Mele Kalikimaka! Join Me For Some Christmas Hilo Days

I thought I’d write about my Christmas time in Hilo, as a sort of snapshot of the holiday season here. First, it is much less noisy and busy than on the East Coast of the US at holiday time in December. Riding my bike around after dark I have seen old-fashioned big-bulb strings of lights on some houses, but no giant inflatable Santas, no mechanical light-up reindeer. No giant inflatable anythings, actually. Most of the decor looks like it gets unpacked and installed yearly, rather than updated.

The nearby coffee shop has a shark and a reindeer on its roof, and there is a Santa holding a beach chair in a lobby of my apartment building.

But that is not to say there are no festivities here! Quite the contrary. I bring tales of resounding classical oratorio in a church, a table laden with cookies to rival the famous Cookie Tables of Pittsburgh, and a park filled with blazing light displays and holiday-clad families and pets.

A Community Sing-Along

The poster at the grocery store read “Community Sing-Along of Handel’s Messiah, December 23.” I immediately thought, I already know the alto part of the “Halleluyah Chorus.” Okay, from decades ago singing in a sacred choir with my mom in Chautauqua, NY, but brains are very good at retaining melodies. And I can follow a score. The website mentioned a rehearsal on the 22nd at the church where the concert would be held. So I arrived at the church by bicycle early for the 5 pm rehearsal, and immediately started making friends in the alto section.

Altos are by nature inclusive and welcoming, you know. Sopranos are known to be a teensy bit high-strung, but altos, knowing we never have to reach for a note in our lives, are just perpetually relaxed performers. And extremely cool in general, and approachable, and laid-back. And also, modest. There were quick introductions, and the alto section became forevermore a unit. The choir director led us all through the choruses in Part 1 of the Messiah, and then we sang the famous “Halleluyah Chorus.” We had an organ accompanist, and a player on electric keyboard, which sometimes sounded like a harpsichord and sometimes like a flute. And we singers sounded pretty decent.

After our hour, the soloists rehearsed, and I got to hear some as I set up lights on my bike, and a rain poncho on me. It had started to rain, which I had already learned means ponding on the roads here. I pedaled off into the dark downpour belting the alto part of the “Halleluyah Chorus,” accompanied now by the resonant squeal of my mountain bike’s wet brakes. “King of Kiiiiiiiings! And Lord of Looooooords!” It only took me about twelve soggy minutes to bike home, and I got through the “Chorus” twice, with a few improvisations: “And it shall rain forever and ehhhhvvver!”

For the performance the next day, the dress code we were instructed to follow was Aloha-wear. This meant floral muu-muus, and red-and-green Hawaiian shirts, and large flower hairpins, and even some sequins. I wore a navy shirt and a purple-patterned skort, an outfit that works well both for biking and singing oratorios. The church was packed, with extra chairs in the aisles, to accommodate all the singers who’d rehearsed, those who’d just come that day to sing, and those who were there to listen.

I gave my fellow altos a brief pep-talk before we began, reminding them that the shrieking sopranos across the aisle were going to try to mow us down, but we’d be fine if we just stuck together!

It’s an electrifying way to perform, singing in a room packed with singers.

Here are 12 seconds of what we sounded like:

One of the singers mentioned later that she’d been sitting next to a friend who’d never been to a sing-along before, who’d exclaimed “Chicken Skin!” when the singing began — she’d had immediate goosebumps as the thrilling sound enveloped her.

Everyone applauded after the final “Hah-laaaaaay-looooooo-yah,” and since we were also all standing, I suppose that counts as an ovation.

After The Sing-Along: The Punch and Cookies Reception

The church provided a large room, and Guava Punch and cookies.

This was my kind of post-Handel’s Messiah reception. My first and only thought: Cookies, it’s what’s for dinner. There was a huge mix of home-made and store-bought, including some of the chocolate-dipped shortbread cookies which are a locally produced favorite. These amazing cookie photos only capture a fraction of the array. I may have gone back for seconds.

