Tag: journal

A Maui Travel Report Podcast

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On this episode of the Torg Stories Podcast, Anne and I talk about traveling to Maui. 

Acknowledgements related to traveling to Maui 

  1. There was a devastating tragedy in Lahaina. It was especially mentioned on the Sail Maui sunset cruise we went on. 
  2. There’s a loud contingent of Hawaiians who post on social media, put up signs, and behave aggressively toward tourists.  
  3. It costs a lot to travel to Maui. It’s an unusual time in our lives that allows us the financial resources to go. 
  4. I’m going to pronounce very few of the place names I bring up correctly. 

What resources did I use to plan our trip? 

  1. The Hawaii Vacation Guide. Click here for their YouTube Channel Page. Erica and Jordan run the page. 
  2. Maui Revealed: The Ultimate Guidebook by Andrew Doughty. I bought the paperback and the Kindle book for my iPad. Click here for Amazon page. 

Which island should we visit in Hawaii? 

  • For me it was O’ahu or Maui. 
    1. For O’ahu, fly into Honolulu. Go to Waikiki Beach, hike Diamond Head, and visit Pearl Harbor.  
    2. I can see now there is a lot there I don’t know anything about. 
    3. For Maui, Maui, resources pointed to it as a place for families with quieter coves, quieter both from a crowd standpoint and a more calm water standpoint. 

    We’re going to look at a map and talk about the geography, what’s where on Maui: 

    1. Anne, how would you describe the shape of Maui? 
    1. Lopsided dumb bell. Two halves connected by a bar/isthmus connecting the two halves. One of the halves is much larger. 
    2. Could be a head as the smaller part, the isthmus as the neck, and then shoulders and a torso. 
    3. An AI overview: Maui is composed of two volcanic landmasses: the West Maui Mountains (Mauna Kahalawai) and the larger Haleakalā volcano. These two halves are connected by a relatively flat, narrow strip of land known as an isthmus, which gives the island its unique profile and its nickname, the “Valley Isle”. This central plain was historically used for sugarcane fields.

    Let’s talk about the different areas of Maui:

    1. West Maui with Napili, Kaanapali, and Lahaina. 
    2. Central Maul with Maalaea Harbor on the south end and the airport on the north end. 
    3. South Maui with Kihei, Wailea, and Makena. 
    4. UpCountry with Haleakala National Park and Summit. 
    5. Road to Hana. Twin Falls. 
    6. Remember to go back into these areas and go into more detail about what we did, what we recommend, what we decided not to do. 

    What did we do that we liked? 

    1. We started in disbelief at the scenery. Could be as simple as sitting on a balcony and doing light work on the computer or reading while also looking at the view. 
    1. Napili Bay. More of the pools and being on the beach. 
    2. Keawakapu Beach. Our VRBO condo rental at the Mana Kai had a great view right from the balcony. 
    3. Snorkeled. 
    4. We rented gear from Snorkel Bob’s for the week from right by our resort.They have several locations. 
    1. Boogie boarded. 
    2. We walked on the beach and beach paths. 
    3. We purchased fruit bowls and took them to beautiful places to eat. We ate pizza and fish. We went to a great food truck park. There are several. 
    4. We shopped. 
    5. Some places we shopped included Whaler’s Village, Kihei Market, Shops at Waliea, and the town of Paia.  
    1. We hiked. For example the Waihee Ridge Trail. 
    1. We drove around and stopped at overlooks or hiked off the road down to the water. 
    1. We sailed with Sail Maui. 

    Packing Suggestions: 

    1. We didn’t check bags. This was really excellent move on our first trip. 
    2. Multiple bathing suits. As a guy, I really just wanted a dry fit (or sun) shirt for each day. I ended up wearing the same one most days. 
    3. Girls enjoyed clothes to take pictures in during the sunset hours. 
    4. Buy sunscreen there. 
    5. Walking / running shoes. Slip on shoes. Maybe a Tevo Chaco type sandal. 

    Other ideas or observations: 

    1. Why did we go at all? My experiences as a player at Olivet Nazarene University. 
    2. We rented a car from Enterprise. Ended up with a Jeep Wrangler Rubicon. 
    3. I might try flying to LA and then trying a different airline once I was there. Tell about the United experience. 
    4. Go back, if we went back. 

    Hawaii Facts from The Hawaii Vacation Guide YouTube Page. (click here for full video)

    1. No billboards allowed in Hawaii. 
    2. There are eight main islands. Seven are inhabited. About 137 total islands in the chain. 
    3. The island chain extends over 1,000 miles to the northwest. The islands extend up to Siberia and Japan. 
    4. Hawaii has four out of the five major climate zones in the world. 
    5. Record low temperature in Honolulu is 52 degrees. 
    6. Maui is roughly half the size of Rhode Island. The Big Island, known as Hawai’i Island, is roughly the size of Connecticut. 
    7. From Napili near the top of the West end to Ahihi Natural Reserve where we snorkeled is 42 miles estimated to take an hour and five minutes. 
    8. There are no private beaches in Hawaii. 

