A peek at what’s been going on in our lives, both big and small, here in Hawaii…

Remember how I groaned about having not trying stand-up paddle-boarding (SUP) here? Well, Eaman found us a place that both rents and drives people to nearby Ala Moana Beach Park, one of the best spots for SUP if you don’t have a car. (It’s not a far walk, but those paddle boards are heavy and wide to carry.) I seriously love the the wonderful owners of this store, a husband and wife team, who even cut us a deal since we’ll be coming weekly to SUP. Just as Eaman has fallen for surfing, I’ve fallen for SUP. Being on the water isn’t just a low-impact but rigorous workout for the core and arms, it’s also my happy place — a place with no phone, camera or anyone else to talk to. It’s just me and my head. As runners say about their own sport, it’s very meditative.

A few weeks ago, Craig presented his thesis and walked out a P-H-D in marine biology. We celebrated with beer, cupcakes and dinner at Himalayan Kitchen. Oh, and he also just won an Emmy for his team’s camera work for the Ironman Triathlon. Very proud! And I’m now related to an Emmy winner.

Oh, just a gorgeous tree near Waikiki Beach.

Our friends hosted a Godfather viewing party/Italian feast recently — we only made it through the first movie before I began to pass out on the couch — and though no one else dressed up, Eaman and I drew upon our love for Halloween and made a trip to Goodwill for costumes. Eaman’s is pretty spot-on, but isn’t my outfit clever, Godfather fans? (All I could find was a unicorn for the horse’s head. I cut the horn…and the rest of its body. I can only imagine what the little girl next to us in the store was thinking when Eaman and I kept asking each other, “How would this look if we cut off its body?”)

Speaking of Eaman and me, we celebrated our six-year anniversary in April. Do you know the story of how we met? Well if you don’t, that’s another story for another time, but it’s hilarious and reveals me for the fool that I am. Anyway, for the occasion, we agreed on no gifts, but he still made me a wildly thoughtful gift and got me these beautiful heliconia flowers, which are native to the islands.

And this past week, my best friend from back home, Samira, came to stay with us and experience island life. We: snorkeled Hanuama Bay, checked out the dolphins and turtles at the Kahala Resort, hit up Art After Dark, hiked the not-for-the-faint Hawaii Loa hike, watched a bluegrass band play at an old lady’s home in Kaimuki (just as cool as it sounds), tried a local dish (poke! delicious!) and had cocktails at sunset. It was such a breath of fresh air to have someone here — besides Eaman — who knows me inside out. Plus, I love having visitors; it reminds you how fun your own city can be.

Also worth noting was an incredible massage I had today. (Pictures clearly not provided.) Stay with me here.

I finally got a chance to redeem a gift certificate I won at a yoga fundraiser auction, and on the surface it was the best massage I’ve ever had, one that ironed out so many of my back pains induced from standing on my feet all day at work. But there was more to this massage than a back rub. This massage was performed by a naturopathic doctor and yoga teacher who had such an amazing light and energy. Originally from Vietnam, she moved to Hawaii more than a decade ago after falling in love with the Aloha State. She’s completely enamored with what she does — healing bodies through yoga at a Honolulu studio and massages done in her Diamond Head Crater-facing apartment that lets in so much fresh air you’ll never go back to indoor massages — and she was such a wonderful reminder of just how happy you can be so long as you’re doing something you love. After the massage, I talked her ear off about our travels and found myself getting strangely emotional in the process. Meeting her came at just the right point — just when I was starting to lose focus. She also recommended I read what appears to be an all-too-perfect book for me at this point in our journey. I’m really not trying to sound like a born-again, but I left that massage feeling like a new person — so refreshed, happy and energized for what’s ahead.

One month until Hong Kong. Let’s make it a good one.

A weekday outing with new friend Niti to Kaimana Beach, a lovely, quiet little stretch of beach just a bit further down from bustling Waikiki Beach.

Waikiki sunset.

Morning hike up Diamond Head — very touristy, but a nice, easy hike to do before my afternoon shift at the smoothie shop.

What I wouldn’t do to have a home on that shore…

View from the top.

Dinner at Spices, a highly recommended Southeast Asian restaurant.

Burmese noodle entree.

A Friday visit to Sandy Beach Park, an awesome, awesome beach with crazy powerful waves that are prime for body surfing. Even Obama does it! We (wisely) decided not to go fully in. Instead, I laid out and played with some dogs while Eaman played soccer.

