Melancholy in Seattle and Home in Hawaii

I have flown Air New Zealand flights from Apia to Los Angeles a number of times. I got used to it and considered it a long commute between homes. But for Vene, the ten and a half hour flight was a long one. We were only four hours into the flight when she awoke to ask me how much longer it was going to be.  Unfortunately we were barely half way to Los Angeles and still had six and a half hours to go.

The year 2008 was the turning point as our lives shifted from Samoa to the United States. The year began with my next to the last cruise I would take on the Ka’imimoana sailing to Apia. I got off the ship and stayed with Vene and the family for three weeks. I was to meet the Hi’ialakai in American Samoa afterwards. I met the American Consulate General and introduced my wife to him. We received assistance from the US Embassy in getting permit for Vene to travel to Pago Pago with me when it came time to meet the Hi’ialakai. When we arrived in American Samoa, we stayed at Turtle and Shark Lodge in Vaitogi. I certainly would bypass any Hawaiian resort for this place. We stayed there for four nights and then it was time for her to fly back to Western Samoa. I took the Hi’ialakai back to Hawaii and made another cruise that year before going back to Samoa for several weeks, this time flying from Seattle to Apia via Los Angeles. I had some last minute documents to take to her as well as her physical.

In September of 2008 and Levene had completed the required interviews and submitted documents to the US Embassy in Auckland, New Zealand. She had her immigration visa and I was scheduled to get her. Several days before I was to fly to Samoa I went to a Seattle Seahawks game against their future hated rivals, the San Francisco 49’ers. I went with my daughter and her husband, my son and grandson along with my son-in-law’s father. Seahawks had some good years and 49’ers were always the NFC West doormats. However, this was the game that was the beginning of the end of the Holmgren/Hasselbeck era. The Hawks lost in overtime 33-30 and went on to their first losing season in years. When the game was over I was looking forward to leave for Samoa to get Vene.

Vene was asleep in her window seat resting from the tear-jerking night. I watched the sunrise from 35,000 feet over the Pacific as the flight attendants began serving breakfast. We were to land in Los Angeles at two in the afternoon local time. As the Air New Zealand 767 approached Los Angeles, I peered over Vene’s shoulder to look at a city I have not been to or driven through in 16 years! Not much has changed and the San Diego Freeway was still jam packed as ever. Last May, an immigration officer advised me on how to bring my wife through immigration when I was re-entering the Unites States from Samoa. Since she had an immigration visa she was to be with me in the line with returning US citizens. We did exactly that and directed on where to go to clear immigration to hand over a packet and receive another package for her green card. “Welcome to the United States” said the immigration officer who gave her a packet and Vene was now officially in the United States.

Our journey wasn’t finished as we took an hour flight to Oakland. After arriving, we went to the car park to get the car and drive to my parents’ place in Livermore. We stayed with my parents for several days before going to Seattle. My mother was showing signs of dementia at this time and her short-term memory was bad. After leaving Livermore Vene began to realize how large the United States was. After driving for five hours, we were still in California though inching towards the Oregon border.

I wanted to spend the night somewhere in Oregon and make the trip to Seattle a two-day event. Vene wanted to get home and didn’t want to stop anywhere. We ate at a Chinese restaurant in Salem before continuing to Seattle. It was the night of the first Vice Presidential debate and we were listening to it on Oregon Public Radio. It says something that a non-citizen who was in the US for less than a week would comment about Sarah Palin’s intelligence while understanding less than half the contents of the debates.

We had our first disagreement when we crossed the Oregon-Washington border as fatigue was setting in. We reached Edmonds after being on the road for 16 hours and stopped off at QFC to buy some groceries and sodas to drink. This was late September and for a woman grew up in a country that knows no winter, the best was yet to come. For that year in Seattle, it was the memorable “snowpocalypse of 2008.” Seventeen straight days of snow! I missed twelve days of work as the snow piled up in the driveway blocking all access. Some tenants made it out, however I backed my car out of the carport and was stuck. I left the car where it stuck overnight until I got some strong help to push it back under the carport. First days of “snowpocalypse” I took photos of Vene’s first ever encounter with snow. On the twelfth day smiles turned to frowns and the novelty of snow had worn off into sheer boredom and frustration of not being able to go anywhere. We walked to QFC and watched automobiles slide and near collisions slipping on the thick sheet of ice. Temperatures were not high enough to melt any of it!

