My cousin Haemi
My cousin Haemi came to Hawai‘i for a visit. She grew up here but moved away, and hasn’t been back for almost 9 years. Haemi is my birth mom’s niece, so growing up I didn’t know her. And as it happened, she moved away a few months before I met my birth mom again, so this was the very first time I got to meet her. It has been very cool being able to meet and get to know her.
She turned 21 while here, so we had a birthday lunch for her.
Haemi’s an athlete so I suggested that we could do a hike. At first I was thinking of something easy, like one of the Tantalus trails, but when she heard my initial plans she hemmed and hawed and then asked if we couldn’t try something a bit more challenging. OK, I said. So we went to Hawai‘i Loa Ridge instead.
Oh. My. God. The last time I did Hawai‘i Loa Ridge was with Chris and Tommy and my friend Rick, and I was probably the fittest of the group. But this time, I was hiking with someone who was half my age, and who was an avid ice hockey player to boot. She had legs of steel and was in awesome shape. And me? Well, I was not. I hadn’t done a strenuous hike in about six months, and due to the crazy holiday season, I hadn’t even biked in two months. Gaah! On the way up, I was calling for water breaks every five or ten minutes.
Once we got to the top, though, the view was worth it, as always:
The obligatory we-were-really-there shot:
Looking back towards Honolulu from the summit. That’s Koko Crater and Koko Head to the far left, and Diamond Head to the far right.
On another day, eating at the Ala Moana Makai Market, we were joined by Amber’s friends Drei and Gavin. Suddenly I had an inkling of what it would have been like to have been in a really big family.
We visited Pearl City Highlands Intermediate, where Haemi spent her 7th grade year before she left Hawai‘i. The place hasn’t changed much. I can remember the same sidewalks and buildings from when I was that age, although since I never attended there, my memories were more of playing around on weekends and riding the sidewalks and stairs on my Mongoose.
We spent some time at the beach, too, and she even got me to go bodyboarding with her, something I haven’t done for years. How come sometimes it takes a special occasion like an out-of-town visitor to make you do fun things like that? Anyway, we had a great time and I was sorry to see her go. Aloha Haemi, come back soon.