Decision Made

[Kauai Kid]

We had gusty 40 knot winds this week in Texas. One gust pulled the door out of my wife's hand and she fell right on her hand!!

Drove to the ER, had the hand x-rayed, x ray evaluated by a physician (not broken thank God) , wedding ring cut off her finger because of swelling, and headed back home in less than 30 minutes!!!

Except for Honolulu, I don't believe we could have gotten a 30 minute turn around on the same accident anywhere in Hawaii.

Obvious to me, without a spreadsheet, that we need to stay where we are and enjoy our Hawaii timeshares as often as possible.

Mahalo nui loa for all you thoughts of this decision.

Sterling (Kelina)

 

[Bill4728]

K kid,

Glad to hear you've made up your mind. I sure you'll continue to be happy in Texas but sorry to hear you're not going to give hawaii a shot.

Visiting Hawaii sure is nice. I sometime wonder if living there could ever be as nice as our visits?


PS Gseptic: I moved your question to this thread

 

[ricoba]

Visiting Hawaii sure is nice. I sometime wonder if living there could ever be as nice as our visits?

I think that's the "$64,000 question"


Sterling,

I think as well that since your wifes health and immediate access to major medical facilities is a prime concern, you have probably made the right choice.

 

[DaveNV]

I think it's different when you live there. It's still great, but you don't do as many "touristy" things as you do when you're a visitor. Suddenly those visitors are "outsiders" who are in your way as you're trying to get to and from work or school. They are the cause of the high prices and crowded streets and uncontrolled development. The list goes on and on, and the location can be anywhere in the world, not just the Islands. It's never as good when you live there.

Enjoy your visits, soak up as much as you can, and relish in the feelings that you're able to completely relax and enjoy the Islands as the locals only WISH they could.

Dave

 

[T_R_Oglodyte]

I think it's different when you live there. It's still great, but you don't do as many "touristy" things as you do when you're a visitor. Suddenly those visitors are "outsiders" who are in your way as you're trying to get to and from work or school. They are the cause of the high prices and crowded streets and uncontrolled development. The list goes on and on, and the location can be anywhere in the world, not just the Islands. It's never as good when you live there.

Enjoy your visits, soak up as much as you can, and relish in the feelings that you're able to completely relax and enjoy the Islands as the locals only WISH they could.

Dave

When we departed the BI last August we chatted a bit with the rental shuttle driver. He was almost desperate to get to the mainland. He was working three jobs to make ends meet. In a typical week he was lucky if he had four hours of time that was not totally programmed. A good night of sleep for him was six hours. He had almost zero time to spend with his family - his contribution to the family was almost entirely financial.

Hard to imagine enjoying any place under those conditions.

 

[DaveNV]

Hard to imagine enjoying any place under those conditions.

A good friend of mine works for Costco here in Washington. He's been with the company a long time, and makes a very good wage. He also really loves Hawaii, and visits whenever he can.

So when Costco announced they were building a fourth warehouse on Oahu, (the new one in Kapolei), he was going to apply for a transfer. Then he found out he'd earn the exact same wages there that he earns here. They make no allowances for the increased cost of living in Hawaii. After factoring in the various costs, increased housing prices, moving expenses and such, he bagged the whole idea. He said, "I'd rather visit there on my terms, than scratch to get by living there." Can't say as I blame him.

Steve, re: your guy who couldn't wait to get to the Mainland: I went to high school on Oahu. I now live on the Mainland. Every one of my school friends I've kept in touch with now lives on the Mainland, as do their parents and kids. I'm sure that same thing has happened to many others, too.

Dave

 

[T_R_Oglodyte]

I went to high school on Oahu. I now live on the Mainland. Every one of my school friends I've kept in touch with now lives on the Mainland, as do their parents and kids. I'm sure that same thing has happened to many others, too.

Dave

And I bet at least half of them live in Las Vegas.

 

[Icarus]

I think it's different when you live there. It's still great, but you don't do as many "touristy" things as you do when you're a visitor. Suddenly those visitors are "outsiders" who are in your way as you're trying to get to and from work or school. They are the cause of the high prices and crowded streets and uncontrolled development. The list goes on and on, and the location can be anywhere in the world, not just the Islands. It's never as good when you live there.

It is different, but I would not exactly call your characterization of it quite accurate. If you stopped after the second sentence, that might be a bit more accurate, well, at least for me.

People in lots of places begrudge the newcomers. This was quite the issue in the Seattle area for a long time. I don't know if it still is or not. They even had license plate holders for natives (whatever that means, because the only natives there are native Americans) that only certain people could get. Same thing in Denver and many other places around the country. On Hawaii, there really are no natives at all. Only people whose families came here before yours. (Contrary to popular belief and opinion.)

I also loved living on Kauai and miss it. The big downside there is medical care. It's not as much of an issue on Maui as it was on Kauai though, but still for certain specialties, etc, you still need to go to Oahu for better care. There are urgent care clinics all over the island on Kauai, but for anything serious, you have to go to Wilcox and that's really the only choice.

-David

 

[Kauai Kid]

I think that's the "$64,000 question"


Sterling,

I think as well that since your wifes health and immediate access to major medical facilities is a prime concern, you have probably made the right choice.

I hope you are safe in Southern California. Your photo at first glance looks like everything is on fire. Takes me back two years to memories I'd like to purge when we lived in New Orleans.

Now they are talking about Texas wildfires being a real strong possibility because of all the rain Texas had early this year.

