Friday, July 21, 2006
The First Full Day . . .
July 5th, 2006: 
A long plane ride through Chicago and on to Honolulu, Hawaii to our accommodations at Brigham Young University. What a day we had!
First, a trip to the Byodo In Buddhist Temple, at the Valley of the Temples Memorial Park. The temple was established in 1968 to commemorate the first Japanese immigrants to Hawaii. Byodo-In tranlates to "temple of equality - not to discriminate". The golden Buddha inside the temple is the largest carved wooden Buddha in the world.
Next onto the Dole Pineapple Plantation! "Can I get a toot-toot?!" Founded by James Dole, we had a chance to learn how to choose and slice the perfect pineapple, then onto the Pineapple Express for a train ride through the plantation. We saw how and where the pineapples were grown. When we arrived back at the "station" we ran through the largest maze in the world to collect stencil characters at the different maze stations.
A little shopping, then off to the North Shore.
Our first trip to the beach! Waimea Beach on Oahu's North Shore. The sand was smooth underneath the calm waves as many students ran into the ocean for their first time. The sand was warm and clean as the students splashed and built dams and fortresses out of sand. A refreshing end to an exciting first day.
Back at BYU, most of us slept with the windows and doors open in our dorm rooms to keep cool. As we slept the first night, we could hear the songs and drums of the Polynesian Cultural Center next door.
A long plane ride through Chicago and on to Honolulu, Hawaii to our accommodations at Brigham Young University. What a day we had!First, a trip to the Byodo In Buddhist Temple, at the Valley of the Temples Memorial Park. The temple was established in 1968 to commemorate the first Japanese immigrants to Hawaii. Byodo-In tranlates to "temple of equality - not to discriminate". The golden Buddha inside the temple is the largest carved wooden Buddha in the world.
Next onto the Dole Pineapple Plantation! "Can I get a toot-toot?!" Founded by James Dole, we had a chance to learn how to choose and slice the perfect pineapple, then onto the Pineapple Express for a train ride through the plantation. We saw how and where the pineapples were grown. When we arrived back at the "station" we ran through the largest maze in the world to collect stencil characters at the different maze stations.
A little shopping, then off to the North Shore.Our first trip to the beach! Waimea Beach on Oahu's North Shore. The sand was smooth underneath the calm waves as many students ran into the ocean for their first time. The sand was warm and clean as the students splashed and built dams and fortresses out of sand. A refreshing end to an exciting first day.
Back at BYU, most of us slept with the windows and doors open in our dorm rooms to keep cool. As we slept the first night, we could hear the songs and drums of the Polynesian Cultural Center next door.
# posted by Author @ 7:38 PM 
