Frank De Lima's 2010 Graduation Address

My friend, Myrtle forwarded me Frank De Lima's 2010 graduation address a long time ago.  I just happened to see it while searching for something else in my Inbox and wanted to share it with you.  I don't know if people on the mainland or other countries will understand his humor, but for those of us in Hawaii, it definitely hit a funny bone.

Frank Wilcox Napuakekaulike De Lima a popular comedian from Hawaii is considered by some media sources to be the most sought after comic in the state. With a Portuguese, Hawaiian, Irish, Chinese, English, Spanish, and Scottish heritage, he is known for light-hearted "Portagee" (Hawaiian Pidgin English for "Portuguese") slurs in his routine.               -Courtesy of Wikipedia

To The Class of 2010" By Frank De Lima
“EAT RICE”

Ladies and gentlemen of Hawaii’s class of 2010.

Eat rice.

If you only pay attention to one thing I say, pay attention to this: Rice is the breakfast of champions … the lunch of champions … the dinner of champions

Whole empires, entire dynasties have been built and fortified on its humble food.

One grain, by itself, is nothing. Just an embarrassing sticky white t’ing stuck on your T-shirt after lunch. But many grains together -- that’s greatness! It is the foundation of a Spam musubi, the heart of a thousand plate lunches, the force behind the global kingdom of L&L drive-ins.

Rice holds the world together. Be a part of the world. Be a part of the future.

Eat rice.

That said, the rest of what I am going to say is just my opinion.

You will have bad days.

Some day you going be the dog, some days you going be the tree. Wish wasn’t, but that’s the way it is.

Take a lesson from Furlough Fridays. Got a money problem? Don’t take it out on the kids.

And brah … vote! Okay? There’s an election coming up. No excuses. Just do it. This is your country. Own it.

You know the saying: If you have lemons, make lemonade. That’s true. But a bitter melon will never become a honey dew. The moral of the story: If can, can. No can, no can.

Some Hawaii folks have an inferiority complex. Don’t be like that. Consider this: Last year, our state produced BOTH a president AND a saint.

Not all malasadas are made perfectly round. So what. The purpose of a malasada is not to look good, it’s to taste good. Remember that.

Don’t sneeze when you eat saimin. (noodles in a broth)

Take your face out of Facebook, okay? At least for a little while. Real faces are better anyway. So are real books. Read one. Or two.

Buy a newspaper. Only get one left. If you don’t, that one going be gone – along with the Long’s ad forever.

Recycle your graduations leis before they become ma-ke (dead). Care homes could all use some extra flower power.

And remember, you live on the most beautiful spot on earth. Malama the ‘aina. Respect the land, respect the water, respect the air, respect all life. Once they’re gone, they’re gone.

Slow down. Walk more. Drive less. The less you drive, the more you’ll see.

Give at least one can of tuna to the food bank. Don’t strive to be mediocre. Be great. Go for the gusto. If you want to climb a mountain, pick Mauna Kea. Not Red Hill.

Learn to play the ukulele. Memorize the words of Hawai’i Pono’i. Make your own lei. Go to the Merrie Monarch Festival. Tour ‘Iolani Palace. Walk around Punchbowl. Buy local. Eat local. Wear local. Support Hawaiian music.

And no forget, thank our military personnel.

Above all, eat rice.

If you have diabetes, make that brown rice.

How I Cut Our Pineapples

Everybody has their own way to cut pineapple.  This is the way I do it.  I worked (toiled, sweat) in the Dole Pineapple Factory for three summers before I went to college so I could find a less physically taxing job.  Because of this, there are certain members of our household who feel I should be the one to cut the pineapple.

Art loves to grow pineapple.  When I saw the last one he harvested, I volunteered to cut it because it was so cute.

Isn't this adorable?












I twisted the crown off the fruit.

Then I cut the ends off.

At Dole Pineapple Factory, the Ginaca machines used to remove all the pineapple skins for us.  We just had to take off what the machine missed.





The next step is to halve and quarter it.

I slice off the cores.  Someone told me the cores are good for digestion so I freeze it for smoothies.










I cut the pineapple into slices.

I then find it easier to peel off the skin and cut the wedges into cubes.  No I don't usually hold the knife that way to peel the skin.  Art just had me do it to show the process.

I was thrilled that I had such a small pineapple to cut and was done in a jiffy.  It was incredibly sweet!

