Trying to make the most of the limited time we had left, I turned to our AAA Tourbook for guidance. It had the Bishop Museum listed as a must see. It required our longest bus trip so far, and it took us through Honolulu and into its residential northern side. We were now savvy about the City Express bus, which made the total trip there about 45 minutes, saving us at least 15 minutes of travel time. I was glad Terri was keeping a sharp eye out on the street signs because I would have been lost. We disembarked in what looked like the middle of a normal residential community with no sign of a museum. But following directions we found if you walked two blocks south there was in fact a museum.
The Bishop Museum is probably the oldest museum in the
island. It has a huge collection of artifacts on Hawaiian and Polynesian culture
(as well as a planetarium, science center and other buildings) scattered over
half a dozen buildings or so. If Hawaii were to have a Smithsonian museum this
would be it. The main building contained the historical exhibits. It was large
and on three levels. We spent about an hour wandering through that one building
and it was absolutely fascinating. I could have spent the whole day there. Not
only were there artifacts tracing the Hawaiian monarchy, but there were all
sorts of other collections too. You wouldn’t think there would be much
Portuguese culture in Hawaii, for example, but you’d be wrong and there was a
small wing just on this one topic.
But what Terri and I found most interesting were the boats
and the maps showing the spread of Polynesian culture across the Pacific. It
seemed amazing that any one in these boats could find a place like Hawaii as it
is in the middle of nowhere and thousands of miles from anything. But as the
exhibits made clear, getting around the Pacific hundreds and thousands of years
ago was not that mysterious a process. The Polynesians didn’t have math or
sextants, but they did have a good understanding of the seasons and the stars.
And by knowing the location of constellations like the Southern Cross at certain
times of the year it was a pretty easy thing to measure latitude. Their boats
held plenty of dry goods and water, and there was all the fish they could want
overboard, and fresh water could be captured when it rained. So over time they
did manage to get and move all around the Pacific, long before white men
discovered the place.
There is also a planetarium. We took in a show where we
learned how to do our own navigation by stars, without instruments. We used our
hands to measure the location of the Southern Cross above the horizon, and how
far certain constellations like Orion were above the horizon based on the time
of year. They showed a film of a trip from Hawaii to Tahiti performed using this
method of navigation completed in the late 1970s. Mainly it was a matter of
following the trade winds until the latitude seemed right by the stars, then
moving west. In addition natives knew that when they saw birds land was likely
to be near, so they followed birds.
While we were there we took in the science center. The
major topic was cloning and we listened to a lecture and saw some cloned mice.
The cloned mouse had a gene that made its skin glow in the dark, and which
actually came from a plant. You could see the parents and surrogate mother in
their cages. I think glow in the dark mice are going to be in high demand in pet
stores pretty soon!
We also enjoyed a leisurely lunch in their snack bar. By mid afternoon though Rosie was getting restless and we headed back to Waikiki.
I had noticed an advertisement in the Honolulu Advertiser
for a weekend concert of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. I couldn’t stand it and
fortunately it didn’t take much arm-twisting to talk Terri into coming either.
I tried to get Rosie interested but she opted to chill at the condo instead.
Terri and I took advantage of the opportunity to go out to dinner by ourselves
and not see a cheeseburger at our evening meal. Rosie was content with some
macaroni and cheese we bought her.
So it was back on the bus with what passed for our good
clothes. I figured Hawaii would be pretty laid back about going to a concert,
but I saw a fair number of men in suits and ladies in expensive dark dresses.
There was a TGIFs close to the concert hall where we had dinner. It was
considerably less expensive than restaurants on Waikiki, but someone had turned
up the AC and we were very cold. We were glad to leave and get warmed up!
The performing arts center is a place called the Blaisdell
Concert Hall. And that’s all there is there: one very big concert hall and
stage. Samuel Wong is the Honolulu Symphony Orchestra’s principle conductor.
He’s either a busy guy or the HSO doesn’t give a whole lot of concerts,
because Mr. Wong also conducts the Hong Kong Philharmonic, and does a lot of
guest conducting too. The concert hall was quite elogent and easily sat a couple
thousand people. We appreciated the wide aisles. I was surprised that they
didn’t fill up the auditorium. It was about 75% full. This performance is done
every year about this time and is something of a tradition. Even so
Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony is arguably the best piece of classical music ever
written, so I thought the place would be filled.
The symphony is about 75 minutes long so to stretch it out
the added some pieces to show off the orchestra’s brass section for the first
half hour. During the intermission the stage became very, very crowded with a
full chorus occupying the back of the stage and the orchestra and soloists
actually pushing off the side of the stage.
My feeling is that everyone should go hear Beethoven’s
Ninth performed live about once every ten years, and it had been more than that
for me. The last two times had been at the Kennedy Center. The acoustics of the
Blaisdell Concert Hall are not quite up to those at the Kennedy Center.
Unfortunately this meant that during the performance certain instruments or
voices got lost. But neither Terri nor I had any complaints about the
performance itself. It was conducted with great spirit by Mr. Wong. The
soloists, particularly the soprano Mary Chesnut, were excellent. The orchestra
is quite good also. I don’t think they are up to National Symphony Orchestra
quality but my Washingtonian bias may be showing. So we were both satisfied and
a little sad when it was over. We weren’t the only patrons who took the bus: a
couple dozen of us were at the bus shelter after the performance. We were back
in our condo by 10:30 p.m. Rosie was happily zoned out on the TV.
We shuffled off to bed knowing that in the morning we had to leave. But at least our vacation had ended well.