As we approached Christmas, temperatures increased and snows began to melt along with the ice. However, it was not quick enough and the ice and snow that turned into liquid would freeze again at night. This lasted for a few more days until night temperatures were warm enough not to refreeze the water. When snows melted to where we can drive out again, Vene, Ian and I ventured away from the condo to look at Christmas lights in the neighborhood. However, it seems “snowpocalypse” had sapped the holiday spirit of the people. We just wanted for New Years to arrive and the cold clear nights after the snow and ice had melted.

Vene would enroll at Edmonds Community College to take English as Second Language course beginning in winter of 2009. Purpose was to improve her English speaking and writing skills as well as formal education in American culture. I was due to take a long cruise to the Marianas and this would give her something to do during our extended separation. Sadly, I was to miscalculate the stress of separation. She would find someone who would temporarily replace me as she tried to overcome culture shock as I would not be there to support her overcome it. There were many strenuous conflicts that erupted while I was at sea. At times the dialogues would be a triangle from the ship to her sister-in-law in New Zealand to her and then back to me via New Zealand. It was exasperating times and Vene found comfort elsewhere which added more conflict to our relationship. Of course admission would come a few years later during one of many intimate conversations we shared.

Year 2009 started off with flight to Guam to rotate on the Hi’ialakai in Saipan. We made plans to meet in Hawaii in July when the ship returned to Honolulu. The Saipan trip was special to me. My grandmother was a young woman living there before and during the war. Her father worked at the sugar cane processing plant that is seen in many pictures describing the battle in Saipan. She and her family were hiding in a cave during the battle. American soldiers threw hand grenades inside the cave they were hiding in and civilians that huddled in front of them were killed. She lost her hearing from that incident. Some of her friends unfortunately took their own lives jumping off the cliffs when American troops were approaching last Japanese held areas. As honoring them, I go to the sites and offer prayers (Eastern Style) for the dead. I saw my grandmother for the last time in 1996 when I was on a Naval Reserve detachment to Atsugi, Japan. I went to Numazu and spent a day with her before going back to the base. She passed away a few months before my mother in October of 2010 at age 92.

I took leave and for the first time in seven years since coming to work in Hawaii I actually played tourist. Levene and Ian met me in Honolulu. We spent our nights at the Hale Koa hotel in Waikiki. We did the usual things tourists do in Hawaii. Go to the beach, shopping and general relaxation the islands have to offer. As usual with vacations it wasn’t long enough. We returned to Seattle afterwards and decided what to do next. Ian went back to Burlington to continue high school. Levene and I decided to go to the Bay Area and visit my parents. This time it was a combination of visiting and vacation as San Francisco is one of my favorite cities to visit.

Also, during this time I was eagerly waiting for the announcement of where the new Marine Operations Center was going to relocate. There was a major fire at the pier on 4^th of July in 2006. Ships based in Seattle were disbursed to different locations throughout Puget Sound. For three years this was normal occurrence as the charred piers sat mired in dispute. I checked e-mail to see if there was an announcement. My personal choice was Bellingham, Washington. Astoria, Oregon had dropped out of the running only to be replaced by Newport, which was further south from Astoria. No one really thought that NOAA would select Newport and it was a latecomer in the race to win NOAA’s Pacific Marine Operations Center.

The e-mail arrived and to my astonishment, the winner was Newport, Oregon! My plans on moving back to Skagit County evaporated. Even if another location in Seattle was selected I would have been happy. I liked living in Edmonds and Vene grew to like it as well. She was going to school and made friends. There was infrastructure in Seattle that supported our way of life! Seattle area was home for me for twelve years and now we were going to have to move! We were still in the Bay Area so we made plans to stop by Newport on our way home. I made reservations renting a condo for several days by the bay front. We left my parent’s place in Livermore and drove up Redwood Highway and then up the Mendocino Coast.

We crossed the Oregon state line and drove along the coast highway to Newport. We arrived late afternoon and settled in our condo. There was enough daylight to drive around, get something to eat and check out the town. Our first impression was it was a picturesque fishing village. We didn’t know what the local fare was so we stopped at national chain fast food joint just to put something in our stomachs. There were the usual Fred Meyer’s, Safeway and small strip malls. Grocery stores had very small ethnic food selection and that was the first sign it was going to be trouble for us to adapt.

