mo maui

ark fam

there were a bunch of us from our church who went to the conference (81 total), in fact at the banquet, our pastors were awarded 2 trophies, for most attendees from one church and for most first timers from one church. pretty good considering we've only got about 200 members.



we had a bbq at our place and invited some friends.


banquet photos

we actually have a hula halau... the ladies killed it!

INCREASE!

we spent last week in maui attending bob harrison's increase event. i thought it was gonna be a seminar where the speakers (christian businessmen) would give us strategies on how to increase ourselves financially. WRONG! the teaching was on increasing every aspect of your life... relationships, marriage, vision, purpose and more! anyway the best part was meting all kinds of people from around the world and hearing how God is working and moving.


Garry and Jeanne from Montana

Magnus and Paula from Sweden. we randomly sat at a table with them at the banquet and he ended up winning an award for sponsoring the most people... he paid for 13 folks to come from sweden and he's only 34! he has 6 companies and offices in 4 countries. wow.

Neal and Donna from Ohio.

Lorin and Patty Carmichael from Hilo. Reppin' da BI!

from left to right: Demitri, Tim, Phil and Dan from St. Petersburg, Russia. their dad won an award too !

now that's offensive!

white knights!

there was a fight one morning this week, at like 2am, across the street from my work. about 30 local dudes scrapping it out. i guess it was noisy because the next day guests complained about it. one tourist called it a gang fight because one group kept yelling WHITE KNIGHTS! WHITE KNIGHTS! i hadn't heard of that gang and doubted that any local gang would call themselves the white knights because, well, it sounds unlocal... and very unmanly.

fortunately our valet got some video of it on his phone. i saw the footage and started cracking up... the guys weren't yelling white knights, they were yelling WAIANAE! WAIANAE!

c'mon, man!

last week i got a phone call at work from a guy who was coming to hawaii. i asked him for his last name so i could look him up in my computer. his last name was akagi, but he pronounced it "uh-kag-ee."

whatever, i didn't wanna assume that he was a japanese guy mispronouncing his own name... he could've been native alaskan or something, right? anyway this morning, i ran in to mr akagi and guess what? he's japanese, but from canada. older man, which was a bit sad, but i guess it's both hard to hold onto culture and easier over time to just go with the flow up there in canada, eh?

made me think, though, if i'm pronouncing chang correctly. it could be pronounced "chahng" instead of chang, like bang.

pidgin to da max

bryce: ask jensen if you're popolo
larry: yo, jensen, am i popolo?
me: little bit.

hey, tsunami!

blue balls!!! i believed the hype! you were a no show - stood us up... we were ready though and we'll be ready next time if there ever is one. sneaky sneaky tsunami.

you really trashed japan. prayers and condolences to my yellow brethren. amen.

i love you, tsunami

i was getting ready for work (graveyard shift) and on the tv... "huge earthquake in japan!" they started showing live footage of the tsunami and i couldn't believe it. i was like, is this old footage? is this real? it was. it looked like those old school movies where they try to pull some camera trick by using miniature models of catastrophic events. anyway i knew what this meant. hawaii is on the radar for a tsunami.

then i was like, wait, i gotta work tonight. crap. so here i am. at work. waiting for a tsunami. less then 2 hours away. tourists have been calmed. some actually fled. streets are empty. thanks hpd.

stay tuned...