about it. More to common tomorrow!! Thanks for reading!