We were blessed with another leisurely morning on Friday, and singers again used that time to sleep in, go souvenir shopping, exercise or go to the beach. While there have been clouds and short showers off and on, the weather has overall been very nice and there has been plenty of sun. These short bursts of light rain that seem to move in and out almost constantly between bright sun breaks must be what keeps the island lush and green and tropical! Also the ocean breeze must clear the air because several of us with spring allergies noticed we were not bothered by them in Hawaii.
We have such a great, responsible group of singers on this tour (and great organizers!) What group of 40+ ever arrives early to anything? But on several occasions we have arrived at our destination early and today was no exception. Our first school, Punahou, was not quite ready for us when we were about to arrive, so we killed time with a stop at Leonard’s for malasadas (on Krystal’s recommendation.) Malasadas are a very sweet, light, doughnut-type of confection (no hole in the middle) that come filled or unfilled and are sprinkled with sugar. They were warm right out of the oven and really delicious!
We have had a very sweet bus driver, Lynn, for several stretches of the trip and she was with us again today and found a great place to park the coach that was accessible to both Starbucks and Leonard’s, so everyone was pretty content.
Around Noon we arrived at Punahou School, which is in Honolulu on the windward side of the island. Punahou was founded in 1842 with 15 students, as a school for children of missionaries working in Hawaii. I believe we were told that it was the oldest school west of the Mississippi. Today it is one of the top private, co-ed college prep schools on Oahu, with annual tuition of 20 thousand dollars. Many notable leaders and famous people have attended Punahou, including U.S. President Barack Obama.
The director of choirs at Punahou is Mike Lippert, who greeted our bus and took us into the school’s wonderful performing arts theater, which is quite unusual because it has a lily pond flowing from outside to inside of it. Mike shared a brief history of the school, the theater and talked a little bit about his choir.
After our choir had brief warm-up in the theater, the Punahou choral students arrived. Tonight is opening night for their musical, and many were sporting their “Guys and Dolls” t-shirts. A couple of the girls had rollers in their hair in preparation for the evening’s production. You could feel their excitement. We were welcomed warmly with a sung Hawaiian greeting, and then the OSU Chamber Choir sang. Following our performance, Dr. Z gave the Punahou students some information about Oregon State and our music program, and then asked Chuck Gidley and Nathan Harms to speak and answer questions about what it’s like to participate in music at OSU as a non-music major. They did a great job.
The Punahou students then sang for our choir before having to head to their next class. The exchange felt very positive.
After Punahou we headed to the Iolani School, which is also in Honolulu. This school’s choir is under the direction of John Alexander and had been in attendance at the choir festival we performed for on Day One.
Iolani means “heavenly hawk.” The school was founded in 1863 by Father William Scott of the Anglican Church. With the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii and corresponding annexation to the U.S. in 1898, its leadership was changed to that of Episcopal Church, and it was operated as a school for boys until 1979. It also is a premier, private, college prep school, with an annual tuition of $19,000/y
We sang for the students in their choir room. Z. talked briefly about our programs, and then we were treated to a performance of “There’s No Business Like Show Business” from the Iolani. John Alexander made an enthusiastic comment about how great it would be if some of our OSU graduates would end up teaching music there on the island. (I think after visiting Hawaii, one or two might be interested!) One of their choir students shared that he is scheduled to visit the OSU campus with his family in a few weeks, so hopefully this will be the beginning of a great, mutually beneficial relationship with the private high schools on Oahu.
Immediately after our visit with Iolani School, it was time to don our luau attire, get back on the bus to drive to Paradise Cove in Kapolei, which is near Pearl Harbor and Pearl City. There are many hotels that offer luaus on-site, but Paradise Cove is a beautiful facility in a cove with a private beach area and magnificent view, and their business is creating the perfect luau experience for tourists. They do it really well. The parking lot was absolutely full of tour busses and the number of people in attendance was large, but they are equipped to get many people through the gates quickly, and from the time two authentically-dressed native islanders greet you with a free island juice or mai tai (depending on your age and preference) and put a shell necklace or lei on you; to the final “aloha” from the stage after the big performance of hula and fire dancing, you are thoroughly entertained. Really, the photographs speak for themselves, but I might add that Krystal is an excellent hula dancer/teacher and that the dinner buffet food was excellent and plentiful, as was the dessert. It was a very enjoyable day and evening.
