A Thousand Steps

Album that I am listening to: Common - Be (2005)


This weekend I was lucky enough to hangout with one of my friends from work. She took me to the Navy Exchange, which is pretty much a department store set up for armed forces personnel. What's great about it is that the items are usually cheaper and tax free!


Anyways, after this she took me out to Hawaii Kai and we decided to climb to the top of Koko Crater. Which is a volcanic tuff cone that rises to 1208ft (368m). I thought it would be a good climb and slightly more challenging then diamond head was around 700ft. Boy, was I wrong. The trail is basically an abandoned railway route all the way to the top. So it is literally a thousand (plus) steps to the top. Some steps are missing so it makes much more difficult as you have to step up pretty high at some points.

The bottom half is not to bad, as it is relatively gradual incline. However, as you can see in the attached picture the second half is seriously steep incline. The halfway point is demarcated by a bridge that transverses a small gully. Since it is a railway there is no bottom....so it makes it a bit hairy (I took the path through the bush..my shoes have no grip,lol). And unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of the bridge...next time.

I had to take a number of breaks getting to the top. It was kind of sad...there where people just running up and down this thing! Plus, I think my friend's dog I was walking was getting impatient with me. But, the view from the top was just stunning. You got a good view of Hawaii Kai and Hanauma Bay (left). We got to the top and the sun was setting, it was nice.

The descent was not physically challenging. However as I mentioned earlier there is really no grip on my shoes, so I had to take it slow coming down.

So what did I learn? That I am seriously out of shape, I hope next time that I will be able to hike up to the top without feeling like I am about to die. But more importantly, that after a pretty arduous task...there usually is a spectacular reward at the end. Just have to remind myself of that from time to time...

Mr. Rager - The internal struggle

I know that rap and particularly this type of rap is not everyone's cup of tea. However, I think its a great song and video and is open to interpretation. I look at it and see an internal struggle between to opposing personas. One good (Kid Cudi) and the other destructive (Mr. Rager). I see that all the people that he is fighting to signify his friends and family trying to help him defeat his negative habits. In the end it is Kid Cudi who himself must end his destructive habits. I read that he recently quite smoking marijuana, possibly this is what he alludes to in this video.




For me,  I guess for it would have to be my timidness and laziness that I need to overcome. So I ask you, if you were given the chance to rid yourself of a negative aspect. What would it be?

I am back!

Welcome,
I have been meaning to get back to blogging, but i have been pretty lazy about getting it started. I was thinking of doing something similar to what my previous blog was about. For those of you who did not know me when i was  blogging when I first moved to the America, my blog started as a way for me to describe my experiences as a Canadian Desi moving to small town Texas. My posts soon developed into political posts, at the time I would have to say that I was a pretty staunch liberal socialist. And it became a pretty good venue for debate among friends and random strangers.

However, in this blog I don't think I will be using it primarily for political discourse. But knowing me, there will be some of that from time to time. I think this blog will focus mainly about living in Hawaii, Food and Travel adventures, public health issues and most likely some introspective musings. I hope to share my experiences and foster discussion on pertinent issues.

Thank you,

- Zeshan