Lauri came with me for a week at the end of October 2007. We stayed at the Imperial Hotel in Waikiki. It is a timeshare, so is a little more comfortable, but the neighborhood is loud and the facility is old. It is about 2.5 miles from my office downtown.
On Halloween, everyone in town flocked down to Waikiki for the evening. Many were driving down, but thousands were walking along the streets, most of them in costume. They were the most outlandish costumes I have ever seen. Many were Japanese and I think they were attempting to all dress as streetwalkers. The streetwalkers must have been hating life, because no-one could tell them apart from the crowd. I did not have my camera with me and by the time I got to the hotel, did not think to take it when we went to get dinner, so I do not have photos. Wait till next year!
It took me 2-1/2 hours to drive the 2.5 miles. I could have walked it in less than 1/2 hour.
On the flip side, on the Saturday before, we went to the Arizona Memorial. The movie is a sobering and thought-provoking experience. The emotions it evokes are hard to explain.
This plaque is only for those lost before and after WWII.For me, however, the Lost Submarine Memorial was even more emotional. There are no multimedia presentations, no crowds, very few who came, seemed even to notice that it existed. Just a large circle of individual plaques--one for each submarine that was lost in the Pacific during WWII. So many men lost at sea, far more than at Pearl Harbor--most without us even knowing for sure where. They simply did not return from their final mission.
That is the horrible price of our freedom!
Here are some more photos:
4 comments:
Well I would have to say that Halloween was probably one of the strangest sites I have seen but the experience was one of the best. More to come right?
I know the feeling. It was the same as Auschwitz probably. I am glad that I went there, but at the same time I really don't ever want to go back. It was so sad and emotionally draining.
We didn't have a lot of time to do Pear Harbor and see as much as you guys did. We basically just went out to the Arizona and then barely made it back to our bus. I would like to be able to go and spend a little time to see the rest of the things to be seen there.
Pearl Harbor is Cool! I especially liked exploring the bowfin
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