The Luau

Mark and I took a wild side Saturday evening:  we went to a luau at the Wailea Beach Marriott Resort.  

I had seen the banners, driving back and forth to the beach, advertising the Second Annual Maui Fire Knife Competition.  Intrigued, I looked it up online and discovered that this event would be held in conjunction with a luau at the Marriott, just a few miles from our condo.  I thought it would be a cool experience, but was somewhat surprised when Mark said he'd like to go as well.  I'm sure he was humoring me; he's not exactly, after all, a luau kind of guy.  I'm sure the fact that there would be men competing with fire and knives, i.e., an athletic event, sweetened the pot, so to speak.

We arrived at the Marriott around 4:15 or so Saturday afternoon, having cut short our time on the beach.  As we walked into the spacious covered lobby and observed the surroundings, Mark commented that the resort represented a completely different Maui experience from the one we were having.  The place reeked of money, island elegance and American Express.  We could only wonder how people could afford to stay at a place like this and how they made their money.

As we followed the signs to the luau area, we passed manicured grounds, palatial open-aired hallways and staircases, finally wending our way to a beautiful clearing overlooking the ocean - the luau grounds, which Marriott terms its Pacific Terrace.

We arrived shortly before the opening time and were glad we had overcome our reticence to be "early birds."  Because the seating was on a first-come basis and there were probably 60 or so tables, it was entirely possible that we could end up in the back corner of the grounds with a very poor view of the stage; close to the food line, true, but far from the stage.

As it happened, we were escorted to the second row of tables, to a table right in front of the stage, and our seats were adjacent to the central walkway of the grounds, which would offer us an unobstructed view of the evening's performances.

The one drawback to arriving 30 minutes before the bar opened and an hour before dinner was served, however, was that there was very little alternative to making conversation with the other couples at our table.

And they were couples.  And as the tables filled up, they were filled by couples.  Old couples, young couples, middle-aged couples, couples with children.  And every one of them straight.  I commented to Mark early on that we would probably be the only gay couple there - and if we weren't conspicuous enough, Mark wore his HRC "Equality" shirt that he had bought when we were in the Castro in San Francisco last fall.

"Oh, no," he replied.  "There will be more."  

There weren't.  Even he admitted later on that he could have left his gaydar at home, saying it was the straightest crowd in which he'd been in a very long time.  Not that we minded.  I didn't feel the least bit  conspicuous or uncomfortable.

Mark plunged right in at our table, asking the three other couples already seated where they were from.  As a result of this opening foray and the subsequent conversation through the evening, we got to know some things about our table mates - our ohana, as the mistress of ceremonies, who brought to mind a younger, Tongan version of Oprah Winfrey, informed us.

The Arizonans

The couple to my left were from Scottsdale, Arizona and were probably in their late 20's.  I suspect they were as yet childless because I think the wife - who struck me as the type whose natural habitat was Rodeo Drive, or the closest local equivalent - impressed me as someone who wouldn't know quite what to do with a baby and would find the whole baby thing somewhat distasteful.

We asked what they'd been doing here on Maui.  We learned that earlier that day, they'd gotten up and driven up to the summit of Haleakala to see the sunrise.  People apparently go up there in droves to see the sunrise which, because clouds are usually below summit and the sun rises above the clouds, can be quite spectacular.

"How was it?" I asked, interested.

The guy turned and looked at me as if I'd just asked him what kind of underwear he was wearing.

"It was a sunrise," he replied, deadpan.  He then turned back towards his wife.

Another couple asked if they'd gone on a tour or by themselves.

"Oh," the wife responded," we went by ourselves.  We bought a book before we came called 'Maui ... whatever', so we knew where to go and what to skip."

"Yeah," the husband chimed in, "we made it up in perfect timing, missing all the traffic and getting there just a few minutes before the sun came up."  Somehow, I just knew this guy had an MBA and was employed in his wife's family's real estate development company.  (How else could they afford to live in Scottsdale?)

"So," inquired Mark, "what else have you been doing?"

"Well," the woman replied, "we went snorkeling down at that bay south of here."

"Oh," Mark responded.  "Did you see anything?"

"Yeah," the woman said, wrinkling her upturned nose which caused her large square-framed black sunglasses to slip noticeably.  "I saw a turtle," she replied, pushing her sunglasses back up, but I thought it was creepy."

"How about dolphins?" Mark continued, since Pelouse Bay is known for such sightings.

"No," the woman replied, "but I don't like dolphins."

This was when, upon reviewing the evening later, Mark and I both burst out laughing.  I mean, why was this woman in Maui?  Doesn't like Dolphins?  "It's like saying," Mark had exclaimed, "that you don't like ladybugs ... or butterflies!"  "Besides," he continued, "as the blonde brainless wonder on Glee once said, dolphins are gay sharks."