We returned to the condo to catch a Mariners game and retired for the night. Next morning we stopped at the Chamber of Commerce to ask where ethnic grocery stores were. Along with a Hispanic store and a vegetarian market (I didn’t know vegans were an ethnic group) there was an Asian store in town. We stopped by to see it. It was owned by a very friendly Vietnamese woman who welcomed us to the community and informed us that she could get any type of foodstuffs we needed. She told us that there was a small Polynesian community south of Newport, though we didn’t see any Tongan or Samoan flags pasted on automobiles when we drove through there a day before. However the euphoria after visiting Mai’s business took a down turn when we walked into a local café and were stared out of the place. The clanging of forks and knives on the plates stopped to silence and we backed out the door. We found another eating establishment that was friendlier. We came to believe we’ve seen everything we needed to see. We had two more days to consume before driving back to Seattle. We spent those two days trying to convince ourselves about the benefits moving and living in Newport. We were saying to ourselves that the move would be good for us but there were more questions than answers. The only place outside of Mai’s that we found friendly confines were the fishing piers. Tuna could be bought straight from the boat for two dollars a pound! Some of the fisherman had spent time in American Samoa and knew immediately my wife was a Samoan by her dress. They set aside fish heads and gave those to her at no charge! We returned to Seattle with ice chest full of fish!

Believing we would remain in Washington State, we hired an immigration attorney to begin our petition to bring Levene’s son to America. Our plans for Liva to finish school in Samoa and join us afterwards crumbled. And this future move to Newport put another crimp into our ideas. After some of the “hostilities” we faced in Newport, I no longer believed that a small town was the place to live and ideal environment to raise children. Perhaps for the “other America” I would have no doubts, but even my personal family demographics were changing.

After returning to Seattle, I got entangled in the controversy over the move. For my part, I never liked Oregon, even in the days when I lived in California. After living in Washington I disliked it more to the point that I would fill up my gasoline tank in Vancouver, Washington so I can avoid filling up in Oregon when we went to California. It failed, as I would have to fill up in Ashland, a few miles north of the California border. You cannot pump your own gas in Oregon and the speed limit was 65 while rest of the west was either 70 or 75. It was an epitome of a “nanny state.” However I was still in the state of denial deceiving myself that the move to Newport was better for us, including Levene’s son when he joined us. I made a comment at an all hands meeting at which later I would regret that we couldn’t wait for the move after the wife heard there was a Polynesian community nearby (which later found out to be a Tongan author). I supported a comment by another employee that the Marine Center needed a home and docks for our ships. As time progressed I began to dislike the idea of moving and living in Newport and there were new reasons for my growing reluctance.

Recalling unfriendly reception the wife and I received at locally owned restaurants irritated me and to believe that it would exist in the 21^st century! And of all places, Oregon! I inquired high schools about English as a Second Language courses only to receive silent response. Research conducted indicated inferiority of local schools. Hospitals claim that interpreters could be provided by telephone unlike Seattle where a staff existed to handle those affairs. Culture didn’t mean a diversity of ethnicity and foods but classical music and art. I love classical music and listen to it all the time but I was thinking more in line of cultural fairs. Plus you cannot compare culture of a small town to a metropolis like Seattle or San Francisco!

There were all sorts of political wrangling that were controversial but ended up moot. Even my rotations to Hawaii was full of melancholy as my thoughts began to wonder that I would be sailing out of Newport or one of the Alaska-based ships once the move was over. I felt that my time in Hawaii where I can speak my other language, listen to the radio or watch television programs and most of all, eat the foods that I was familiar with were coming to an end.

The beginning of 2010 started with me sailing on the Ka’imimoana to Western Samoa. There were not many people from the time I sailed there in 2003 to 2007.  I did sail with the captain who I knew as a junior officer on the Rainier many years back. I was to sail to Western Samoa and get off the ship in Apia, spend three weeks with the wife’s family and my stepson then meet the Hi’ialakai in American Samoa. I would not know at the time that this would be my last cruise on the Ka’imimoana as she would be decommissioned several years later.  It was odd being at my wife’s home and village and not have her with me. I was to depart for Pago Pago but a cyclone came through the islands tearing things apart in American Samoa. So my goodbyes were short lived and I was back at my in-laws house for two more days. I sailed on the Hi’ialakai back to Hawaii and then flew to Seattle in April of that year. The season of 2010 was uneventful and even writing for the blog became mundane as the second half of any season after my transfer from the Ka’imomoana was going to the same place repeatedly.

