Close Encounters of The Third Kind

Hawaii. Oh how I loved Hawaii.

I went to Hawaii during my first overseas trip. On this trip I spent 2 weeks in Peru, 3 weeks in LA and a week in Hawaii.

Landing in Hawaii was so refreshing. After being in LA for 3 weeks, Hawaii almost felt like home. The people were friendly, the atmosphere was relaxed and there are smiling faces wherever you go. It almost felt like home.

View of Waikiki from Daimond Head Crater

I had booked myself into a hostel in Waikiki. It was an awesome location, I was literally 50 metres from Waikiki beach. When I arrived at the hostel with 3 suitcases (yep! beginner's mistake of overpacking!!), I got myself checked in and then asked for help with bringing my suitcases up the 3 flights of steps to get to my dorm. The 'help' was a 6 foot tall, gorgeous, and topless blonde surfer. I LOVE HAWAII!!

Once I settled in, I headed out to town and booked myself into a few hiking tours, a skydive and a Luau.

A pipe that looks like a cigarette

To get a better picture of my time in Hawaii, this is what my daily routine looked like.
630am - Wake up
7am - Get picked up to go on one of the hiking tours I booked in the mountains.
12pm - Return from the hike. Go grab some Maccas for my only meal of the day, then head down to the beach to sunbake
6pm - Leave the beach and pick up a half bottle of Vodka for $12 (375ml) and head back to the hostel.

 

Late night chilling on the beach

 630-7pm - Have the bottle of Vodka for dinner with the other travellers at the Hostel.
10pm - Noise curfew starts. We either have to go to bed, or if we want to party on, we head down to the beach.
1005pm - Have a good drunken time on the beach and share a few joints.
3am - Stumble into bed and get some rest before the next day begins.

A hiking path during one of my hangover hikes

There's some variation to this routine, but it was basically the same each day. There was a day where the morning hike was replaced by a skydive, or where the afternoon sunbaking was replaced by a second hike. That was painful!! 2 hiking trips on a hangover. It was mind over matter all the way!

My last day in Hawaii was the most intense in a way. I had had a wonderful week so far. The hiking however painful it was, took me to beautiful places and wonderful views. I'd gone to the waterfall where Jurassic Park and Lost was filmed. I hiked up Diamond Head crater (a once active volcanic crater - albiet thousands of years ago). I skydived over the ocean and watched the coastline come into view as I descended (Yes. I was hungover from alcohol and weed for this. I was also on 1.5 hours sleep). I met a gorgeous Irish guy. I met some international students who I befriended for an afternoon on the beach and had lunch with. It had been an amazing week.

I had no hikes booked for my last day in Hawaii. Just a chilled day planned for shopping and attempting to get out of Waikiki before going to a Luau that evening. Besides the tours, I didn't venture more than a few hundred metres from my hostel. You just get suckered into the Waikiki beach blackhole and spend all your days on the beach tanning. I became a tanarexic. It wasn't until I got back to Sydney before I realised how dark I was (Japanese surfer black).

That afternoon, as I was walking down the main street along the beach, a guy taps me and asks, 'Hey! Don't I know you?'
I turn around and find myself looking at a black (excuse the non attempt of political correctness) guy standing on his bike.
'No, I think you have the wrong person,' I reply.
'Oh sorry. I thought I knew you.' He responds. 'You're not from around here, where's your accent from?'
'Australia.'
Ok, in hindsight, that was an obvious icebreaker he used. I didn't realise at the time. I had such a great time in Hawaii, so I was open to talking to random people on the street without much forethought. So we talked right there on the street. I can't remember his name, but it was something like Martin Louis Jackson III. Yes, the third. He emphasised that. The. Third. He owned a TV show about boxing on the local cable channel. He was an entreprenuer of sorts and he grew the best weed in town. But he doesn't deal. No sir, he don't deal. He provides the herbs to friends only.
'Do you smoke?' Martin Louis Jackson III asked.
'Not cigarettes,' I answer.
'I wasn't asking about cigarettes. Why don't we head down to the beach and have a smoke.'
I agreed. What harm could be done? We'll be in a public place. Any funny business, I can scream for help.
So we head back in the direction I came, walked past my hostel, the Zoo (I had spent an awesome 2 hours in there on my second day) and walked further down along the beach towards Diamond Head Crater. Martin finds a quiet-ish spot at a BBQ area and sits down at one of the wooden tables. I sit opposite him and watch him expertly roll up a joint. We chat and pass the joint back and forth. This is the smoothest joint I've smoked ever!

Diamond Head Crater - Photo taken during a hungover hike

'This is so smooth,' I remark. 'Do you spin any tobacco in it at all?'
'Hell no. It's all marijuana. I grow my own and I grow the best,' he replies.
'Would I be able to buy some off you for the friends back at the hostel?'
'No. Like I said, I don't sell. But I'm happy to meet you again for another smoke. You can bring your friends if you like.'
Sounds fair I thought, so Martin Louis Jackson III pulls out a pen and pad and starts to write down his contact details. Writing down your phone number and email takes 30 seconds, give or take. But halfway through Martin Louis Jackson III remembers theres a very important phone call he needs to make. He pulls out his phone and dials the number.