The Kapiolani Community College farmers market, held every Saturday. Our day consisted of: super delicious pizza (homemade pesto, hand-stretched mozzarella and local tomatoes), Vietnamese iced coffee and cinnamon rolls with a backpack full of asparagus, pineapples and exotic fruits to bike home with.

I can’t remember what this was, but it was fried and apparently, very popular.

A huge thanks to Ted and Bethany over at Two Oregonians, who are hosting Eaman and I at their second {Digital} Dinner Party, an ingenious idea in which fellow RTW travel bloggers get together — virtually, of course — to mingle, “dine” and chat about the foods we miss, the foods we’ve discovered along the way and stories from the road.

Meet & Mingle

Hello and Hola! We find it most fitting to greet you in the two languages we’ve used along the road so far in our RTW trip. In August 2011, Eaman (an Oklahoma-bred Iranian guy) and I (a New Jersey-bred Indian girl) left our jobs in finance (him) and magazine journalism (me) to pursue our dream to travel the world. We began in Peru, continued on through Argentina, Uruguay, Chile and Colombia before spending a week with friends in Panama. We’re now in Honolulu, Hawaii, where we’ll be living for a few months in search of sun, surf, sand and a little break from all the moving around. We love intimate dinners, long walks on the beach and…oh, wait, wrong dinner invite.

Dinner Specialty

We’ve sampled an insane amount of delicious food in our travels — quinoa soup in Peru, steak in Buenos Aires, obleas in Colombia — but we thought it’d be best to bring a food from our current locale, Honolulu, which isn’t the typical backpacker pit-stop. I give you…the OnoPop.

Started in Hawaii by two brothers, Ono’s popsicles are local, organic and reflect Hawaiian ingredients as well as the Mexican paletas, an ice pop from the brothers’ Mexican homeland. Plus, they have the zaniest flavors: Rambutan Kaffir, Okinawan Purple Sweet Potato, Kalamansi Coriander — need I say more?

I’m more of a traditionalist, so I went with the strawberry lemonade at a recent Honolulu street food festival, called “Eat the Street,” which is held the last Friday of every month. The flavor was so tart, so natural so juicy. And just look at these strawberry seeds!

Table Talk

We’d love to talk about what 4.5 months traveling through South America looks like, regale everyone with tales from our three days in paradise in the San Blas Islands and talk about what it was like to travel 15 hours to Honolulu from Panama, attend my cousin’s three-day Indian wedding extravaganza, reconnect with family, deal with the very first nasty cold of my travels, find an apartment, get a job and find a place to crash for a week before our apartment lease began — all at the same time. (Post on that last, multi-layered one to come next!)

Check out the rest of the dishes and travel tales at http://www.twoOregonians.com/rtwdinnerparty.

Yesterday, I shared with you the major food groups in Argentina. But there’s one food tradition I left — for good reason. It’s the merienda, and it deserves its own post.

I’ve fallen in love with this evening snack ritual — usually a cafe con leche and 1-3 medialunas, or croissants — that was incorporated into the Argentine diet to hold you over until their definitively late dinner time.

Sometimes I plan my day around our merienda. Sometimes I map out where next week’s meriendas will be. Sometimes they involve coffee and dessert. Sometimes they involve just dessert. Sometimes I think I’d rather have three meriendas a day than three meals a day.

So come with me on a visual tour of some of my favorite meriendas. I promise, you’ll fall for them, too.

We’re now in Buenos Aires, enjoying the comforts of a big, cosmopolitan city and our very own apartment (details on that in the next post). But we would be remiss to move on from Peru without a little reflection.

I think Peru will always hold a special place in our wanderlust hearts because it was the first stop on this big, crazy adventure. We didn’t know much about the country beyond Machu Picchu, but we’ve learned so much.

The people are some of the warmest, most generous you’ll find. And the country itself is huge and varied with so much to do–whether it’s hitting the beach, going for a hike, soaking in hot springs, trekking through the jungle or tasting food in the rising gastronomic capital of Lima. (We sadly missed a major food festial by one week!!)

A friend in Buenos Aires told us that we did good by starting in
Peru because you expect and almost crave a big culture shock at the beginning of this kind of trip. Starting in Buenos Aires would’ve felt like going from one New York to the next. Peru was indeed a culture shock, but in the best way possible. No skyscrapers, no herds of people in a rush, no taking things for granted.

Peru was a quick lesson in appreciating the small things in life (i.e. hot water, electricity and something to eat after a long day hiking), not to mention natural beauty at its finest.