A few days later Art's friend, Morris called and asked for some help lifting something.  As a thank you, he gave Art this pineapple that he grew.  Good grief!  It was the BIGGEST, heaviest pineapple I've EVER seen.  It took me an hour to cut it and there was enough to share with my brother and a neighbor. The amazing thing is that it was super sweet with almost no acidity.

Art just took off the crown and planted it.  I hope he cuts whatever grows out of this one.

The Culprit!

When we were gone to China, we were amazed at how much our new Satsuma Tangerine tree(ling) had grown.  I've been imagining wonderful sweet tangerines coming from it before my granddaughter who is 6 years old leaves high school.

AGGRAVATION!  That's when we noticed that the leaves were rapidly being eaten.

I no longer have any impatiens because all six of the luxurious fuchsia plants I'd added to our garden were eaten down to the nub by slugs.

But could slugs climb up a tree?

We searched for signs of slugs, but couldn't find any.  Soon I was picturing my tree completely bald with no hope of fruit.

Then we found the culprit.

Well... sort of.  The culprit was in metamorphosis.  We never noticed it before because he (or she) is the exact color of the leaves.  (It's a butterfly or moth cocoon)  By the afternoon, only an empty shell was there.  If it was a she, I hope she lays her eggs some place else.

An Ordinary Glorious Day!

It was a busy day!  We got up early to go to the Farmers Market and picked up some vegetables and fruits.  While there we stopped to chat with some of our favorite vendors and met smiling neighbors.  We bought some gobo-burdock root to share with Auntie Grace and daikon for Auntie Dorothy.

We were excited because we had finally finished our National Parks Trip Photo Album for mom.  Art really feels it's important for us to print it because mom enjoys seeing all the photos and remembering so many of the details of the trip that she usually forgets until she looks back at the photos.  Her job will now be to add her memories and write them in Japanese.  We then write the albums on DVDs and send them to her siblings in Japan as well Sam (Art's Tokyo college buddy).

It's been a long slog to work as quickly as we can to select photos, research and write important things about each park, find names of wildflowers and format them on pages.  Our album ended up being 103 pages!  But it was worth it and we were DONE and ready to have it printed.

Since we were going off to town, we planned to also pick up my medication at Tripler Hospital.  Everybody seemed to be smiling.  We could find parking!  The sun was shining brightly.

At Office Max, we saw our young cousin.  He is in charge of their printing.  He took our flash drive and said we could do our errands while he loaded and printed it.  We had a wonderful chat before leaving.

Next we went to see Auntie Grace.  She gave us Swiss Chard and lettuce from her garden.  Cousin Arnold was there so we talked about possible trips we might some day take together.

We went back to Office Max and collected what our cousin had printed for us.  The 103 copies were absolutely fabulous!  Crisp, perfect colors.  It's the best we've seen yet from any printer.

Then we went to see Auntie Dorothy and dropped off lettuce from Auntie Grace and the daikon we'd bought her and Uncle.  There was a large Hayden mango that had fallen from her tree.  I gave it to her and she laughingly said I should just take it home.   We passed a parking lot and waved to a friend I hadn't seen in a while.

Art and I decided to stop at Burger King and use a coupon we had for a chicken sandwich.  Everybody there was full of smiles.  Our meal was great!  I'd noticed a 50% off sale on their soft serve.  It was only 79 cents!  Art couldn't believe the HUGE cone she created and handed me with a laughing smile.

In the parking lot, we bumped into my friend Joanne from Zumba. 

"Isn't it an amazing day?  Everybody is so friendly and happy,"  said Art.

It really was.  I wish I could bottle days like this for when the clouds roll in.  Life is yin and yang.  For all these wonderful days, I know life is a balance.

We brought the pages home and I put them in an album for mom.  She was thrilled and ecstatic about the gorgeous photos and the memories that came flooding back.

She called me downstairs a moment ago.   "OH NO!" she said.  "You wrote June 1, 2013 instead of June 12, 2013 on the first page."

Mom used to work for a newspaper.  She may not be able to read English well, but she can catch errors.   Sigh...

Yin Yang.  Oh well.  It's been a glorious day!  And you know what?  I think she's getting a lot of secret pleasure out of being able to find our errors.

She's happy.  That's the main thing... and so are we.

