The Emily Blog » honolulu

Chinatown photos

Emily — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 04:20:44 +0000

Some photos I took in Chinatown sometime last week.

The espresso machine at Manifest, a bar Frans has become very fond of as a place to hang out and wait for me after work until I show up and the adventure begins:

Gold Gate Lounge sign:

Frans and Nuuanu Ave sign:

Shop display:

Saturday in Waikiki

Emily — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 21:27:36 +0000

I spent most of the morning wandering through Waikiki with the new camera. A few photos I took:

Funny guys outside Cheeseburger Waikiki.

Flower at Hilton Hawaiian Village.

Seed pod on the sidewalk. This picture disturbs me because it looks like a painting. But it’s not. That’s just how the sidewalk looked, and how the seed pod looked.

Food down the street: Magoo’s pizza wagon; local veggies at Long’s

Emily — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 21:09:22 +0000

I finally got a photo of the Magoo’s pizza wagon that parks next the the 76 station just a few blocks from our apartment. Magoo’s (the bar) closed down a year or two ago, causing much sadness among the graduate students of UH’s Department of Linguistics. It was immediately replaced by the Varsity, which has been deemed too loud, too expensive, and generally lacking in edible food. The Magoo’s pizza wagon survived, though, and just a few weeks ago I picked up a chicken and pepper pizza to give it a try. Yum!

Yesterday I picked up some – surprise! – fresh local veggies at Long’s Drugs. Maybe not quite as cheap as the farmer’s market, but certainly convenient. Who knew you could find fresh Hawaiian-grown cucumbers, tomatoes, and eggplant at the DRUGSTORE? Made my day.

Sunday photos

Emily — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 18:26:32 +0000

On Sunday I finally found some free time to take my (crappy) camera out and bike around the neighborhood taking pictures of random things. Here are a few that I like:

Spaceship. Thing.

Emily — Tue, 12 May 2009 21:03:55 +0000

Okay, I finally figured out what’s going on with the “spaceship” someone’s constructing next to the walkway on McCarthy Mall (University of Hawai’i Manoa campus). I was already thinking it was neat. Now I think it’s SUPER neat.

It’s not actually a spaceship (yeah, that’s the bummer part), but graduating art student Kazuki Takizawa (website at www.kazukitakizawa.com is creating a solarium out of metal rods and colored glass. When it’s done, people will be able to walk inside and experience the color and light. There’s an article about the project in KaLeo, UH Manoa’s student newspaper.

I’m totally looking forward to seeing it finished and standing inside on a sunny day.

Shangri La: Wow. Oh wow.

Emily — Sun, 03 May 2009 08:24:02 +0000

I’m sure there’s probably a better title than “wow, oh wow” but that’s really what I felt this afternoon. A little overwhelmed, a little confused, a lot “wow”.

I toured Shangri La today as part of a museum studies class I’m taking (field trip!). Shangri La was the Honolulu home of American tobacco heiress Doris Duke and in 2002, nine years after her death, it was opened up for public tours. The place is incredible. Why? Because of the art. It is chock-full of art. Islamic art. From all over the world. From back to at least the 13th century. I think my jaw was permanently dropped for the entire tour. The place is amazing. Here’s a little bit of (Persian?) tile goodness:

So who was this woman who collected so much incredible art? I guess that’s what confuses me. She was insanely rich, for one – her father died when she was 12 and she basically inherited his entire fortune. She owned a plane, a Boeing 737, and who knows how many hosues. But it also sounds like she was incredibly curious about everything, very passionate, very driven, and most of all very private. She was the mastermind behind Shangri La, planning the architecture, art, everything. As part of the tour, the docent told us bits and pieces about her personality that he’d heard from people who knew her personally. It seems, though, that there is a lot missing from the story.

And what about the whole Orientalism thing? Is this just another (rich) Westerner who’s collecting pieces of the East because they represent something mysterious and romantic? I guess I find this troubling, in a way, and then there’s also the whole “Hawaiian paradise” aspect of it – she came here, fell in love with the place, bought a piece of it, dynamited the harbor to build up the land, kept mostly to herself, shaped it into her own private paradise. Nothing’s simple, I suppose, and even troubling aspects of things don’t seem like they should get in the way of appreciating the incredible, profound beauty that is also a part of this story.

On a related note, it sounds like they’re trying to adapt the tour so it’s focused more on the Islamic art side of things, not just the famous person side. And I did learn quite a bit about Islamic art on the tour. Success!

Counting down…

Emily — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 03:01:16 +0000

It’s finally hit that point in the semester where everything’s still crazy-busy, but I can count the remaining projects on one hand and the end is in sight! I presented a paper at the College of Language, Linguistics, and Literature graduate student conference this morning. The paper was about the “rhetoric” of language documentation – how people are advocating for the documentation of endangered languages, what (sometimes problematic) themes are emerging, and how this might be changing. I looked at the Language Documentation Training Center here at UH as a case study, trying to figure out what point(s) of view was/were emerging in their discussions of language documentation. Hopefully I’ll get the presentation online later today.

On the more fun side of things, the Honolulu Academy of Arts held their monthly ARTafterDARK party last night, and I went with a few friends. It’s a great event – you can hang out with friends, drink wine, explore the museums, and then – oh! – the DJ fires up the bhangra and you realize there’s a DANCE FLOOR IN THE MAIN COURTYARD.

Royal Hawaiian Hotel

Emily — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 15:35:22 +0000

I love the pink. A friend and I went to their bar last night for beachside touristy drinks.

Photo of the day

Emily — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 05:45:55 +0000

Another photo from King Street – this one is a store window near the intersection of University and King.

Ala Wai Canal

Emily — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 22:44:25 +0000

I’ve been thinking a little lately about various photography projects I want to pursue. I’ve started taking photos along King Street (more on that later) and hope that soon I can start taking photos of the Ala Wai Canal, which divides Waikiki from the McCully neighborhood of Honolulu, and dumps into the ocean near Ala Moana. My running route usually takes me along one or both sides of the canal, so I have plenty of time to meditate on the weird, wonderful, and sometimes disgusting things I see in and around the canal.

On today’s run I saw:

at least four submerged shopping carts
some fish that I swear were barracudas. They were long and predatory-looking. Of course, the barracuda is the only fish I know that’s long and predatory-looking, so I guess they could have been something else.
an abandoned half-eaten box of pastries and half-full gallon of milk, sitting by a bench
a really cool white fish with an enormous bumpy head
a few funny dogs
three people fishing
signs saying DON’T FISH THE WATER IS CONTAMINATED
a perfect yellow hibiscus blossom floating in the thick brown water

Maybe I think ugly and weird things are more interesting than I should, but I really want to start taking photos of all this random crap. I guess if you spend enough time in a place – or in this case, along a certain route – you start noticing and appreciating all the quirky stuff.

Little boat in the Ala Wai, near the McCully bridge