Sterling

 

[Kauai Kid]

K kid,

Glad to hear you've made up your mind. I sure you'll continue to be happy in Texas but sorry to hear you're not going to give hawaii a shot.

Visiting Hawaii sure is nice. I sometime wonder if living there could ever be as nice as our visits?


PS Gseptic: I moved your question to this thread

With all the incredible sites to see in Washington DC we actually were not able to do many touristy things because we were working 10-12 hr days. I suspect the same is true of many folks working on Hawaii. A lady in church at Hanalei was not aware of the construction going on in Poipu because she is working 7am-6pm 5 days a week, works a half day on Sat and Sunday is her day of rest.

She wants to move to the mainland.

Before long Bill Gates will be doing the Hollywood movie tours cause he'll be the only one that can afford to live there.

Sterling

 

[hibbert6]

40mph winds???

We had gusty 40 knot winds this week in Texas. One gust pulled the door out of my wife's hand and she fell right on her hand!!

Sterling,

I'm glad your wife's OK and I like the idea of fast ER's, but ...40mph winds??? That by itself would be enough to make ME move! 'Course, I live in a place where, each year, we get a dozen nights below freezing, a dozen days over 90 degrees and no humidity.

Still, I love Hawaii and can't wait to return!

Dave

 

[Fern Modena]

Sterling,
Medical care is very important. You made the right decision. Jerry's needed some specialized care in the time we've been here. Things are getting better here, but for a major metro area, there are still many gaps in specialized care. At one point our insurance paid for him to be medivaced to LA to go to UCLA. Believe me, you don't want to have to live your life like that.

There's a saying about Las Vegas (which is probably true of parts of the islands as well)...You know where Las Vegans go when they need specialized medical care? McCarran Airport. Yup. McCarran. Why? Cause they are gonna fly somewhere else...

Fern

We had gusty 40 knot winds this week in Texas. One gust pulled the door out of my wife's hand and she fell right on her hand!!

Drove to the ER, had the hand x-rayed, x ray evaluated by a physician (not broken thank God) , wedding ring cut off her finger because of swelling, and headed back home in less than 30 minutes!!!

Except for Honolulu, I don't believe we could have gotten a 30 minute turn around on the same accident anywhere in Hawaii.

Obvious to me, without a spreadsheet, that we need to stay where we are and enjoy our Hawaii timeshares as often as possible.

Mahalo nui loa for all you thoughts of this decision.

Sterling (Kelina)

 

[Kona Lovers]

Glad to hear your wife wasn't seriously hurt. Hope all is well.

My wife and I have discussed moving to certain vacation destinations we like, and have always come to the last question: Where will we then go for vacation?

Marty

 

[Kauai Kid]

We had gusty 40 knot winds this week in Texas. One gust pulled the door out of my wife's hand and she fell right on her hand!!

Sterling,

I'm glad your wife's OK and I like the idea of fast ER's, but ...40mph winds??? That by itself would be enough to make ME move! 'Course, I live in a place where, each year, we get a dozen nights below freezing, a dozen days over 90 degrees and no humidity.

Still, I love Hawaii and can't wait to return!

Dave

I'm sure the Santa Anna winds in S. California were well over 40 mph. I bet you're glad you don't live there too. Generally we have a breeze in Texas but this wind was cause by a cold front moving in. Still, it beats 130 mph winds with gusts to 200 mph in Katrina!! Amazing to me the water in the storm did most of the damage.

Sterling

 

[Kauai Kid]

I'm going to work a couple days at the fruit juice stand in Dec just to see Hawaii from the eyes of locals. I've seen mainlanders so incredibly rude to Hawaiians that I actually went back later and apologized to the Hawaiians for the "Ugly Mainlanders". Wanted them to know we all aren't rude.

Sterling

 

[auntdef]

Sterling,

Sometimes rude is something we percieve when others are from different cultures or just other parts of the U.S. Believe it or not the most helpful people I've run into in America were from San Francisco and NYC and the least were from Wisconsin. Who would have thought mid-westerners would be ruder then right & left coasters. Maybe these people were having exceptionally good (or bad) days. Hawaiians are lovely people who have bad days too, and I've met some of them and no one apologized to me for their behavior.

Let's give 'mainlanders' a break, if you want rude, hop over to London, which is truly one of my favorite cities....people never hold a door open and never say thank you when I hold that door open for them. BTW, my dh is a Brit and he can't make enough excuses.

 

[Hawaiibarb]

Another perspective

I, too, have to say that I do not view visitors to Hawaii so negatively. Mostly, the visitors I have met have been so happy to be here, and are enjoying it so much, that it makes me feel good to see their pleasure in being here. I live on Oahu and I happen to work for the largest hospital here (except for Tripler), and I feel good about the quality of health care offered on this island. But I agree that folks with serious problems often do come over to us for care; health care has to be an important part of your decision re which island to choose as a residence.

As far as taking time to enjoy Hawaii..... probably any of us get so wrapped up in our everyday lives and jobs that we forget to enjoy the beauty around us and the special things that make our part of the country so unique. People in Vermont couldn't believe I went there for vacation when I live in Hawaii, but our country has so many different beautiful places to visit.

I feel so lucky to live here. I have a job I love, work with wonderful people, enjoy our multi-ethnic society so much! You all remind me to carve out more time to enjoy my beautiful island!

Please enjoy every minute you are here the next time you come to visit.....and plan your next trip here while you are flying home!

Barb

 

[wandering gnome]

Sterling,

I'm curious about where you received 30 minute medical care. Was near a major metro area like Houston or Dallas?