Founder's Week and Love Is In The Air: February 10 - 16, 2025

 

   

      Love is in the air - it's Valentine's week and for Family Home Evening we started out learning how to make origami hearts.  It took a little time, but everyone who tried to make the origami hearts were able to master the skill and you can see the results of all the hearts on the table in the bottom right picture.

     Then we played team charades.  There were two teams, and half the team had to act out the phrases and the other half of the team had to guess what they were acting out.  All of the clues were Valentine/love related.  The pictures of the team with all girls acting were trying to get their team to guess Jack & Rose from the movie "Titanic".  It took them a long time to guess that one.  The other team is acting out "Beauty and the Beast".  That was a hard one too.  But most of the phrases were easily guessed

It's Founder's Week at BYU - Hawaii and they are celebrating 70 years.  The school opened in 1955 as the Church College of Hawaii.  In 1974 they changed the name to Brigham Young University - Hawaii.  Quoting from an article written by Juan Carlos De los Reyes, a student in our YSA Ward, 

"As BYU–Hawaii looks to the future, it remains rooted in its mission to prepare students to become leaders in their families, communities, and countries. The university’s commitment to excellence, spiritual growth, and cultural understanding ensures that it will continue to be a beacon of light and learning for future generations. From its first class of 153 students to its current global reach, BYU–Hawaii’s story is one of faith, perseverance, and aloha, creating disciples of Jesus Christ worldwide."   There were special activities all week for students, alumni, and the community.

  

   I found these two photos of an aerial photo of BYU-H taken in 1955 (top) and a current photo of BYU-H (bottom).  You can definitely see the growth of the campus.

      On Tuesday night there was an alumni/student talent show at the BYU-H Aloha Ballroom.  We decided to go check it out.  We were surprised that it wasn't very crowded, but then I realized that a lot of students are working at the PCC, and even more were probably practicing for culture night happening in 3 weeks.  The first performers were a community group of hula dancers.  They began with the blowing of the conch shell.

        Then one of the hula performers gave an oli, or a Hawaiian chant, of welcome.  Then they performed several hula dances.   These ladies are very good.  The leader of the group teaches hula lessons every Wednesday night at the Marriott Courtyard hotel that is in Laie.

 

    Next performers were a student dance class performing Tongan dances.  They started out all dancing while standing up, women in front, men in back.  The student in the bright red dress, front and center, is Maheta.  She is in our YSA Ward.

    

 Then they all sat down cross-legged on the floor to dance, women still in front, men in back.

The dance ended with the women sitting and the men standing up while dancing.  Notice all of the performers will huge smiles on their faces.  They have so much joy and fun when they dance.

    We were entertained by a group of 3 guitarists.   They were very good and played a song that we were not familiar with, but the locals all knew it and we could tell it was very popular.  It was sung in Hawaiian, so we couldn't understand the words, but the tune was very catchy.

   The Aloha Center employees performed the "boot scootin' boogie".  Elder and Sister Tate (they are in our district) who serve at the Aloha Center are the two dancers on the left of the singer.  

    The next group to perform was a Tahitian group.  Although we regularly see these dances at the Polynesian Cultural Center, it never gets old because of the performer's enthusiasm and love of the dances.

     A solo performer sang next.  She is a current student and sings in the BYU - Hawaii's  Ho'olokahi Chamber Choir.  She said she was nervous, but she sang wonderfully.

        We left before the show was over, but the last performers that we heard was a family group.  The Grandpa (far left in the picture) has been on the TV show, Hawaii 5-0 and has played in some famous places on the island and elsewhere.  His son (far right) and two of his grandsons were playing ukuleles with him.  They were all amazing, but the grandsons (middle two) were very accomplished for as young as they are.  Of course, one of the songs they played was the theme from the TV show, Hawaii 5-0.  I was really glad we stayed long enough to hear them perform.

 

    We received these 70th anniversary t-shirts when we attended the talent show Tuesday night.  We decided to wear them the next day when we did town run.  While we were at Wal-Mart picking up an order, we took time to take a selfie to show off our new T-Shirts.

 

   Speaking of Wal-Mart, when I went inside the store, I was greeted with Valentine's Day balloons everywhere.  It looked like I had just walked into a party!

     There are a lot of historic church buildings around downtown Honolulu that we drive by a lot on our town runs.  I was finally able to get a somewhat decent photo of the Kaumakapili Church, the United Church of Christ building. This church building was dedicated in 1911.

  

    I thought I'd highlight one of our stops for town run this week - June's Fabrics.  It's located in a small old warehouse, but it's crammed full of fabric as you can see from the picture to the right.  They specialize in Hawaiian print fabrics.  We have only picked up here one other time back when we were doing town run last spring.  As a sewer, I would have loved to browse the inventory while I was there, but we had no time for that with all the stops we had on our list. 