We made another stop in Newport on our way back from another visit to the Bay Area to see my parents again. My mother was ailing and her dementia was entering into advance stages. This would be the last time I would see my mother alive. My son had graduated from high school and came with us. It was the last time he would see his grandmother as well. On the way back to Seattle we stopped off at Grants Pass, Oregon and spent the night. We continued to Newport the next day thinking about spending the night there and explore the town more. We arrived in the afternoon but somehow the enthusiasm was not there. We tried again to convince ourselves that the move would be good for us. Whatever positive thoughts we had were self-delusional. We shopped at several “hippie” stores on the waterfront and decided to have late lunch at one of the more celebrated fish and chips and clam chowder restaurants in Newport.

The wait was nil as there were two other couples before us. The couple that stood before us was seated immediately. We noticed an older ethnic couple sitting in the wait area waiting to be seated. The hostess would come by and notice us and the other couple in the waiting area. However, would walk away as if she had other things to do besides sitting us to our tables.  Other staff members would look at us, say nothing and walk away. Others would just outright ignore us. There were plenty of empty tables so why we had to wait additional time to be seated was a mystery. No one would tell us to wait or that we will be seated in a few minutes. It seems like we were waiting for about half-an-hour until a waitress came up and asked if anyone had paid attention to us. We replied negatively and she grabbed menus and sat us in her section. A few minutes later the other couple was seated at a table not far from us.

She took our order and we received our food about 20 minutes later. Meanwhile the ethnic couple never had a waitperson tend to them and while we were eating our food, they walked out. Even as we were sitting at our table we were gawked by some of the customers at other tables who gazed at us in an inquisitive manner. We were not loud or disturbing others and were not drawing attention to ourselves. Our conversation consisted of again trying to convince ourselves that we would like it here (Newport) if we were to move. The reason I tried this particular restaurant is I read a review where the staff at this diner was infamous for reluctance to serve certain customers. I thought the writer had a chip on his shoulder or acted inappropriately to be treated like that. I believe there are two sides to every story so as to give benefit of doubt we went to this particular restaurant to eat fish and chips and clam chowder before heading back to Seattle.

The food was mediocre and the clam chowder was not worth the hype. The only redeeming value of this restaurant was that one particular waitress who was nice enough to do something that other staff members did not. I would never go back to this place. With that experience along with other issues I faced concerning the move I was livid that we would be treated like that every time we visited Newport. I felt that my job was welcomed, but me and my family was not! By this time many of the “Welcome NOAA” signs were taken down unlike 2009 right after the announcement.

Before leaving Newport, we stopped at Pier 7 and bought tuna fresh off the boat. The fisherman along with that one waitress was the positive aspect of this small Oregon Coast community. Nevertheless, I could care less if I ever saw Newport again! I was hoping that something or anything take place that would allow us to move elsewhere! To move from Seattle to Newport felt like being demoted from the major leagues to Double or Single A baseball. It wasn’t even high enough to be rated triple A. Word soon came that NOAA was considering reopening Hawaii billets for ETs. I indicated my interest in filling one of those billets with enthusiasm. I told Levene, who was despondent by this time that there is a chance we could move to Hawaii! Of course our spirits perked up. But the wait for an answer to the request was long and filled with uncertainty.

Year 2011 started with me taking the Hi’ialakai to Saipan. We left in March of that year. Right as the ship left the pier at Ford Island, I received a phone call from the Division Chief that our request for move to Hawaii was accepted, get ready to house hunt and move to Hawaii! I called Levene while we were departing Pearl Harbor and told her the good news!  While we were underway to Wake Island we received a message that we were to divert to Laysan Island and evacuate personnel. It took about three days to reach Laysan. The atoll was hit by the tsunami from the Tohoku Earthquake that shook Japan and a deadly tsunami that devastated Sendai and the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant afterwards. We dropped the evacuees off at Midway Island. When that was done we were diverted to Kure to evacuate personnel. However it had very little to do with the Sendai Tsunami and this time they could be victims of political tsunami in Washington DC as the government was inching towards a shutdown.

Our transit to Wake Island for the first dive expedition was delayed again due to us being the only ship in the area to be able to conduct evacuations. We picked up the science party at Kure and headed back to Midway again for their airlift to Honolulu.  The threat of a government shutdown was prevented at the last minute in needless brinksmanship from the drama queens on Capital Hill. After two and a half weeks of delay due to evacuating personnel we finally reached Wake Island where dive expeditions began. I could tell the scientists were anxious to get into the water and start work!

After the Wake Island expedition was completed we continued our transit to Saipan. I was to rotate out of Saipan, go to Samoa and get Liva then head back to Seattle and start house hunting in Hawaii. My spirit was high and mood was good to know I was going to move to Hawaii instead of Newport. In Saipan, I made the usual visits to the cliffs, offered prayers and ate at and stayed for hours at Hiro Island Japanese Restaurant in the Victoria Hotel complex.  The owner had no idea I spoke and understood Japanese until I asked for the bill. After that I was always welcomed and it was my second home in Saipan with second serving of rice and miso soup as well as Japanese beer and Japanese language television in the background.

