Gecko Gets Fresh and Homesickness

aloha_amanda — Sat, 14 Apr 2012 20:33:00 GMT

Tomorrow is my official one-month anniversary of being in Hawaii. I will celebrate it with a trip to Walmart, because that is how I celebrate everything. By consuming.

I have been working and living at one small farm, but soon must leave and move to another farm. I will only be at the other farm for two weeks, and they will not feed me in exchange for my work, so I've decided to live off of the package of spirulina I brought with me. I've been working for this other farm in the evenings for cash money dollar bills, but they are not technically part of the WWOOF organization and do not understand that they must provide food for their helpers. Alas, I am desperate for a place to stay while I await word from other farms. So I will probably smell like algea by the end of the two weeks.

Today I was hacking away dead leaves in a banana patch and a green gecko (not native to Hawaii, although cute I have found out that they are rat bastards who harass and sometimes even EAT the native brown house geckos) jumped out onto my foot. It quickly scampered up my leg and I tried to shoo it away with a banana leaf. It proceeded to run up my leg and into my shorts. I screamed. I hit my thigh with the banana leaf. The gecko, unharmed, scampered back down. I am starting a new anti-green gecko campaign. I learned that the native brown geckoes, who make a cute little chirping noise, only come out at night because the rat-bastard green geckos harass them so badly. DOWN WITH GREEN GECKOS!

Amidst the chaos of trying to find a place to stay while here I've been feeling homesick for the first time in a long time. Normally when I travel far from home I do not feel homesick. Here I long for the Hudson River Valley, all of my friends there, and my family back in the Midwest. I long to see those green, enless corn fields flowing like ocean waves in the stifling summer breeze. I think about my cats, my brother, my parents, my cousins and aunts and uncles, the barbecues and family get togethers I will miss (like always), the funny stories I will not be a part of, the births, and all of the things that are important to a Midwestern girl. In New York I will miss my community of lovely volunteers, the friends who are my extended soul family, the beauty of the valley, the rolling green hills and Catskill Mountains, the black bears wandering around at twilight, rummaging in the garbage in the early morning, the laughter, the connection, the music and merrymaking, the joy of community. I seek that here, but I do not find it in the same calibre as on the mainland. New York state is the only other place that has felt like home to me, and in my stubbornness I am loathe to admit that Hawaii does not fill that 'home' place in my soul. It is beautiful and slightly exotic and can be very fun, but it is not a place I can settle down into and grow roots.

I question whether I can do that anywhere, though. Five years of endless travelling, moving around every few months or weeks, never quite able to sink in. I feel like I have to keep moving.

Big Begin

aloha_amanda — Sat, 7 Apr 2012 21:34:00 GMT

A few weeks ago I did something a little unorthodox. Of course, my whole life has been slightly unorthodox, full of sporadic little adventures based mostly on desperation of some sort. What I did was this: I quit my seasonal job in Vail, Colorado, and bought a one-way plane ticket to the farthest place I could conceivably afford to fly to with my meager savings and I waited.

Two weeks of unpaid vacation went by and finally March 13th arrived. I flew out of Denver International Airport and arrived the next morning at Kailua-Kona airport, on the Big Island of Hawaii. Although some may scoff at the mildness of this move, I must mention that A) My planning did not take me any further than the plane ticket, which exausted my funds, B) Hawaii is pretty much another country. It's at least a couple thousand miles from any significant landmass, and C) I decided that I would survive on a small package of spirulina and live in an $8 Walmart hammock with an 8X8 tarp to cover me. So, when I go I go hard.

I had an overnight layover in San Jose airport where I met a woman who was vacationing on the BI and had never been before. We immediately bonded and decided to share a sleeping bench in the airport for the night. The next morning we stumbled bleary-eyed toward the Pete's Coffee stand and discussed Hawaii over steaming paper cups of coffee. My friend, V, told me all about the various budget adventures she planned to take while on the island and invited me to stay with her a night or two if I needed to shower or simply sleep on a real bed. She was staying in the South Kona coast at a nice little country retreat, hidden away from the rest of the nice little country coast (it's very country out here).

One five hour flight later and I was at ground zero of my own personal freedom. I was far enough away from the mainland that it would be a pain in the ass to go back right away, but not too far that it would be too much of a pain in the ass if something happened in my family, or I simply wimped out and got sick of spirulina. V picked me up in her rental car and gave me a ride to the Old Airport beach, where I spread out, sat under a tree, and formulated something resembling a plan. I decided I was uninterested in town and I wanted to walk the coast a ways. I tried to rearrange one backpack, one travel guitar, one heavy pair of boots, and one smaller bag so that they would be easier to walk with. I had packed lightly, but not practically. My only shoes were slipper mocossins with fur lining, appropriate for Colorado winter but totally inappropriate for my current situation. The heavy boots were also impractical, as they were made for Ohio winters.

I ended up walking around five miles that first day, the weight of my belongings totally weighing me down. I kind of wanted to die by the time the sun was setting. My whole body ached and I could not breathe easily because of the way I was carrying the bags against my body. It didn't matter though, because I was in Hawaii and I never had to return to my punkass job again! As night fell I began to look for a place to hang my hammock. Just before the last light sunk under the earth and left me in complete darkness I saw a black figure moving swiftly in a ravine below. I was hoping it was a friendly domesticated dog. It looked like a panther. I ignored it and pressed on, looking for appropriately spaced trees far enough away from the highway that I would be safe from harassment. I searched for about an hour more before I collapsed in exaustion next to a row of hedges near a lava rock wall. I wedged myself in between hedges and wall and unrolled my tarp, clumsily shrouding myself and my belongings. I prayed that I would no longer feel as if I had been hit by a semi truck when I awoke.

Although seemingly endless, the night I spent 'under the bush' was rather beautiful. A little chilly, thank god for wool socks, but no complaints. I wasn't harassed by any scorpions, fireants, centipedes, brown recluses, or police officers. Bums and tweakers I figured I could fight off or join in some sort of vagabond alliance, but the former pests I did not wish to meet.

So, there it is. That's how this trip began.

Life is a Dirty Beach

Gecko Gets Fresh and Homesickness

Big Begin