  

    We had another full van after all our stops.  You can't see all the boxes we had in the back of the van and underneath all the snacks we picked up at Sam's club for guest services.

    

      On Thursday I brought the Valentine's Day treats in for the student workers that Sister Sauve and I had put together last week.  They are all so far from home and most of their families can't afford to send care packages to them, so we try to help make their birthdays and holidays somewhat special for them. 

     Elder Rappleye and the motor pool group got to play with the big toys (Kubota, backhoe, and dump truck) on Thursday.  They are working on clearing out the green space that the PCC has been using because that space is going to be used by BYU-Hawaii now.  One of the jobs was moving a big pile of wood to get it ready for pick up by another company.  Elder Rappleye was the dump truck driver.  Bri would load up the back of the truck with the logs using the backhoe.  Elder Rappleye would drive the dump truck over to the new area and dump his load.  Elder Bates would then use the Kubota forks to stack the logs up.  All morning they worked out in the green space.  The servicing of carts would have to wait.  I think Elder Rappleye liked the change of scenery and pace.  He did forget to put a hat on and got a little too much sun on his head and face.

      Sister Sauve had brought in jars of candy for the students to guess how many pieces in each jar.  The person whose guess was the closest to the actual amount got to take home the jar.  On Friday she announced the winners - Jar #1 - was a tie with Joanna and Bryron, but she gave it to Joanna because Bryron was the winner of Jar #2.

 

      After we got done with work, we quickly went home hoping that Paulino, our back neighbor wouldn't be home from work yet.  Luckily, he wasn't home yet, so we grabbed the origami hearts we made on Monday night along with some hearts I had left from decorating the office and "heart attacked" his front door.

      I had written some sayings on the origami hearts and added some stickers to jazz them up.  I don't know what he thought when he saw his door, but his girlfriend went back to the mainland (she said she needed a break) before Christmas and hasn't returned yet, so we thought he might be feeling a little lonely and down on Valentine's Day.

   Our plan was to head down to Honolulu to check out a free Hula show at the International Marketplace in Waikiki that they do every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evenings.  We wanted to see if it was worth bringing our family to when they come visit in a couple of weeks.  We left early enough to allow plenty of time to find parking, or so we thought.  First google maps took us to the wrong place, then when we found the right parking garage, it showed 13 spots left on the top level, but by the time we got to the top there was no parking spots left anywhere.  By then we only had about 5 minutes until the show started so we knew we didn't have a chance to find another place to park and walk to the International Marketplace in time.  That was totally disappointing.  

      Instead, we ended up going to the one place we knew we could get a parking spot - Wal-Mart!  Then we walked the half a mile to Ala Moana Park.  We arrived just in time to see the last few minutes of the sunset.  Then we walked back to Ala Moana Mall's food court and got some dinner.  We found a Charlie's Philly Steaks eatery, so we had to get Elder Rappleye's picture taken by the sign.  It turned out to be a pretty lame Valentine's Day date, but if you had seen how crowded the food court was you would know we weren't the only was with lame plans.  While we were eating, a Hawaii Tours driver sat down across from us, and we started talking and found out that he lives in Laie and is a return missionary.  Missionary tags can be great conversation starters!

    Saturday was a great day for some beach time.  It was windy, but the sun was out which made it warm. You can see in the right-hand picture the kite surfers had been out on the water.  You can't tell from the left-hand picture, but the wind turbines in the background were turning. We were thinking how much Dave Rhoades would have liked a day like this - a perfect kite flying day. 

       Last winter here in Hawaii we hardly ever went to the beach, it was too rainy, overcast, and/or chilly for the beach.  This winter has been wonderful - warmer, drier, and a lot more sun.  So grateful to have a memorable last winter here in Hawaii.  

      We had a low-key Sunday.  No piano lessons, my student couldn't make it. No mission activities.  We did have our extended family home evening on google meet with all of our children and grandchildren able to zoom in.  The wonders of technology have made serving a mission so far from family bearable.  Thirty years ago, when my parents and Elder Rappleye's parents served as senior missionaries they were not able to Facetime, google meet, zoom, see family posts on Facebook, Instagram, or even talk on the phone (long distance fees too expensive).  Letters were still the only way to stay in touch.  That must have been a great sacrifice for them, and I admire them tremendously for it.  Our sacrifice seems like a small price to pay compared to theirs.  Just trying to "Honor Our Legacy", as one of the seven cultural beliefs of the Polynesian Cultural Center encourages.