I left Saipan and headed to Guam to catch a flight to Honolulu. Before heading back to Seattle I took a detour to Samoa to bring Liva to America. By this time I had confronted my wife and asked for the truth. For years she told me that Liva was her adopted son from an older sister who passed away from cancer. I never really gave it much thought during those years of deception, as Liva would follow me everywhere I went. He would be in the car waiting for me to go to town to get foodstuff. He and I talked again in 2005 when he asked me to help him with his homework from school. Not knowing Samoan I gave him the answers. I had a suspicion that the charade was going to fall apart beginning with his heartbreaking reaction to his mother leaving Samoa in 2008. He was in tears watching us pull out of the driveway standing on his ancestors’ grave in the front yard of the house. A few years later, I looked at photos taken the day before Vene and I left Samoa when we went to a friend’s house for goodbye drinks. Liva came with us as we picked him up after school. As he got older there were many physical similarities that I dissected as I made copies of photos of him and his mother standing together. I asked her if Liva was her biological son rather than adopted as the initial story went. It made getting his visa to rejoin his mother in the United States easier and progressed much quicker. 

Liva’s departure from Samoa was no different than his mother’s a few years earlier. Except this time the family members and friends came to airport to send him off.  It wasn’t easy leaving the grandparents. However this was a promise I made to his grandfather years before when I married his mother. We were flying to Honolulu where he would clear immigration and then fly in the same Hawaiian Air flight as me except he sat in First Class. I was still on orders and NOAA paid my way home from Hawaii, sitting in coach! We left Apia around midnight and arrived in Honolulu in the morning. We had a six-hour layover before we caught our flight to Seattle.

I returned to Honolulu for a week to house hunt with the wife. We stayed in Kaneohe at the Marine Base. I wanted to find a place on the Windward side preferably in Kaneohe due to less traffic going to and from Pearl Harbor regardless what time of day it is. We found a house in Mililani but it appeared the landlord upset the tenants as the place was trashed! It was a four bedroom house though the bedrooms look like a large room divided in half. There was much work to be done and the rental rate for Hawaii was acceptable! After several days of paperwork and such we were not accepted. Time was running out and the day before we were to return to we found a listing on Craig’s List. We called and went to look at the house in Kaneohe. A small three-bedroom house! Perfect location for us and we were accepted by the landlord.

Vene and I returned to Seattle and prepared for the move. As said in the military the two best places in the world is the one you just came from and the one you are going to. I didn’t feel like that about Seattle. In fact I was hoping we could stay in Seattle as some of my counterparts made plans to be geo-bachelors. However my ship was in Hawaii and I was not on mix tour where I would be off the payroll when not sailing. I lived in Seattle nearly as long as I lived in San Diego by three years. By the time we left Seattle in July of 2011, I lived there for fourteen years. Leaving the Emerald City was not a happy occasion. Not moving to Newport and going to Hawaii instead was a happy occasion though.

We turned over the condo-apartment that I lived in for nine years, said goodbye to friends and places we hung out. We stayed at the Navy Lodge in Marysville for several days before departing. My good friend from Burlington and his son came down to see us. His son and my son went to school together from kindergarten to high school graduation. We drove to the airport slowly to get a good glimpse of our last look at Seattle. On the way I peaked over the bridge and got my final look at the old Pacific Marine Center with the Space Needle in the distance. Turned in the rental car and then off to the airport to catch the six hour flight to Honolulu and to our new home.

Much has changed since we arrived here in 2011. My son Ian got a job as a Deli Clerk at Kaneohe Safeway but stayed with us for only ten months. He enlisted in the Navy and returned to the mainland for training and schooling in 2012. Liva graduated from High School in 2013 and currently working for roofing company out of Kaneohe and is in a relationship with a young woman he met in high school. Levene is pleased with living in Hawaii. However her Samoan side shows when the temperature is 70 degrees at night and to her that is cold! She talks about the prices of foodstuffs, though we shop at military commissaries. However I always remind her that the alternative was Newport, Oregon! One of paradoxes of life came true when years before we ever contemplated getting married, just out whim I asked her in 2005 if she would like to come and live in America. She said yes only if I transferred to Hawaii and we lived there. Six years later we did and who would have ever thought at the irony!