Opal Thai in Hale’iwa, HI

May 20, 2015 4 Comments read Everything is Terrible, Hawaii, Masticating With Mellzah, Pacific, Travel, USA, West

While on our trip, our group decided to have lunch at Opal Thai in Hale’iwa, which we’d heard is the best Thai food on Oahu. It’s cash only, so a few of us made a trip to a nearby ATM. I withdrew $60, which I figured would be more than enough cash. When we were seated, we were handed menus, but minutes later the owner arrived at our table and plucked them out of our hands. He then proceeded to quiz us on our knowledge of Thai food. Do you like Thai food? What’s the last thing you ate at a Thai restaurant? Can you even name six Thai dishes? Then he informed us that he would be ordering for us and we’d be eating family style. He asked us about what we didn’t like and proceeded to give us shit about it. Oh, you don’t like cilantro? Do you eat Mexican food, like salsa? Did you know there’s cilantro in that? I began to get a very bad feeling about my lunch prospects. One: I really don’t like having someone else decide what I’ll be eating. If I’m paying for it, I goddamn well want to choose. Ideally, I want to be able to choose even when I’m not paying. I’m especially leery when the decider is someone who knows what he has to unload from his fridge to prevent spoilage losses. Two: I loathe eating family style, especially if there’s a possibility that I’ll only like one or two of the dishes. I don’t want to take more than my share of anything, I don’t want to be made to feel like I’m taking food out of someone else’s mouth. As a fatty, I’m especially sensitive to this because I don’t want to be known as the Jabba that ate everyone else’s lunch. Three: I’m here for lunch, not a goddamn quiz show. I especially don’t want someone treating me like Miss Hicksville, U.S.A. because an ingredient tastes like soapy tinfoil to me. Yes, I know cilantro is an important component of the cuisine. Knowing that doesn’t change the way it tastes and the fact that it ruins any dish it touches for me.

The food started rolling out, and he didn’t really take any of our dislikes into consideration–either because he wanted to prove us wrong about what we claimed to dislike (like educating a toddler), or because he straight did not give a shit. Literally everything one of us said we didn’t like or wouldn’t eat was represented on the table. The things that I did eat were on par with other Thai restaurants I’ve been to, nothing extraordinary. Looking at the other tables in the restaurant, it appeared that everyone was getting the same things, and I was pretty sure we’d been duped. When the bill for lunch for six people arrived and it was almost $200, I was sure we’d been duped and I was ashamed that I didn’t have enough in my wallet to cover my full portion of the bill. And when I looked up and saw Guy Fieri’s face on the wall, I knew why this happened. When your restaurant is full of tourists on vacation who saw you on the Food Network, you don’t really need to worry about repeat customers, so you can cook what you want, rack the bill up to what you think they can afford to pay (and there’s always that ATM across the parking lot in case you overestimated the cash in their wallets), and shake their hands on the way out and act like you’ve given them an experience.

I don’t what makes me angrier: that I spent nearly three times as much as I’d planned on freaking lunch or that I walked out from a lunch that was three times as expensive as I’d planned still hungry due to the aforementioned not wanting to take more than what I perceive to be my fair share of anything. Damn family style bullshit. Jason left stuffed to the gills because he ate everything that was left over on every plate out of fear of hurting the owner’s feelings. Given his business model, I don’t think he really cares one way or the other. What I do know is that we now refer to expenditures in terms of Thai Lunches For Six. Buying a new car? The payment is only one and a half Thai Lunches per month! Going on a trip? The hotel is only one half Thai Lunch per night! Movie night? We can get two tickets and a soda that rivals Lake Michigan in volume for 15% of a Thai Lunch. What a value!

A Dawn Makapuu Lighthouse Hike

May 18, 2015 Comments Off read Hawaii, Pacific, The Great Outdoors, Travel, USA, West

One of my thirty-three goals to accomplish this year was to take an early morning hike that ended with a sunrise view, and I felt that doing so while in Hawaii would be one of my best opportunities for a number of reasons, namely the relative ease of getting high enough to get a decent view of the horizon, and the time difference working to my advantage since I’m not what anyone would call a morning person*. After a bit of research, I determined that the hike to Makapuu Lighthouse would be the ideal morning route–only about two miles round-trip with a relatively low chance of serious injury due to hiking in the dark with a flashlight. Since I was staying on the North Shore and Makapuu Lighthouse Point is on the opposite side of the island, I set my alarm clock for 3:30 so I’d arrive at the end of the trail with plenty of time before magic hour began. Sneaking out of the house in the middle of the night so as not to wake the others was an unusual experience. Stars glittered thickly across the sky, and I saw the Milky Way for the first time.

