This morning, while at Starbucks ordering the morning coffees, a lady remarked that she liked the 'Aloha' shirt I was wearing. When I thanked her for the kind comment, she asked about my accent and where I was from. When I said Australia, she enquired what language we spoke in Australia! Right now there is a lady from continental U.S.A trying to convince her friends that Australians only speak english abroad, and that our native language is actually Dutch.
As my daily routine here is to get up around 0330 to 0430hrs, go for my morning walk, then sit outside Dennys waiting for the coffee shop to open at 0530hrs, I get to see a little of the side of local life that others wouldn't notice. I am perpetually surprised with the number of homeless people around. More than I recalled on previous visit. I guess if you must be vagrant, where better than in Hawaii, right? Still a very sad sight to see these folks that in better circumstances could have had a vastly different life. Who knows what chain of events lead to their present situation. The few that I have spoken with seem decent folks, if a bit guarded about discussing themselves. I could never imagine how desperate their lives must be, living among such affluence, but being reduced to a life on the streets and rummaging through bins for food or recyclables to cash in.
Certainly makes one grateful for the things we take for granted every day.