While eating my seconds, okay, maybe my thirds, I chatted with fellow singers, and learned that many were headed out shortly to perform for a second time that day, as members of the Volcano Festival Chorus, at the annual Holiday Lights Display at the Queen Lili’uokalani Gardens. I’d heard at the rehearsal from the choir director that this event was running Saturday after our performance, and the next night, Christmas Eve, as well. The timing was perfect for downing some more Guava Punch, wolfing a few more cookies, and biking to the Gardens for the festivities.

The Annual Holiday Lights Display in the Queen Lili’uokalani Gardens

Hundreds of people were in the park to see the lights, the singers, the hula dancers, and Santa. Every dog was wearing an outfit, or blinking lights, or both.

Christmas Eve Day Brings Blue Skies and Warm Breezes

I awoke early to a balcony view of pink dawn light on the Mauna Kea volcano. Alpenglow? Volcanoglow.

It is weird living near a volcano. I realize much of Hawaii is volcanoes, but I did not expect them to be outside my window like this.

I will, incidentally, be discussing volcanoes in much more detail in my up-coming blog post, “Life on Vulcan.”

A pink volcano is not a bad first thing to see waking up on Christmas Eve Day.

It turned out to be the most glorious day. I had a ukulele lesson to get to at 10 am, and may I share that it is a special version of joy to zoom on your bike to your ukulele lesson with your ukelele in your backpack, on a glorious sunny holiday day in Hawaii.

I will have much more to say about ukulele playing in a future, as yet unnamed, blog post.

After my lesson I bought a few groceries, which fit into the backpack with the ukulele, and I biked around, and then sat under some trees to look at the ocean for a while. I am not usually very good at just sitting, so this was a major undertaking for me. I am working on it, though, this skill of staying put. In this instance, I felt I achieved a very successful level of sitting in one place. I also chatted with some local people; that is a frequent occurrence here. People are friendly and chatty in Hawaii to a surprising degree. I learned about how one man paid for his son’s college education by collecting cans and bottles from the trash to recycle. He was at that moment fishing more cans and bottles out of the trash bin. A grandma told me about her ADHD grandson’s Christmas present surprise at home under the tree, a crab trap, since he was losing patience trying to catch a fish on their fishing forays. She was there with her husband and grandson, watching her day evaporate while no fish were caught yet again.

When I had exhausted my ability to sit and look at the ocean, I wandered around picking up a few bottles and cans from the area, and brought them over to the man who’d paid for his son’s education, to add to his collection in his pick-up truck. He’d just caught a pair of crabs, large, blue, and tangled in his net. They would be dinner, he said with some pride.

I’d bought some very fresh Ahi tuna from the local waterside fish market, Suisan, as well as some of their dehydrated Ahi spicy poke to try. The latter is sold as Hawaiian Candy. It’s chewy.

Christmas Hilo Day

If you bike, you know that it is particularly thrilling to ride a bike on a beach. This is one of the black lava sand beaches of Hilo; the sand is like soft dust, although there are a lot of driftwood pieces adding texture, as well as interesting volcanic rocks.

We all know, though, that to take anything natively Hawaiian from Hawaii will summon Pele’s Curse, so while it is okay to pick up interesting bits of driftwood and interesting volcanic rocks to look at, one has to then put them back. SEE: Pele’s Curse – Wikipedia.

I was surprised that the Hilo Farmers’ Market was open on Christmas! It is an excellent market. And I guess one always needs vegetables and fruits. I bought myself a cold lychee drink. Other available Christmas Day activities in Hilo included going to this youth center in an old Armory building that looks like a castle, on the left, and engaging in ferocious ping-pong and pickle-ball play, or dressing your entire family in matching festive Aloha-wear for a bit of a promenade.

I hope your day was merry and bright, or entertaining, or calm, or just full of cookies.