Warmest Aloha

Early in our marriage, my husband and I spent a year in Hawaii. As a result, I have three pieces of advice for you readers:
1. If you ever move to Hawaii, never move away, and,
2. If you have to spend only a year in Hawaii, make sure it's at the end of your career and not at the beginning. Nowhere else compares.
3. If you've never seen Hawaii, FIND A WAY! Swim, if you have to. Every human should see Hawaii in their lifetime.

Some of the best things about Hawaii you could only experience by living there. The business culture in Honolulu was one of the most frustrating, and most rewarding, places I've ever worked. Like most tropical areas, professionalism is pretty laid back, if it's there at all. Then again, you don't have to be very skilled or accomplished to rise quickly in the companies there. We actually had a friend who was a high school graduate go from working as a maid to being a fairly high ranking banking executive in just a few years.

The church atmosphere was also frustrating and very gratifying at the same time. People were always leaving, so we were continually saying goodbye to someone dear. The church we served lost half of it's elder board the first two months after we arrived. Yet, this same frustration made it easy to give the church the "personality" that it needed to have. There simply was no "old guard" to battle with over the "way we'd always done it."

I'll never forget our arrival in the Honolulu airport that June night of 1997. I knew the minute I stepped out of the gate that part of my heart would be forever broken. I knew I would spend a year missing home and friends and family. I also knew that as soon as I left I would carry with me an ache for Hawaii and the friends and church family we'd leave behind.

I suppose that's the missionary's dilemma anywhere she happens to go.
I wouldn't trade it for the world.