'Hello?' Martin says into the phone. 'Hey!! What are you upto? Do you want to do something later?'
I'm now sitting there, very stoned and getting tunnel vision. This did not sound like a very important phone call to me. Not something you have to stop writing your phone number midway for. What the hell is going on? Is he calling for back-up to kidnap me? And then once they kidnap me, he's gonna rape me. Oh Shit! What do I do? Wait! We're in a public place, I just need to scream out for help. Oh no Wait!! We're in a public place!! We look like we're friends just chilling out. People won't believe me! He will just explain that I was having an anxiety attack. We have witnesses along the beach who will say that they saw us walk here together. There's no danger. Oh shit oh shit oh shit!! What do I do now? He's clever. He's got it all worked out. Fuck!

Martin Louis Jackson III hangs up the phone from his very important conversation and resumes writing his contact details. Very. Slowly. When he finally finishes writing his contact details and gives them to me, I've decided I need to leave. Go away from here. Get back within the safe gates of my hostel.

'Thanks for this.' I say to him. 'I think I better get going now. I've got a Luau to get ready for.' Oh nice one! Excellent excuse.
'No problems,' Martin Louis Jackson III replies. 'It was nice to meet you. Call me if you want to meet again.'
'I will. Nice to meet you. Bye.' I get up as normally as I can. I don't want to look like I'm running away scared. So I walk away as fast as I can without looking suspicious and head straight for my hostel. A few seconds later, there is a ring of a bicycle bell and Martin Louis Jackson III rides past me, turns his head back, smiles and in what I felt was a creepy voice, says 'Byeeeeeee.'

Once Martin is out of sight, I walk as quickly as I can to the Hostel and look for a familiar face. The people I was closest to in the hostel were all out, so I go to my room and lay on my bed. My head is spinning. I try to sleep. I'm too freaked out by this near rape abduction. I can't sleep. So I just lay in bed trying to calm myself down. What I needed was a friendly face to tell me that I'm okay, safe and that no one was going to hurt me. Since I couldn't find anyone here, I decided to go online and in search of some friends from home.

I go to use the internet at the hostel, log into MSN and hope some friends are online. One of my friends is online so I send him a message and hope he responds. He does! Yes!! I tell him about what has happened and how freaked out I'm feeling. I hope that he understands and tells me to calm down and think logically. He didn't do that. His reponse was, 'ROFL ur so stoned man! u are smasheddddd HAHAHAHAHA.'

Not what I was looking for. Not even close. I was heartbroken. I was stoned and heartbroken. I'm going to have to sort myself out, by myself. So I go offline and head back to my bed to try to sober up before I head out to the Luau.

It's 330pm. I have 2 hours to smarten up. I'm laying in bed, trying again to sleep. My alarm is set for 5pm just incase I don't wake up in time. That's not a problem. I can't sleep. My head is going in circles. I know I'm not going to be kidnapped and raped now, but what about tomorrow? I catch my plane back to Sydney tomorrow. I smell like weed. What if I still smell like weed tomorrow. What if I'm at the airport waiting to board the plane and the sniffer dogs smell weed on me? I'm going to get arrested. Oh shit man! I'm going to get arrested. I won't be able to leave the country. I'm going to have to call home and tell Mum and Dad that I'm in jail in Hawaii because I smell like weed. Shit! Check your luggage later Ronda. Make sure no one has sneaked some weed into your three suitcases. Fuck! My parents will die if I have to call them to say I won't be back.
WHAT THE FUCK? Get a grip on yourself woman. You are being fucking paranoid! You won't get arrested. You won't have tell to Mum and Dad that you're in jail because everything will be fine. Pull yourself together. You're just stoned and really paranoid. Calm down and everything will be fine. Take a deep breath and calm down.

So listening to my logical side, I take deep breaths and try to calm down. But when I take the deep breaths I can smell and taste the weed again and it sends me spiralling into paranoia. Oh my god! I'm going to jail! No you're not! Yes I am. The dogs are going to smell it. No they won't. You're not going to jail. What if I leave the hostel now to catch the bus to the Luau and Martin Louis Jackson III is outside waiting for me? What if he saw and knows where I'm staying? I'm going to get raped. Oh my god!! Pull yourself together! You're not going to get raped. You're just being damned paranoid because you're stoned as a mofo.

My inner selves continue to argue for awhile as I lay in my bed. No doubt, it would've been a funny sight. I'm laying in bed straight as a post, my eyes are probably twitching as I try to keep up with the conversations in my head. I probably also look as if I've seen a ghost, clutching the sides of the bed and all white knuckled.

Eventually, 5pm rolls around. I get up and have a quick shower to refresh myself. I'm not so paranoid anymore. I head out to where the bus picks up all the attendees of the Luau. Once the bus arrives, trying to look as normal as possible, I hand the organisers my ticket and climb aboard. I find myself a seat towards the back of the bus and finally fall asleep.

The bus ride to the Luau location took 90 minutes, which was great for my stoned self. By the time we got there, the paranoia was completely gone. Now I just had to act as normal as possible. We got seated for the pre dinner Polynesian show and I was seated next to an older American couple. Once they found out I was from Australia and travelling on my own, they started to ask more questions about my trip so far. I tried my best to behave normal and answer their questions coherently.  We chatted throughout the course of the dinner and had a rather civilised night considering the state I was in. By the end of the night I was feeling almost normal again. Thank goodness! No nightmares this evening of being arrested and sent to jail.