Speaking of which, I intuited that this woman felt towards Mark and me roughly the same way she feels about sea turtles (see above).  Her husband seemed okay with sitting next to a gay couple until, that is, "Oprah" announced that it was time to say the "traditional Hawaiian blessing before the meal" (which turned out to be the Hawaiian version of "Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow," sung by her, after which Mark quipped that he thought that was Lutheran, not Hawaiian).  

"Here in Hawaii," she had pointed out, "as ohana, we join hands.  So all of you who feel comfortable doing so, join hands with your table ohana."  I reached for Mark's hand as he did with his neighbor to the right and so forth around the table.  Suddenly, the guy next to me looked up, a deer-in-the-headlights look in his eyes, and said, with an edge to his voice, "What are we doing?"  I suspect that the thought of holding the hand of the gay guy next to him and unnerved him.

"It's a prayer," the guy across the table said.

"Oh," he replied, the anxiety fading somewhat from his face.  He and I clasped hands and, so far as I am aware, he left the event that evening just as straight as when he arrived.

Nick and Francesca

The couple to their left, Francesca and Nick, were in Maui on their honeymoon, having gotten married the previous weekend.  From Boston, they immediately impressed us as very young and very friendly.  Cute. Not once during the evening did I sense anything but acceptance from them towards Mark and me as a gay couple.

They were happy to talk about their wedding.  He is the only son in a Greek family from Boston, and she is from an Italian family from eastern Long Island.  They had to have two receptions, they told us, the first on a Saturday following their marriage in a Greek Orthodox Church and another one the following day for Francesca's Italian family and their friends.  Both featured wonderful ethnic foods and large quantities of alcohol.  It sounded like fun.

Francesca was short, plump and bubbly.  Nick was very tall and beefy.  When they got up to dance later in the evening, I saw them together upright for the first time.  She was about 5'1" and he was at least 6'6", if not taller.  They were quite the sight.

Nick had told us that he had gone to the University of West Virginia, and I wondered how a Greek guy from Boston ended up in Morgantown, West Virginia - until he mentioned that he had played football there, presumably on a scholarship.

"It's funny," he said.  "Everyone assumed that because I played football I was studying to be a PE teacher."  That is precisely what I had assumed, given Nick's size and personality (most people would not characterize him as an intellectual).  But he had gone to explain that the classes that he took were really interesting, proceeding to describe a couple.  I have to say that my brain glazed over a tiny bit at this point in the conversation, but I gathered that he was describing a child development class he had taken.

"So are you a PE teacher?" I asked.  He smiled and said, "No, I'm in sales."  At that point, I thought about animated he had been when describing that child development class, and I couldn't help but wonder if he'd "settled" for something instead of following his dream.  Perhaps he'll find his way back to that dream sometime down the road.

Prior to the opening of the bar, Mark and I took a break from introductory chit chat by taking a stroll around the grounds.  We had our picture taken, admired some of the Polynesian crafts on display (and for sale) and eventually joined what had quickly become the largest crowd gathered around one of several demonstrations.  A couple of young buff Polynesian men (above) were demonstrating how to skin, open, drain and shred the meat of a coconut.  Call me gay, but I couldn't help but think that the crowd was probably more interested in observing the young men than learning about coconuts.

When the complimentary bar opened, Mark and I each picked up a piña colada and a Mai Tai.  I hadn't had a piña colada in over 30 years, and I was anxious to try one.  When I was in college, I drank sweet mixed drinks all the time:  piña coladas, daiquiris, Zombies, rum punches (like the one called "Water Buffalo punch" that was concocted in a lined garbage can when a bunch of us were in Daytona Beach for spring break back in 1978), Black Russians, White Russians, Amaretto drinks, etc.

Saturday's piña colada was sweet.  I enjoyed it.  The Mai Tai's, however, were not to my liking.  After a respectable period of time, I went back for another piña colada but took only one swig and realized I couldn't handle the sweetness.  

Mark had gotten up at one point and came back to the table with a clear drink.  "Is that a gin and tonic?" I asked, surprised, having assumed that the bar offered only a limited selection of pre-mixed drinks.  "Yes," he replied with a mischievous smile on his face.  "You didn't bring me one?" I queried.  "No." Again, the mischievous smile.  I promptly got up and got my own.

The Ohoians

By this time, we had been joined by another couple, this one probably in their late 40's or early 50's.  If I had to guess, I would have said he is a banker, she a homemaker.  I might have guessed them to be Mormon, but they each had a piña colada.

