We left off at afternoon tea on the first day after leaving Auckland, so now we will jump along a little faster to get to Hawaii - which was very special for me we were there at a very auspicious time.
As I was the only child on the ship I was treated with kid gloves.....pardon the pun! Most of the adults while I was walking past moved to one side - just in case they touched me - this is what I thought at the time but now probably 52 years on can imagine why - didn't wish to converse or become involved in any way with this sprog....
The staff were a little more polite but I spent most of my time sitting on the deck in a deck chair watching the sea go past colouring in in my colouring in book. There was nothing geared up for us (me) but it did improve after Fiji.
Fiji arrived at about 5 a.m. my mother and I went up on deck and couldn't believe how warm and balmy the air was. Neither of us had experienced the tropics and man was it kewl. Sun frocks at the ready after we had docked we went for a tiki tour.
This is 1958 so there were hardly any vehicles and not that many tourists. Their main buzz came when ships called into their port of Suva. We took a taxi with another three people to the Maggie Grey Hotel for a cup of tea and biscuits.
Walked through the streets and went back on board for lunch. It had been planned that there would be a visit to a village in the afternoon and this I was really looking forward to we had been told about dancing and singing wow I wanted to see it all. What I didn't realise was that there would be a kava ceremony and my mother would have to partake of this drink as did all the adults on this little tour.
The circle of guests around the kava bowl and making of the drink were totally enthralling as this man worked water through what looked like to me straw - just like on my uncle's farm in N.Z. - BUT this stuff as I now know has a wee bit of a kick.
Each person was offered a bowl and our tour guide from the ship had wised everyone up that you had to drink the entire contents of the bowl or it would be considered a slight....came to my mum - they handed her the coconut half cup about one third full. Bravely she took it with both hands as the others had done and placed it up to her lips. Now I knew my mothers perpensity to gagging.....any unusual smell, sound etc. made her stomach gag........evidently the aroma was enough to get the gag in motion but ofcourse being the 'lady' she was there was no way in hell she wasn't going to down this lot.....poor woman - it went down fast, came back up a bit, went down again, came back up a bit and finally after holding her mouth firmly shut I think it went down. At that stage everyone was laughing and her gagging could have been heard on the other side of the island. But I give her marks 10 out of 10 she did keep it down but took a day or so to get over the event.
In the lounge on the ship there was against a wall a box covered with a cloth. It had a sign that said do not uncover or touch - now for me as a nosy kid that was just too much. Every time I was near it though there was always a steward looking and saying or gesticulating NO don't touch. I would ask what is it? they would just laugh and say you will find out when we get to Hawaii. Hence this bloody box became my obcession and I watched it with caution every day in case it moved or the cloth was changed - whatever it was my major issue.......for the entire trip. Except for the lurking behind the potted plants watching the adults dancing in the bar at night.....now thats an entire blog of its own.....learning curve for young child.
In Fiji another two children had joined the ship so there were a trio of untouchables but at least we could play cards together and colour in and watch the sea go past - doubt a child of today would be able to sit still as long as we had to. No running no talking loudly etc. etc. but we were allowed to swim in the pool at lunch time only when the buffet came out. I loved it because these ships didn't have stabilizers and bucked and bronked quite a bit - therefore the pool was only about a third full as it would be at the top one minute on one side and then go up the other - backward and forwards like a wave machine (people pay money to play with that kind of stuff now)...hehe
The adults were allowed to swim at all other times but us sprogs only had from 11 through to 1 ish I think - we didn't have sun screen then so we all ended up like little red chillies but that was how it was.
One fantastic amazing person was on board - she was a famous movie star - I remember her as being the most beautiful person/woman I actually think I have ever seen even up to now.... She wore parios coloured with flowers and often one in her hair she had lovely dark hair that shone like gold and glass and always walked with grace....I was smitten. I was going to grow up to be her and look like her. I still have her autograph but I wasn't allowed to ask her, the purser organised it from my mother's request. See kids were to be seen and not heard.......Heddi Lamar from the Road movies....what an amazing woman I will always remember being in the elevator with her and she actually smiled at me and I can still remember her perfume think it was gardenias......if I smell that flower even all these years later I remember her. At night she wore tight fitting dresses with high heels and every man on the ship didn't watch anything except her - first time I have ever seen women frothing at the mouth and nodding to each other in her direction with I assume some form of semiphor unwritten but all the women knowing what each other was thinking....
