My father recently passed away peacefully in his sleep.  We went through some old slides and scanned a few of them.

Runners participating in the Honolulu Marathon start in downtown, run through Waikiki, up around Diamond Head and then out to Hawaii Kai. They then loop back running around Diamond Head again and ending in Kapiolani Park.

He’s way too healthy for his age…

Seriously this guy ran a full marathon in Crocs?

At least Minnie has decent shoes…

Your guess is as good as mine…

Its a Japanese tradition to eat soba when changing from the old year to the new year. Soba representing longevity (long noodles). Typically its eaten hot and soup based. As you get closer to the midnight the lines a popular soba restaurants get longer and longer. We decided to go early, around lunch, but we still had to stand in line for close to an hour at Sunaba in the Akasaka (砂場 赤坂店) district of Tokyo.  The soba there is so good.

BTW, Sunaba was the location of the heimlich vacuum maneuver in movie Tampopo with a young Ken Watanabe.

After lunch we walked down the street to Akasaka Sacas on the grounds of TBS TV.  On the corner is an old house (occupied by an old lady) – looks like it was build before the war.  Wonder how much they offered her to move when they build Akasaka Sacas several years ago?  There were some groupies waiting in front – maybe SMAP?

On the grounds of Sacas is an outdoor skating rink, looks like they were prepping for a New Years Eve TV show.

The day after the Honolulu Marathon, finishers were wearing their bright orange “Finisher” T-shirts all over the city. Many were walking very suspiciously – some with Salonpas pasted all over their legs, while others were already training for their next marathon.

I took a brief walk around Chinatown hoping to get a steamed pork bun (manapua) – but didn’t come across any.

The Honolulu Marathon takes place in December and in terms of participation its one of the tenth largest marathons. This year 23k runners participated – over half flew in from Japan.

The Kenyans are out in front – they make it look so easy.

The second pack were working a lot harder.

Then the rest after a long wait.

How cute, matching Louis Vuitton jogging pouches.

With traffic stopped till the afternoon, hotel guests catching an early flight, have to walk several blocks with their luggage:

A tired elf.

Kalakaua Avenue, the main throughway through Waikiki, is closed for almost 12 hours for the Honolulu Marathon. Its kinda nice – unless you have to catch an early flight out.

It was raining sheets a few hours earlier.

I avoid shopping centers during this time of year but was lured by the though of delicious coffee and cakes at Ala Moana Center in Honolulu. Luckily we found parking without too much effort.  The economy must be better – the shopping center was packed.

An interesting look.

In Honolulu again for a couple of days and we decided to check out the “Masterpieces of Landscape Painting from the Forbidden City” exhibit at the Honolulu Academy of Arts. The exhibit opened in conjunction with the APEC Leadership conference held in Honolulu and features painting from 13th century China. This is one of the first times paintings from this era were allowed outside China. The exhibit was interesting at first, but after a while all the paintings started to looked the same – they seem to be painting of the same landscape over and over. But we enjoyed some of the other exhibits of Asian and Indian art at the museum.

Wonder what happened to the shop with the Coca-Cola Saimin Fountain sign? Saimin is Hawaiian-style ramen noodles.

My typical Hawaiian breakfast – omlete, rice, Portuguese sausage, miso and papaya.

Awesome sake, the Dassai 23 Daiginjo at Sushi Shirahama.  The 23 stands for rice being milled down to 23%, typically Daiginjo is milled to 50%.  Dassai also produces Dassai 39 (milled to 39%) and Dassai 50 (milled to 50%).

A friendly welcome…

We didn’t have a chance to get out much while we were Honolulu this time. But we did take a brief walk in search of coffee near the state capital.

The huge banyan tree on the grounds of Iolani Palace.

As usual we took a walk around Waikiki after a heavy dinner.

Hmmm, looks like the Apple Store now has a pool.

Mom when I grow up…

He’s definitely is not liking his shirt.

Lunch break Hawaiian style

Atsuro by Michelle. A pose from Ashatanga Yoga’s 4th series – not that I would know, still working on the primary series. I didn’t know that this was anatomically possible.

We needed to kill some time before catching our flight out, so we stopped by the Jackson Lake Lodge at Grand Teton National Park. The lodge has a great view of the Tetons.  When we arrived, the cable news stations had their interview tents setup on the grounds.  They were waiting for a speech by Ben Benanke. Ironically, the lodge was overrun with tourists from China.

It’s entertaining to watch the bus tourist groups in Yellowstone. They’re likely from China, possibly Taiwan. Because these groups are time constrained, they’re always in a rush. First they rush off the bus, jockey for position to take a picture of their significant other, at least one strikes a sexy model pose. Next switch positions. Soon after the guide calls out that time is up and they rush back onto the bus. Don’t know why, but they all seem to have Nikon DSLRs – no Canon in sight.

We stayed overnight in the Canyon area of Yellowstone National Park and ventured out in the cold morning to catch the sunrise at Hayden Valley. It was a cold 30F (-1C), the temperature will rise to about 90F (32C) during the day.

To get away from the crowds, we headed for the Uncle’s Tom Trail – its not really a trail but a very long staircase of 328 steps leading to the base of Lower Falls.

Game break before the climb back up.

Back up.

And leaves some exhausted.

Lower Falls from afar,

The typical postcard photo of Lower Falls.

We went to Upper Falls lookout in the Canyon area. It turned out to be a popular spot for bus tourist groups – the lookout was packed.

Why people die at National Parks.

Mom has purple hair?