It turned out they are from Dayton, Ohio.  "Well," they clarified, "we're really from Buffalo; we've only lived in Dayton a year."  During the ensuing conversation, they repeated - and almost appeared to emphasize - that they were only recently from Dayton, that they were originally from Buffalo.

From this, I constructed a "story," as follows.  

They had lived in Buffalo all their lives, and their families had also lived there all their lives.  Buffalo was their home.  The only reason they had left was because he had lost his job, and new jobs are hard to find at his age (something I know a little bit about).  They, he had finally found a job in Dayton.  It wasn't Buffalo; it wasn't New York State; it wasn't even Cleveland; but at least it was only a good day's drive from Buffalo.

They didn't really like Dayton, I theorized.  They missed Buffalo, but they had, however, found that moving away from the only home they had ever known had caused unexpected changes in the organics of their individual personalities as well as their marriage.  

Parenthetically, as I listened to them talk about Buffalo and saw the wistful look in their eyes, I thought about how I really couldn't relate to that feeling they obviously had.  My life has been a series of "moving ons."  I left my hometown when I started college and only returned on visits thereafter.  I left Illinois after graduating from university and settled in Ohio.  A few years later, I joined the LDS Church and went on a mission.  Then I moved to Vancouver and lived there for ten years before then moving to Utah.  

Mark has described similar "moving ons" in his life, but many of the people he has worked with and known since moving to Utah about the same time I did had had similar experiences, i.e., they had not grown up in Utah, nor - unlike the Buffalo couple - was Utah the only home they had ever known.  

My experience, however, has been different:  most of the people I have known and associated with in Utah since moving there have been native Utahns; it is the only home they have ever known, and many of them have looked askance at me for being a "foreigner."  I recall a number of years ago giving a brief account to female attorney from my old firm of my wonderings that had led to us settling in Utah.  She, a native of Bountiful (a suburb of Salt Lake), had lived in Utah all her life, as had her parents and grandparents before her.  After listening to my story, she had replied, "What a strange thing to do.  I have lived here all my life and I can't imagine living anywhere else."  Indeed.

But I digress.  Getting back to my (made-up) story regarding the Ohio couple ...

After their move to Ohio, she had become guardedly more open to new situations, whereas he - relatively and comparatively speaking - had become much more adventurous.  It had been his idea to come to Maui, their first trip to Hawaii and their first vacation alone since the early years of their marriage.  

When asked what they planned to do while here, he somewhat wistfully replied that he wanted to ride down Haleakala (the volcanic mountain in the southern half of the island).  Pretty adventuresome.  His wife, however, would have none of that.  Later, however, when the couple from Arizona were describing their Haleakala trip, the man from Ohio had carefully questioned them to make sure there were adequate directional signs along the way.  He might be willing to try some adventuresome things, but he wanted to make sure he stayed on the well-traveled path.

The other couple at our table were from Portland.  He appeared to be about 67; she was 27.  Hmmm.  Not much to say about them.  We were surprised yesterday afternoon as we returned to the beach and were starting our ascent of the hill separating Big and Little Beaches to realize that they were just ahead of us.  We didn't strike up a conversation.

Dinner and Show

Dinner was heralded by one of the Polynesian boys blowing a conch shell.  Our Tongan Oprah directed everyone's attention to the imu (underground oven) at the back of the grounds where the kālua pig would be uncovered.  Wikipedia informs us that, traditionally, "the pig is cooked in a sand or dirt pit over a fire using koa wood. Rocks are then placed in the pit to retain cooking heat long after the flames have burned down. The meat to be cooked is salted, rubbed with herbs, stuffed with more hot rocks, then wrapped with ti and banana leaves. To maintain even heating and to retain the meat's natural moisture, the meat is covered with wet burlap, then with a layer of sand or soil. The meat is then left to cook in the pit for six to seven hours, absorbing smoke and steam from the koa wood and banana leaves. When the meat is fully cooked, it is removed from the imu and shredded. This is done to allow the melted fat to mix with the meat to help maintain its uniform consistency and flavor."

In the above picture, the boys are removing the banana leaves, preparing the pig for its ceremonial entry onto the luau grounds, pictured below.

A few minutes later, it was chow time.

The menu consisted of traditional Hawaiian and Polynesian foods, and everything was delicious.  We each tried a little bit of most things, as is apparent from Mark's plate:

The pork was especially delicious, and I also enjoyed the lomi lomi, a salmon and tomato salad:

Soon, it was time for the luau program to begin as the sun set in the West.

Mark accused me of photographing and taking video clips only of the guys, but I did take some of the girls, too, as the following picture and video attest (sorry the video is sideways - don't know how to fix that and not gonna try).

That being said, I might have shown more preference for the numbers featuring the guys as opposed to the women.

More videos and the Fire Knife competition in the next post.