The drive across the island was quiet, but not deserted. What was deserted was the park: it doesn’t officially open until 7am, half an hour after the sunrise. The reviews I’d read told me to expect this, to park down the road a bit, and to clamber through the gate to access the trailhead, so that’s what I did. It’s eerie hiking in the dark. Your light bobs across the trail, and you become keenly aware of everything you can’t see–all of the eyes that could be watching you approach, taking advantage of the fact that you’re on unfamiliar terrain, and circling behind you to crack you on the head and take your stuff. Yes, I have been watching too much Walking Dead recently, why do you ask?

The hike itself was easy, and ended with a rocky area that led to a few observation platforms. I arrived well before sunrise, so I had a drink of water and sat down to wait. All of a sudden, Jason said “That’s a big bird!” I saw its dark brown back half swooping around the platform and looked to see where it might have gone to get a better look. Evidently, it wanted a better look at us as well, because the next thing I knew, this enormous owl was hovering above us and darting down as if to attack. I threw my hands over my head in a defensive posture that can only be described as “horrified flailing” and immediately regretted the owl-taunting I’d engaged in recently. It swooped around us again and I seriously prepared myself to fight an owl with my purse. It pump-faked at us again and then flew away. I remained paranoid for the rest of the hike. Was there a nest nearby? Was I inadvertently getting closer to it? It was one of those rare moments in life where you hope to not find something. You want the cancer scan to be clear, the house to have gone undisturbed in your absence, and the attack owl to be anywhere other than where you are. Eventually, I saw another spot of light moving up the trail, which confirmed my earlier suspicions about how easy it is for others to see and track a light while the carrier of the light has no idea that they’re being observed. I watched them until they made their way to the other platform. By that time, golden light had begun creeping over the horizon. As it grew closer to dawn, more and more people arrived, much too talkative for this early in the day. What never really arrived was the sunrise. It got progressively brighter, but a cloud wall obscured the actual sunrise, and shortly after that, fog rolled in and it began to rain. By the time we made it back down to our car, the parking lot was packed full of cars and tour buses, and I was glad I’d gone before the rest of the world was awake. It was an amazing trip–just watch out for the owl. *I can’t even count the number of times that I’ve said to myself before going to sleep that I was going to start getting up early and exercising in the mornings, but I can tell you that when every single one of those mornings has come, I responded to my previous day’s resolve with “ugh, no” and burrowed deeper into the covers.

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Flashback Friday: Oahu About Fifteen Years Ago

April 24, 2015 Comments Off read Hawaii, Pacific, Travel, USA, West

Me and my “psychotic friends network” shirt, because I can always be counted upon to keep it classy.

I’m off in Oahu with a group of awesome people, and prepping for this trip made me dig up the photos from the last time I was there. I hadn’t thought about it for a long time, and it was surprising how flipping through the album brought everything back. Snorkeling in Hanauma Bay for hours and realizing afterward that I’d forgotten to put sunscreen on the backs of my legs, which made sitting difficult for a week. Hiking in brutal heat, learning about native and invasive plant species from a surfer bro named Mitch. Climbing the steep Diamond Head stairs, complaining the entire way. Marveling at the ubiquity of ABC stores. The peace at the grounds of Byodo-In Temple. It’s funny, the stories I remember about the people as well: the night we went to a Korean barbecue restaurant and one of my boyfriend’s aunts grabbed my breasts and said in halting English that they were “very good”. The way Bob would pop his hands off the steering wheel every time he sneezed and said it was a pilot reflex–I remember that every time I sneeze in the car. The time and effort Mitsuko put into ensuring I had a nice trip, even though it was her wedding week. The way she smiled and thanked me for making her son a good person. There was ultra-cringeworthy stuff, too. The way I almost shouted into a cell phone at the Ala Moana mall because I hadn’t really used one before. The way I showed up to the aforementioned wedding in a white dress. How did I not know that was taboo? Why didn’t anyone tell me? How did the bride keep from slapping the shit out of me? This time, I’m going to be in charge of what I see and do. I’ve got so much planned, and I hope that fifteen years from now, my new photos fill me with even more memories of a wonderful time filled with wonderful people. Only maybe this time, I’ll have learned to keep my horizon lines straight.