We sailed into Honolulu at I think about 7 a.m. and we had watched the most amazing sunrise....it was even more balmy than Fiji and the smell was amazing it was soft and sweet. All the boats came up to the ship and gave over wonderful smelling flower leis. We had to hurry off the ship as friends of my parents were staying in Honolulu - they were a couple who never had children and spent our New Zealand winters at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel - he was eventually given a Knighthood and had turned blind at the age of 30 something - Auntie Dore and Uncle Noel we were to meet them for lunch at the hotel and spend quality time with them for a couple of days off ship.
There was this wonderful pink building with a portico entrance we pulled up in the taxi and got out - well I don't think they do it now but then in the lobby there was a fountain which you could take a cup and drink from - it was a pineapple juice fountain....wow I was in heaven, except for the far too many I snuck in over two days and will always regret. The rooms that they had overlooked Waikaiki (all my spelling will be bad) and I had never seen a beach be groomed before and of course it wasn't much of a beach originally it was added to and probably to this day has sand put on it to keep it up to scratch. There were also these few (and I mean 3 or 4) men on boards surfing - now that was new in 1958.
What I remember most about the days we spent in Honolulu was the fact that it had just been made the 50th State so we had arrived in America being one of the first ships to do so, prior to that America was San Francisco....what a kewl thing - all I can say now it was wonderful but it was such a very long time ago.
I was allowed to sit with the adults in the outside bar which overlooked the beach in the early evening and my mum would have a pimms with all the goodies (cucumber etc.) and also maybe have a maitai...(sp?) which made her as silly as a chook but also Dore as well so the ladies would be giggling and poor old Uncle Noel would be looking into space just nodding every now and then.
Back onto the ship and onward to San Francisco....as we left the harbour we threw our leias into the water which means that I will be going back - but hell its 52 years now will have to be pretty bloody soon or that ritual wasn't real.....
GUESS what was in the box in the lounge on the ship was? - IT WAS A BLACK AND WHITE TELEVISION SET - when I finally saw what it actually was I fell in love with television and it has turned me into a techno nut from that moment forward. When I first watched it there was a cartoon on of Tweety and Sylvester I think.....oooooohhhh TV finally got to NZ in about mid 1960's so this was spectacular way back in 1958 - I was smitten...
Chat with you again soon.
Cheers
As I was the only child on the ship I was treated with kid gloves.....pardon the pun! Most of the adults while I was walking past moved to one side - just in case they touched me - this is what I thought at the time but now probably 52 years on can imagine why - didn't wish to converse or become involved in any way with this sprog....
The staff were a little more polite but I spent most of my time sitting on the deck in a deck chair watching the sea go past colouring in in my colouring in book. There was nothing geared up for us (me) but it did improve after Fiji.
Fiji arrived at about 5 a.m. my mother and I went up on deck and couldn't believe how warm and balmy the air was. Neither of us had experienced the tropics and man was it kewl. Sun frocks at the ready after we had docked we went for a tiki tour.
This is 1958 so there were hardly any vehicles and not that many tourists. Their main buzz came when ships called into their port of Suva. We took a taxi with another three people to the Maggie Grey Hotel for a cup of tea and biscuits.
Walked through the streets and went back on board for lunch. It had been planned that there would be a visit to a village in the afternoon and this I was really looking forward to we had been told about dancing and singing wow I wanted to see it all. What I didn't realise was that there would be a kava ceremony and my mother would have to partake of this drink as did all the adults on this little tour.
The circle of guests around the kava bowl and making of the drink were totally enthralling as this man worked water through what looked like to me straw - just like on my uncle's farm in N.Z. - BUT this stuff as I now know has a wee bit of a kick.
Each person was offered a bowl and our tour guide from the ship had wised everyone up that you had to drink the entire contents of the bowl or it would be considered a slight....came to my mum - they handed her the coconut half cup about one third full. Bravely she took it with both hands as the others had done and placed it up to her lips. Now I knew my mothers perpensity to gagging.....any unusual smell, sound etc. made her stomach gag........evidently the aroma was enough to get the gag in motion but ofcourse being the 'lady' she was there was no way in hell she wasn't going to down this lot.....poor woman - it went down fast, came back up a bit, went down again, came back up a bit and finally after holding her mouth firmly shut I think it went down. At that stage everyone was laughing and her gagging could have been heard on the other side of the island. But I give her marks 10 out of 10 she did keep it down but took a day or so to get over the event.