    Thanks checking out this page and for listening to the Torg Stories Podcast!

    Twelve Places I’ve Lived: Journal Entry July 3, 2018

    For the something like twenty-three years since I stopped living with my parents, I have moved a lot.

    For the something like twenty-three years since I stopped living with my parents, I have moved a lot. This hasn’t necessarily meant I changed jobs a lot. After all, I worked at St. John’s University in New York for eleven years. I am able to remember how long I have been married by adding one year to my oldest’s age. Here’s to hoping I can continue to remember my daughters. It seems to be getting a little harder to remember my own. With a move to Boone, North Carolina on the horizon, I’m going to try and remember the places I’ve lived since I’ve been married.

    1. Megan and I started on the top floor of a tall apartment building on Church Street in Charlotte, North Carolina.
    2. We moved to Milledgeville, Georgia for graduate school and brought our daughter home to a three bedroom apartment.
    3. My second year of graduate school Megan worked as a resident director of a dorm and we lived there.
    4. When I got the job in New York, we lived in a two-bedroom apartment under Hell Gate Bridge in Queens.
    5. Megan and I bought our first house in Stratford, Connecticut.
    6. We moved back to Queens, this time to College Point where we used to sit in the park and look across the water to LaGuardia airport and watch the planes take off.
    7. We moved back to Connecticut, this time to New Canaan. It was another Church Street, this one up the street from the library.
    8. We moved to an old farm house outside of New Canaan where the neighbor offered our land lady a million dollars for the place so he could make it part of his backyard.
    9. Our family moved to Asheville.
    10. I also rented a studio apartment in Glen Cove on Long Island. I felt like the Great Gatsby might live up the street.
    11. Our family stayed another year in Asheville, and I moved from the rental to a different studio apartment, this one in Kew Gardens where the sound of the frequent trains on the Long Island Railroad woke me each morning.
    12. I’m now sitting in our home in Greenwood, Indiana. It’s sold. We don’t yet know where we’re going to live in Boone.

    What to make of all those moves? I don’t yet have a theory.

    Kept writing past 7 minutes today. Word count: 383

    Podcast on The Craft of Writing Memoir: Derek Owens’ Memory’s Wake

    The craft of writing memoir and the subject of recovered memories and post traumatic stress syndrome were among the topics as I visited with St. John’s University English Professor and Vice Provost Dr. Derek Owens. His latest book is entitled Memory’s Wake and tells the story of an abusive relationship between his grandmother and mother. The book is part memoir, part biography, and part research project. Owens is also the author of a book about the teaching of writing I really enjoyed called Composition and Sustainability: Teaching for a Threatened Generation.

    You can listen to the podcast below or via iTunes by searching for Prof. Torg’s Read, Write, and Teach Digital Book Club. Also, you can help the podcast attract listeners if you’ll take the time to “rate it.”  Link to iTunes and the podcast page here.

    Derek Owens Memory's Wake William Torgerson St. John's University writing memoir

    So that you can get a sense of our discussion, I’m including my questions below:

    1. Memory’s Wake is your telling of the abuse relationship between your grandmother and your mother. You also include a lot of the history of upstate New York and research about memory and abuse. So it’s part memoir, part biography, and part research project. Is that a fair description? As to the question, what’s Memory’s Wake about, would you have anything to add?
    2. I’ve latched onto the phrase, “Every Story Has a Story.” By that, I mean for every story we hear or read, that story has it’s own history of how it was written.  This book tells a story that began before you were born. When did you start messing with it in a way that you thought you might write about it?
    3. I want to talk about the rules that govern the conventions of this text. I don’t mean rules I’d find in a grammar handbook. I mean that this book has it’s own rules for how it was written.  To mention a few examples, the sentences don’t start with capital letters, you don’t seem concerned about complete sentences, sometimes you attribute sources and sometimes you don’t, and there’s a lot of play with margins.  I’m guessing you tinkered with that a lot.  The book doesn’t have chapters. Some pages just have one little black and white picture.  There’s heavy use of italics in places. Can you tell me about how you arrived at the published form?
    4. At what points in writing this story did you think it wouldn’t get finished or published? How did you push through those points? What was driving you to get it done and out into publication?
    5. Can you talk to me about how research works in this book?  I’ll tell you what I think I’ve inferred and you can correct me and add to what I’ve said. I think I see excerpts from your mother’s journals, stories told to you by family members, books or articles you’ve read, and visits to places in upstate New York.  I’ll dig in on a couple of these after I hear your answer.
    6. What was the result of writing this book? To you? What do you know/understand that you didn’t understand before? Is your take on memoir different than it was before?  Did the writing of this cause you to remember anything new or see your own childhood in a different way?

    The podcast was recorded with a Blue Snowball mic via Garage Band and a MacBook. You can read more about the book and its publisher, Spuyten Duyvil, here.  You can also listen to the podcast below or via iTunes by searching for Prof. Torg’s Read, Write, and Teach Digital Book Club. Please take time to “rate it.”  Link to iTunes and the podcast page here.

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