FM took his family to one of his favorite Guam restaurants ~ Fujiichiban. Personally, I think he just likes saying the name 😉 It wasn’t his mom’s favorite though so it’ll be on to another restaurant next time.
The in-laws have arrived. FM’s mom, dad and aunt are here for the holidays. FG greeted them at the airport with flower leis as they got off the plane. FG really enjoys hosting people in our home so she’s in her element ~ she even left individually wrapped chocolates on their pillows. I think she has my “hotel” blood in her.
Below is Aunt Fran having a difficult time adjusting to island life. She staked out the hammock early.
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When FM and I got married, we agreed to celebrate Christmas in our own home rather than travel during the holidays. It’s worked well for our family especially once FG arrived. She loves celebrating Christmas in her own home and we have many traditions. So many traditions that I’m having trouble keeping up with all of them. One of our Christmas traditions is my mom, Grandma Betty to FG, would come to our home and celebrate the holidays with us. My mom would travel to Germany, enduring the long flight and the cold, snowy weather to spend Christmas with us. Unfortunately, she won’t be coming this Christmas ~ at first it was because my in-laws will be visiting for Christmas and our house is too small for multiple visitors but now, my mom thinks the almost 24 hour flight time would be too much for her. As you can imagine, FG is very sad about this and continues to ask “When is Grandma Betty coming?”
We’ll have to start a new tradition where we visit Grandma Betty during a holiday so FG can have a new tradition ~ maybe the 4th of July!
Posted in Favorite Girl, Flashback Fridays | Leave a Comment »
The December 1941 Japanese attack on the U.S. was not limited to the Territory of Hawaii, but also the Territory of Guam and because of the International Date Line, the attacks occured on 7 December 1941 in Hawaii and on 8 December 1941 in Guam. In addition to Guam and Hawaii, the Japanese also attacked Wake Island and the Commonwealth of the Philippines.
Four hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese attacked Guam and struck targets such as the USS Penguin and the Pan Am facilities. Before dawn on 10 December, shortly after Navy Governor Capt. George McMillan surrendered Guam to the Japanese, the flag of the Rising Sun was hoisted and Guam became part of the Japanese Empire. In true Japanese fashion, they changed the names of geographic locations. Guam became Omiya Jima, the Great Shrine Island and the capital city of Hagåtña became Akashi.
My mother, who lived on the Big Island of Hawaii and was only 6 years old at the time of the attacks, remembers having to black out the windows. They were not allowed turn on the lights after dark and were overall fearful of a ground invasion. Thankfully for Hawaii, the Japanese didn’t invade the islands like they did on Guam, the Philippines and Wake Island.
Many of the Japanese pilots who attacked that day thought the US had been notified by the Japanese diplomats that Japan was “Declaring War on the US” They felt dishonorable that they were involved in a sneak attack. The master planner of the attacks, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto said “I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.” Admiral Yamamoto was a Harvard educated economist and, during his time in the US, learned of the fighting spirit of the United States citizens. He couldn’t have been more accurate ~ our Nation became resolved to right the wrongs and not only did soldiers and sailors go off to war on two fronts but those back in the states became a part of the fight by rationing and recycling, not to mention Rosie the Riveter and war bonds.
I have to admit it’s a bit strange to visit the Arizona memorial at Pearl Harbor and be surrounded by Japanese visitors.
But I imagine it’s equally strange and awkward when the Japanese visit Nagasaki and Hiroshima and see Americans tourists there. It’s interesting to look back and to see how far we have come with our relations with the Japanese. May we never forget but continue to forgive.
Posted in Flashback Fridays, Travel | 3 Comments »
I wondered why the geckos around our house were starting to get fat bellys. Now I know ~ they’ve got beer bellys.
Posted in Travel | 2 Comments »
Maya and Sport ~ Maya adores her big brother, Sport and the feeling is usually mutual but not always.
Maya is growing quickly but still has all her puppy teeth. I forgot what a pain the puppy stage is and how she eats EVERYTHING in sight. I had to get a worm out of her mouth yesterday. Lovely, eh? But she is sweet as can be and loves to cuddle so I think she’ll turn out to be a nice dog.