In the lounge on the ship there was against a wall a box covered with a cloth. It had a sign that said do not uncover or touch - now for me as a nosy kid that was just too much. Every time I was near it though there was always a steward looking and saying or gesticulating NO don't touch. I would ask what is it? they would just laugh and say you will find out when we get to Hawaii. Hence this bloody box became my obcession and I watched it with caution every day in case it moved or the cloth was changed - whatever it was my major issue.......for the entire trip. Except for the lurking behind the potted plants watching the adults dancing in the bar at night.....now thats an entire blog of its own.....learning curve for young child.
In Fiji another two children had joined the ship so there were a trio of untouchables but at least we could play cards together and colour in and watch the sea go past - doubt a child of today would be able to sit still as long as we had to. No running no talking loudly etc. etc. but we were allowed to swim in the pool at lunch time only when the buffet came out. I loved it because these ships didn't have stabilizers and bucked and bronked quite a bit - therefore the pool was only about a third full as it would be at the top one minute on one side and then go up the other - backward and forwards like a wave machine (people pay money to play with that kind of stuff now)...hehe
The adults were allowed to swim at all other times but us sprogs only had from 11 through to 1 ish I think - we didn't have sun screen then so we all ended up like little red chillies but that was how it was.
One fantastic amazing person was on board - she was a famous movie star - I remember her as being the most beautiful person/woman I actually think I have ever seen even up to now.... She wore parios coloured with flowers and often one in her hair she had lovely dark hair that shone like gold and glass and always walked with grace....I was smitten. I was going to grow up to be her and look like her. I still have her autograph but I wasn't allowed to ask her, the purser organised it from my mother's request. See kids were to be seen and not heard.......Heddi Lamar from the Road movies....what an amazing woman I will always remember being in the elevator with her and she actually smiled at me and I can still remember her perfume think it was gardenias......if I smell that flower even all these years later I remember her. At night she wore tight fitting dresses with high heels and every man on the ship didn't watch anything except her - first time I have ever seen women frothing at the mouth and nodding to each other in her direction with I assume some form of semiphor unwritten but all the women knowing what each other was thinking....
We sailed into Honolulu at I think about 7 a.m. and we had watched the most amazing sunrise....it was even more balmy than Fiji and the smell was amazing it was soft and sweet. All the boats came up to the ship and gave over wonderful smelling flower leis. We had to hurry off the ship as friends of my parents were staying in Honolulu - they were a couple who never had children and spent our New Zealand winters at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel - he was eventually given a Knighthood and had turned blind at the age of 30 something - Auntie Dore and Uncle Noel we were to meet them for lunch at the hotel and spend quality time with them for a couple of days off ship.
There was this wonderful pink building with a portico entrance we pulled up in the taxi and got out - well I don't think they do it now but then in the lobby there was a fountain which you could take a cup and drink from - it was a pineapple juice fountain....wow I was in heaven, except for the far too many I snuck in over two days and will always regret. The rooms that they had overlooked Waikaiki (all my spelling will be bad) and I had never seen a beach be groomed before and of course it wasn't much of a beach originally it was added to and probably to this day has sand put on it to keep it up to scratch. There were also these few (and I mean 3 or 4) men on boards surfing - now that was new in 1958.
What I remember most about the days we spent in Honolulu was the fact that it had just been made the 50th State so we had arrived in America being one of the first ships to do so, prior to that America was San Francisco....what a kewl thing - all I can say now it was wonderful but it was such a very long time ago.
I was allowed to sit with the adults in the outside bar which overlooked the beach in the early evening and my mum would have a pimms with all the goodies (cucumber etc.) and also maybe have a maitai...(sp?) which made her as silly as a chook but also Dore as well so the ladies would be giggling and poor old Uncle Noel would be looking into space just nodding every now and then.
Back onto the ship and onward to San Francisco....as we left the harbour we threw our leias into the water which means that I will be going back - but hell its 52 years now will have to be pretty bloody soon or that ritual wasn't real.....
GUESS what was in the box in the lounge on the ship was? - IT WAS A BLACK AND WHITE TELEVISION SET - when I finally saw what it actually was I fell in love with television and it has turned me into a techno nut from that moment forward. When I first watched it there was a cartoon on of Tweety and Sylvester I think.....oooooohhhh TV finally got to NZ in about mid 1960's so this was spectacular way back in 1958 - I was smitten...
Chat with you again soon.
Cheers
