Posts Tagged ‘Hilo’

Cruise - Day 20 - Hilo, Hawaii

Friday, October 2nd, 2009

We had a very early start in Hilo, needing to meet on the pier at 8:15am for our  tour. Ange and I had forgotten what the tour actually was. It turned out to be a 6 hour bus tour with an awesome local named Rudy.

The first stop was a lava tree park, where lava has cooled around the trunks of trees before the tree has fully burnt down, leaving a hollow tree trunk shaped pile of lava. The flora in a park was amazing, with plants and trees growing right on the lava.

There were a few hiccups with the day though. Ange had a tumble on the lava with Will in the baby carrier. She somehow managed to land without hurting him at all, but banged her knee fairly badly and has been hobbling around. The boys are also starting to get ready to go home, or at least it feels that way.

The biggest problem though was realising just how warped our attitude towards Aboriginals is. Rudy was telling us that there’s only around 8,000 full blooded Hawaiians left and asked how many Aboriginals there were. Someone on the bus said “too many”, which led to most of the rest of the bus discussing the Aboriginal “problem”. I think the fundamental racism stood out more than usual because we’ve been knee deep in indigenous culture for the last month, visiting countries that are proud of and reverent towards that culture. I was embarrassed to be associated with those idiots, and ashamed that someone passionately sharing their culture was us was exposed to just how little we value our own.

Photos for the day