We didn’t get to share all the pictures we would’ve liked to with each post, so here, the stuff you didn’t see:

Yarn at a market in Cusco:

Dinner with new friends at organic restaurant Greens in Cusco:

Hiking in the ancient Inca town of Pisaq:

Amazing vegetarian lunch at Govinda in Lima. I haven’t seen tofu in a while

Abuela warming up empanadas in Pisaq:

Inca Kola, apparently made of lemongrass but tastes like bubblegum. The novelty wore off quickly:

Cusco by night:

Hike to Ollyantaytambo, another ancient Inca town:

We randomly saw a performance by The National Ballet of Georgia in Cusco…and it was awesome:

The nicest clothes we had (that also worked with the cold weather) to wear to the ballet:

There were always tiny puppies and kittens at the small basic hostels we stayed at during our treks:

Break during our jungle trek:

Riding on an abandoned Peru Rail train in the jungle:

Making good on a major craving in Arequipa:

Next up, a tour of our Buenos Aires digs!

We landed in Cusco last Friday and have accomplished the following thus far:

1. Walked the local neighborhoods
2. Sampled local cuisine at the San Pedro market
3. Visited the Pisaq market and climbed to the mountain top there
4. Contracted gastrointestinal infections
5. Contracted salmonella poisoning (Eaman)
6. Spent a night at the Cusco clinic (both)
7. Missed our four-day trek to Macchu Pichu

Let us explain…

Everyone–friends, guidebooks and all–warned us that Cusco was nothing but a tourist trap. Once we began to explore, we thought they couldn’t be more wrong. It’s a vibrant, bustling mountain city with enough hometown charm to prove any Lonely Planet wrong. The locals are warm, the babies are beyond squeezable, and the food at the market? Out of this world! I mean, rice, eggs and beans–all delicious–for $1. Hello!

With our friends Brandee (left) and Natalie (center):

Trying to hold it together:

Pisaq market:

We did our best to fight it, but with our Macchu Pichu trek looming in two days, we didn’t want to risk anything. And so we called a doctor (through a clinic our hostel works with), who came to our hostel within 45 minutes. After examining us both, he determined we both had GI infections. Unfortunately, Eaman’s had caught up with him a little sooner than mine had.

The antibiotics were supposed to be enough, and for me, they were. But for Eaman, not so much. The next day his body was totally rejecting the meds a.k.a. he was vomiting. That meant he needed the meds through an IV. And that, my friends, was how we got to our first hospital abroad within a week of traveling. It looks like we may have gotten ill from the traditional Peruvian drink known as the Pisco Sour, which uses raw egg whites for its foam. I know it sounds like a no-brainer, but EVERY tourist drinks them. I guess it was luck of the draw. Or perhaps it was the unpasteurized cheese from the San Pedro market, which WE DIDN’T KNOW was unpasteurized. Ugh, no more sampling.

Here’s Eaman at the clinic. In my defense, he told me to take this picture:

The stay at the clinic obviously meant Eaman was out of the Macchu Pichu trek. According to the doctor, I was actually well enough to go, but I wasn’t about to leave Eaman alone. To be honest, my stomach wasn’t feeling 100% anyway. It was oddly fun to be cooped up in the room with our friends, HBO and Cinemax. Don’t judge; we felt like crap.

We got out yesterday and these past few days have been such a blur. A part of us just wants to get the hell out of Cusco. It’s left a sour taste in our mouths, and that’s not just because our antibiotic has a tendency to leave us with a none-too-delectable metal flavor on our tongues. We feel defeated that this happened so early. And I hate to say it, I had a moment–during extreme gastrointestinal pain–when I just wanted to be back in the U.S. I just wanted a friggin’ bowl of Cheerios.

But we’re trying to stay positive. Our insurance was wonderful and will hopefully reimburse our whole Macchu Picchu trek. So instead of doing a taxing four-day hike, we are leaving this coming Monday for the Inca jungle trail, which includes hiking, mountain biking and ziplining. (We’re assuming we’ll be back to normal by then. Fingers crossed.)

I believe that everything happens for a reason, and there was some reason we weren’t supposed to go the classic route. Plus, we have a whole year for adventure. Such is the beauty of long-term travel.

For now, our goal is to just grt better. And now that I’m absolutely frightened to eat anything unfamiliar, we’ve sadly been eaing pizza and McDonald’s 24/7. Sigh. I feel like such a sell-out. But it does give me peace of mind that Mickey D’s was the first meal that I could successfully eat since getting sick. Chicken sandwich, French fries and Sprite FTW!

We just didn’t think we’d have to learn that lesson so soon!

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