The surface details: Myself and my sister, Pam and my brother Charlie. December 2010 on the Waipi'o Valley floor on the Big Island of Hawaii. Picture taken by our van tour guide at the site of his family's taro farm. We kept our identity as tourists during our entire trip but we rarely saw crowded situations. Very quiet on our visit, late in the afternoon. But we were not so alone; many ancient spirits abound in that place!
The sense of place: The secluded remote Waipi'o valley on the coast, on the northeast shore can only be accessed by going down a road so steep that the authorities only allow four wheel drive vehicles. The valley does open in the back to the somewhat dusty dry interior.
The second photo (which I featured earlier) shows the view from the overlook before you descend into the valley.
This valley has a strong role in the history of the island with conditions ideal for growing taro, the main food crop for the islanders. Royalty ruled from this rich valley long ago.
I felt a strong almost spiritual other-worldly sense on this valley floor. As if I entered another dimension or land when I descended down to valley on that steep steep road driven by our young guide. He spun that feeling himself with his stories about his family and their dedication to their ancestral land.
I also felt strongly that I was in a spiritual special place at the Place of Refuge which we would visit later in the week.
The people in the picture: Sandy, Pam and Charlie. Brother and sisters. In our 50s. Children of Al and Claire Ginsburgh of Rockford, Illinois since the mid 70s. Where are our parents? They have passed on, leaving us bereft, making our own way in the world. Of course, we, the children, are in our own middle age, with our own established lives. Marriages, children, education, careers, homes. We have gotten through the death of our father in April 2007 and our mother in Feb 2010. We look ok, considering, relaxed, traveling together. We had talked about this trip when we experienced the death of our mother together earlier that same year.
Charlie had come with Dennis and me (and Uncle Al) on a trip in February 2007 to Oahu to watch my daughter play in a softball tournament. Pam kept saying "next time you go, I'm coming too!". And, though I might hesitate to say, the money concentrated by my father and grandfather enables us to make this trip.
We went on our own, just us, the grown siblings. The family built by Al and Claire. But they no longer walk on this earth; they can't accompany us. We realize that most grown sibling groups don't travel together, we were rather an anomaly. Both my brother and sister are now single so they don't have a readily available travel partner.
What else you might see: Doesn't seem that we, as surviving siblings, stand rooted at this time and in this place. A verdant valley on a tropical island. At an ancient taro farm among the monkey trees. Endorsing ourselves as an intact family. Could it be that the back of that narrow valley in the background clothed in milky light might signify a greater beyond. Maybe where our parents now dwell? And where also we must also go sometime in the cloudy future.
But now, we pose for a snapshot of adult siblings taken by our young guide Doglass late on a winter afternoon.
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