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Having grown up in Hawaii and then moving to Puerto Rico, I’m ‘umbilically connected’ to the beach. I’ve been fortunate to have been to more than a few lovely, tropical beaches and it’s hard to pick favorites but here are the ones I think of whenever I see those “top ten” lists of favorite beaches:
1) Hapuna Beach, Big Island, Hawaii
2) Polihua Beach, Lanai, Hawaii
3) Savannah Bay Beach, Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands
4) Haputo Beach, Guam
There is one beach that I would actually like to live: Puako Beach on the Big Island. Since the average price of a home there is a million dollars, I’ll have to win the lottery before that will happen though 🙂
Posted in Flashback Fridays, Hawaii, Lanai | Leave a Comment »
As a vegetarian, I get a lot of questions about what I eat, how I maintain a nutritious diet and, occasionally (only three I know of in 20 years) someone will decide to become a vegetarian themselves. More often than not, people want to cut out the amount of meat they eat and I’m happy to share any tasty recipes. In no way do I try to actually convert anyone to a meatless life ~ you either want to or not. FM certainly hasn’t been swayed although he happily eats my meat-free meals at dinner (when I actually cook).
My golf partner, T., was very curious about my recipes and I told her I get most of my new recipes every month from the Vegetarian Times magazine. I hate throwing away my used magazines and, when in Germany I shared them with a fellow veggie, Alex. Since T. was so curious, I sent several back issues, via FM, to give to T’s husband who was suppose to take them home to T. You know, the husband postal service. We’d done this with novels and have had no problems.
When we were all out at dinner the other night, I asked T. if she tried any of the recipes in the magazine. Suddenly, the table got very quiet and her husband looked down with a very guilty look on his face. I knew immediately what had happened ~ he threw away the magazines for fear his wife might become a vegetarian. It’s not like she’s an easily influenced 18 year old and, since I’m not a fan of someone who would actually censor his wife’s reading material, I’ve decided to give her “The Best of Vegetarian Cooking” for Christmas 😉
Posted in Miscellaneous | 4 Comments »
So it wasn’t quite like Breakfast at Tiffany’s but I had a very elegant, delicious and informative lunch at the Hyatt which was hosted by Tiffany’s store. I sat at a table with 2 navy spouses and an air force spouse. The Navy life intrigues me so I asked lots of questions of those 2 ladies and they were equally interested in the strange army life.
Tiffanys had several of the spouses wear little black dresses so they could model the jewelry. There were so many gorgeous pieces and so many diamonds. Also present were several very muscular security guards keeping a close eye on everyone which I don’t blame them at all…one ring cost $24,000. Yes, I have the right number of zeros 😉
I’m not much of a jewelry wearer. I basically wear my wedding ring/engagement ring and I’ll occasionally (rarely) throw on gold earrings and a necklace. The sales director gave us a brief lesson on what makes a Tiffany diamond special. He then offered for us to look through the special diamond magnifying machine so we could check out our own diamond. Three of us at the table looked at each other and all agreed we didn’t really want to take a look. Why would we want to see flaws or anything else since we were all emotional attached to our wedding rings. The fourth woman at our table sheepishly looked down. We asked if she wanted to check out her ring and she shyly said “Well, when I first got engaged, I had the ring appraised.” Wow, that’s what I call one practical woman! She explained that she wanted to make sure the jeweler hadn’t cheated her soon-to-be husband.
It’s unlikely I’ll be getting any Tiffany diamonds anytime soon ~ we spend all our disposable income (little that there is) on traveling. I’d rather have those great memories than a hard rock anyday.
Posted in Miscellaneous | 3 Comments »
After spending a very tranquil Thanksgiving with FM and FG, I curled up to my book club novel “The Red Tent” at about 9:45 p.m. FG had just gone to bed and FM was in the living room going through old files. About 5 minutes later, the bed started shaking. At first, it reminded me of when Bennett would lean up against the bed and, with all 100 lbs of him, it would give the bed a good shaking. I could see Sport across the room curled up on his dog bed and Maya was in her crate for the night. That’s when it hit me ~ an earthquake!
As I made my way down the hallway to see if FM felt it, FG came out of her room. Her bed is elevated on stilts (you know, the IKEA special) so her bed really shook. FM, who was sitting on the floor, felt nothing. And so much for dogs have the sixth sense to predict an upcoming earthquake ~ both dogs were sound asleep.
FG was quite shaken (pun intended) and ended up sleeping with me that night. The local paper reported the magnitude of the quake was 4.6 and located 35 miles southeast of Guam’s capital, Hagåtña. After hearing about the earthquake on the Big Island in Hawaii the day before, it seems the Pacific Rim is a rockin’ place these days! Rocking in the New Year may have a whole different meaning for us this year…
Posted in Travel | 3 Comments »
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