Day #12: June 23rd - Las Vegas to Honolulu

We had the breakfast buffet at the California hotel at 8:00 and packed up all our things.

We went next door to the Main Street Casino and saw a lot of the antique furnishings.  It was interesting.

When we were in the elevator a fellow looked at us and said, "You must have won big because you're all smiling."

We told him we hadn't gambled at all and asked how he did.  He smiled ruefully and said, "I'm just keeping Vegas prosperous."

Our daughter, Tiffany had mentioned the Venetian gondola rides so we had to stop by and see what it was all about.

Mom loved listening to all the music.









She was shocked when we told her that the skies were painted and not real.

We were just in time to catch this free performance.

And then it was time to head for the airport.

It still boggled my mind to see the pyramid and Sphinx. 

Mom said she didn't need the wheelchair and could walk.

Here's proof that Hawaiian does still provide food and they are an on time airline.











Our check in luggage was waiting for us, thank goodness!

When I returned home I found two more clearer photos of our missing luggage and sent them to American Airlines in Texas and Las Vegas' baggage claim along with ALL our contact information and address.

Four days after our return home, our missing carry-on arrived via Fed-Ex.  It had a lot of stories to tell.  The bag had somehow gone to Irving, Texas to Fort Worth, Texas to Memphis, Tennessee to Honolulu.  It didn't tell us how it got from Honolulu to Texas in the first place though.  It was also missing our TSA lock that we know we had on and that luggage tag with my email was cut off.  Other than that, everything seemed to be there.

And so ended the saga of our trip to the canyons. 

We're working on the trip album for mom now.  Our luggage mishap will have a small place in the narration of our travel.  We'll be highlighting all the beautiful places, the kind people, the delicious food and definitely all the gorgeous wildflowers that mom loved.

That is what needs to be remembered.

Day #11: June 22nd - Las Vegas

We got a leisurely morning start.  We did notice that despite the full kitchen, it did not have a coffee maker.  Then we realized that it must be because we were in St George, Utah which is a Mormon town.

No problem.

We had muffins, bananas, grapes and some of our bottled water.

We then took a short trip to see the beautiful Mormon Temple.













And then we were on our way again back to Las Vegas.

We were back in Vegas where it all started.

Art spoke again with Carol from Las Vegas' Baggage Claim who asked for all the pertinent information from American.

So our question is...

How did our carry-on gate check-in at  Honolulu's Hawaiian Airlines flight to Las Vegas end up in Texas at American Airlines?

And why did it take so long to find when it was supposed to be tagged by Hawaiian Airlines at the gate and had my own personal luggage tag with contact information on it?

Well... we still weren't sure what was going to happen.  We still didn't know if everything in it was still there.

Art's favorite travel clothes were in there along with our original chargers.

We couldn't dwell on it. We had only a day left to our trip.

We checked back into the California Hotel and Casino.

We went out to dinner at P.F. Chang's in the Planet Hollywood Resort and Casino and had a great time.










Mom was agog at all the frenzy and glitz of Vegas.

We loved the fountains at the Bellagio with synchronized fountain and music.  The portable chair came in really handy.  Thank you for that advice, Kay of An Unfittie's Guide to Adventurous Travel.  We must have stayed there for about an hour watching three or four sets of the fountain performances.  Mom loved it!

We saw a little more of the night lights before returning to the California hotel.

However, before we went in, we took mom to Freemont Street for a look at all the hustle and bustle there.

Art and I were pretty worn out, burning the last of our remaining adrenalin for  the day ahead.

Mom was tired, but happy with her memories of all that she'd seen.

Day #10: June 21 Grand Canyon North Rim

We got up at 7:30 and made coffee.  Art and I went out to get muffins and bananas for our breakfast at The Coffee Shop and Roughrider Saloon.

The freshly baked muffins were really great, by the way.

We went to the Visitors Center.

I loved watching the ranger give the park oath to children who were becoming Junior Rangers.

They promised to learn and experience everything they could and to share their knowledge after they left the parks.

Mom wanted a calendar she saw of the canyons national parks so we were very happy to get it for her.

She wanted to remember everything she'd experienced so far.

There was something about that north rim of the Grand Canyon that really appealed to mom.

It may have been the clearer views of the canyons.

It may have been the lack of crowds and more peaceful feeling.

We stopped at Point Imperial and Roosevelt Point where the views were really stunning!

