One month left

My Kauai adventure continues going along splendidly, now well over two months, and my return date is looming on the horizon a month from now.

One thing I have learned is that a two or three week vacation is not early enough time to have any kind of really genuine connection to a place. It takes a lot of time to get to know local people and become familiar with the places and experiences here. Seeds, if you will, that I have been planting since the beginning are recently sprouting and those in turn open up further opportunities in a kind of snowball effect.

Since getting here I have slowly shifted from what at first was very much what I did on previous visits (i.e. tourism) to something now more akin to living here. I'm enjoying volunteer work in the National Tropical Botanical Garden and through that meeting people, learning things, and have a regular schedule of garden work. The "hale" construction project has in turn added a new dimension to that work and made more connections, including people off-island.

By now I know my way around the island, places visit or to eat (or to avoid) or where buy this or that. It isn't hard being a relatively small island mostly developed only around the periphery along the one main highway. It's easy to become familiar with such a place and quickly feel at home.

Most importantly, people here really do live the aloha spirit. Some many have been kind to me, teaching, welcoming, sharing without expecting anything in return. That they love it here themselves is a big part of why they are more than happy to share.

Over and over I hear from almost everyone I get to know that Kauai either embraces you, or it "spits you out". I'm not sure exactly what that last part entails but unquestionably my experience, thankfully, has been the other side of the coin.

Since I still do have another month the adventure continues.