flickr

ok, it's been a super long time since i used this site. things get busy and it is hard to keep up with this. i just wanted to say i have a flickr account that i will try to use. since all i have to do is upload pictures (i'll probably have a lot of them in the future) it will be an easier way to share what i'm up to. the address is http://www.flickr.com/photos/melstarr/ and it will be somewhat private, so in order to see some pics you'll have to sign up for a free account and add me as a contact. let me know if you want more info :)

part IV

so im not in hawaii anymore. unfortunately. but i am back in dallas with friends again. so thats good too. i really miss my family already.

its been a little more than a week since i left, so this might be hard to catch up all the rest of what we did on break. it'll just be some highlights...

on christmas eve we went to the chapel at schofield barracks. it wasnt quite home. i dont ever remember wearing flip flops to christmas eve service. i really missed my home church. it didn't feel like christmas. i still had a good one, but i had to remind myself what month it was. if it was going to be different, i wanted it to be memorable. so we went to the beach on christmas afternoon!

we went snorkeling at hanauma bay... twice! that was definitely one of the best things to do. it was my first time and i was amazed by how close the fish come. i saw convict tangs and leah and i saw a moray eel! my fear of deep ocean water disappeared when i had the goggles to see in the clear water.

we visited lots of different beaches. waikiki, sunset, bellows, ko'olina, barbers pt. some were really good for waves, others were prettier. my favorite that was pretty and had decent boogie board waves was bellows. also it was semi private, being owned by the gov't and closed to the public during the week.

i got to eat at this wonderful sushi all you can eat restaurant with my dad. it was cool, we're the only ones in the family that like to eat fish. i was excited to try new foods and spend time with dad, since he had to work some of the time we were there (somebody had to). it was decorated really nicely with pink paper umbrellas and green lanterns on the ceiling.

i also had the best waffles ever with macadamia nuts, bananas and coconut syrup.

another fun thing was just hanging out with my family at home. i really needed some relaxing time because of the stressful end of my semester. its nice to be able to hang out with leah or read a book. im so thankful for such a memorable vacation with my family. i love it that we could all be there.

part 3

after a day relaxing at home we went to waikiki for tuesday and wednesday. we stayed at the hale koa, a gorgeous hotel for the military right next to the hilton, on the beach.

its great, lots of green and gardens. a luau place and a big pool. we ate at a restaurant there a couple times. i had coconut syrup on waffles! the best thing ever. the point of staying in a hotel a couple hours from where we were was so we could go to the beach longer and it was easier to walk downtown than parking. traffic is terrible. i never thought i would get to practice hearing some Korean in hawaii but it turns out a lot of the people who live here and visit are asian. they have a couple japanese radio stations and at least one korean one =) oh and korean soap operas on cable. but everyone gets annoyed at me when i try to watch.

we saw a lot of street performers on instruments and those weird mime people who paint themselves and stand there. there was a gold guy, a silver guy, and a 'copper cowboy'.

this is for you Mae, i know how much you love cowboys =) there was also a guy painted in newspaper sitting on a bench covered in newspaper and reading a newspaper. they make funny noises too. like this giant panda person in a panda suit. it squeaked every time it moved!

part 2

by the way, i've been here about a little more than a week. its very nice to have family live here. we dont have to live out of a hotel and look completely like tourists (only a little) because they have an apartment and know their way around by now. the day after we arrived we drove around the east coast to ft bellows and beach cabins there. we stayed within view of the water. it was neat to hear the waves all night long. we swam, laid on the beach, rented a kayak and boogie boarded. the waves weren't huge on that side of the island but it was still fun.

the beach at bellows

view from the cabin

i'll post some pictures but you can go to tara's blog to see some of the same. we headed back to mililani on sunday. it took us a couple hours to drive around the coast, north, and we saw the huge waves that normally people surf. the waves have been 20+ feet high lately, so no one is in the water much there. we've had some good coconuts from stands by the road. yum, i love em fresh. there's also a dole plantation close to the apt, so we'll see that eventually.

I'm in Hawaii

woo hoo. its been awhile since i blogged. before i could say it was because i had nothing to say that you'd want to read (Korean grammar anyone?) but i should say something about hawaii =)

i got to leave dallas 2 days early, so i missed the last two days of class. that was great. it turns out i didnt miss much in the way of tests and projects. we got them turned in on time. and i was plenty sick of classes by that time. i spent a few hours wednesday packing up my room because i procrastinated. the dorm makes us move completely out of the rooms over christmas break even if we are coming back in january. bleh.

so my friends dropped me off at the airport early in the morning on thursday. that was cool of them, i miss them already. especially watching home movies without them. my flight was delayed an hour because of ice on the east coast. if it was delayed any more i might not have made my connecting flight. my weird (but abnormally cheap) flight took me from dallas to atlanta to LA to honolulu. it was good though, i met Tara and Dave in atlanta and we were able to sit next to each other on the looong flight to hawaii. hey i just realized that i was really near both Ashley and Jeremy. aww, sorry guys.

we had so much food on the flights from atlanta on. i thought they would never stop feeding us snacks and drinks. its been a long time since ive had that kind of service on a flight, way to go Delta! the stinky part was the choice of movies. there was sky high, not once, but twice! they decided to show it on both legs of the trip. luckily our entire row of 3 seats had non-functioning headset hookups, just static. it was fun, though, flying with family instead of by myself.

when we got to honolulu it was late late my time (four hour time difference). but my parents and leah were waiting for us with pretty flower leis made from real flowers. my first impression of hawaii was that it smells really good.

cant wait

harry potter and the goblet of fire. that was my favorite book, i think. although i havent read the first few in awhile. i just remember liking the 4th one. and now it comes out friday!

im turning in our final draft of the phonology paper. did i mention working with a partner is hard? but its good for me no matter how i complain. it makes me more willing to do a thorough job so i dont ruin someone else's grade. i have a good partner too. we have a few more things to turn in after this but its good to have at least one done.

also, i cant wait to go to the aukermans for thanskgiving. it will be so much fun. and four days without classes! its almost unheard of. and its cold out finally! i hope it lasts awhile.
Thank you God, you are good.

beatles

im finding that i really like the beatles a lot more than i thought i would. im kinda sad that i never listened to them sooner. i love all other kinds of classic rock and older stuff (NOT oldies) thanks to my parents who kept a lot of great records around the house (pink floyd, led zeppelin, america, deep purple, etc). unfortunately they werent really into the beatles, therefore i wasnt either. i always liked the songs on the radio that i knew were by them but i didnt always know who did what song. so now im borrowing some cds and getting a chance to see some of their movies and i really like them. way to go me for being late on everything. kinda like me getting a gamecube when they are almost obsolete or an ipod mini right before they stop making them. but its still good!

i should thank God more often for giving people talent. life would be much more boring if they had none.

ok fine

hey beth, did you write that with the help of babelfish? this is Mae and I for halloween. i just wanted to do something different. we ended up going to taco bell for a treat and watching nightmare before christmas. that was fun. woo hoo. sorry i dont have cute baby pictures to post =)

this is halloween, halloween lalala