However, what I really think mom enjoyed were our stops to photograph all the wildflowers we saw.

I don't know what these were.

I knew what these were because I'd seen photos of them at the Visitors Center.

I'm not positive this is an aster. 

The color and markings on the flax were really beautiful.

I've loved lupins ever since I saw them in Canada many years ago.

We did see this Penstemon everywhere we traveled on this trip.

There were also beautiful and interesting insects to photograph.  Art found this pink grasshopper.  I've NEVER seen a pink grasshopper before.
 

We read somewhere that the bison (or are these buffalo?) were becoming a problem at the park because they were eating up a lot of the vegetation.

There was road construction on the way back to St. George which delayed our travel a bit.

And then suddenly...

Would you believe?

An e-mail popped up on my cellphone.

It was a message from American Airlines asking if I'd lost a piece of luggage.

They were writing to the e-mail I had on our missing carry-on's tag.  Neither Hawaiian nor American has access to that e-mail.

We could not believe it!

We couldn't call American because we lost reception then, but I sent an e-mail to them which I hoped would transmit as soon as there was any sort of connection.  It was Friday and they were probably no longer at work.

Art called Hawaiian Airlines to alert them to this development because it was still the middle of the day in Honolulu.  Hawaiian said we should handle it ourselves since American would probably prefer working directly with us.

We arrived in St. George.  Sheesh!  It was still HOT!

Once in St. George, I remembered that I'd taken a photo of our luggage at the start of our trip.  I always do since we'd lost our luggage (for just a day) in the Netherlands a long time ago.

I sent that photo to American Airlines.  Art called Baggage Claim in Las Vegas.  They were a LOT more proactive.  I sent them the e-mail American Airlines had sent us along  with the photo and they said they would take care of things.  However, it was the weekend so it looked like nothing could be done until we returned to Hawaii anyway.

We kept our fingers crossed.

Day #9: June 20th - Antelope Canyon

We had a lovely complimentary breakfast at the Page, Arizona Quality Inn at 7:30 and at 10:00 arrived at the Antelope Slot Canyon Tour office.

It was hot... and dry!

We were surprised to see that the tour office was packed with people.  It took quite a while to process everyone.

The Photographic Tour cost $242.10 for the three of us, $80.70 per person.

We got onto these trucks with benches in the back and had a bumpy ride to the canyon site.

It was Denise of An English Girl Rambles who posted about this site that made us want to come.  I'm very glad we did!

Rob was our tour guide.  He was really wonderful.  The first thing he told us was to take our cameras off of automatic.  We needed to set the white balance to cloudy.  He was also politely assertive telling other tour groups to move out of our camera range since he was conducting a photographic tour.

I wasn't prepared for how crowded the canyon was!  Although there are some photography tours that will not allow point and shoot cameras, this tour was not strict.  In fact, there were only three people with really high powered single lens reflex cameras.

Several of the tour directors were throwing sand into the sunbeams to make our photos more dramatic.

What many didn't realize is how much dust and sand was being thrown into the air.  I saw one Japanese group go by wearing masks. That would be a wise thing to do if you're going to do this tour.

The colors of the canyon were absolutely gorgeous!

Yes, I do have photos without people but when I remember the experience, it's the crowds of people that I remember the most.

Rob told us to put our hands in the sunbeam and he took our photo.

Would you believe someone chose this place to do a proposal?

I never got to see which girl in the crowd this was intended for.

We headed out of the canyon only to find that our truck would not start.

 

There was about a half hour wait for the next tour to arrive so we could use their truck to return.

Thank goodness we had that portable chair so mom could sit and relax while we wandered around taking more photos.

As soon as we got back we headed out toward Grand Canyon's north rim.











We passed Lake Powell on the way.  The blue green color was really startling against the red and white rocks.

We arrived at around 6:00 and the lodge restaurant was already booked until 8:30 so we ate a pizza next door at the Deli in the Pines instead and went to our cabin.

We let mom rest at the cabin while Art and I went to the gift shop.  He was able to find a t-shirt and I got my souvenir mug. 

This was the first time mom had been in a log cabin and she was awed by the experience. There are two rooms per cabin and the connecting door must be made of paper because we could hear every word the kids were saying and shouting on the other side.  We finally had to knock on the door to ask for a little quiet.  It wasn't perfect after that, but we were so tired we fell right asleep.