Black Sand

Yesterday we took a road trip to the Northern shore of the island. This area is full of enormously lush valleys and one in particular led to a black sand beach.

In the car... reading Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali - an incredible book about a Somali girl who had been raised as a Muslim and a refugee on the Horn of Africa and then fled to the Western world to escape an arranged marriage. Now she lives with a death threat over her life as she fights for the rights of Muslim women and the reform of Islam as a member of Parliament... and listening to My Redeemer Lives by Nicole C. Mullen.

Pololū Valley

Hiking to the bottom...

Black sand. The stacked rocks and stakes are set up as alters and idols as a part of Hawaiian mythology - an animistic worship of the so-called spirits which are found in the waves, the sky, the trees...

Awesome rustic swings and even a teeter-totter made from old ropes...

So after all those miles hiking down and up a mountain and to the edge of a jungle... we hit the road again. Hawaii is stunningly diverse.

Hawaiian graffiti... white coral placed on the black lava rocks! It blankets the landscapes!

Finally we embarked upon a field of old lava which was apparently hollow underneath. There were caves and canyons everywhere, we felt like the ground could disappear beneath us! But about a mile from the road there was one particularly enormous cave with a tree growing up from the bottom... and a movie crew shooting some sort of action/adventure scene down there!

Wish I knew the name of the movie... I think it had something to do with a necklace and the actor down there was running through the cave. If you see it... I was there!

Plan B

Last night (after watching the last episode of the Oprah show - ever! Which I loved by the way... she was preaching!) dad and I went out for a Thai dinner and ice cream... then a walk on the beach....

At 8:10pm we returned to our car and found that the gate had been locked. Apparently that beach was only opened until 8! We had no way of getting out of there... dad called 911 and an officer came to check on us but there was no way for him to help us either. Hours passed and we were getting ready to come up with "plan B" (finding someplace to sleep for the night) when a security car FINALLY came!

So we got home from our date pretty late. After 3 hours of sleep I was up again to call the Swedish embassy (they only take calls for one hour a day which just so happens to be between 5am-6am in my time zone).... we're knocking on all our doors right now! (I think we're past "plan B" when it comes to immigration.... we're around "plan M" or something) The rules for immigration seem to change weekly. Last week we though I'd have to wait around 7 months before getting back to Sweden, then we heard that I could go back in 2 weeks and finally today we've discovered that I will have to wait "not long"... we're thinking 1 or 2 months. My life is one fat adventure! Please pray that I will find a way to salvage the second half of my round-trip ticket back to Sweden! Right now I'm scheduled to fly from Hawaii on June 8 but I will obviously have to push that back and also try to redirect myself to DC (another part of the new rules which tell me I must personally leave fingerprint in DC before returning to Sweden) Ahhh!

On a side note, there's a shark stalking the coast of Kona this week! 2 attacks already! I guess they'll be no cliff jumping, surfing or snorkeling for me...

End of the world

I'm really sad about all this "end of the world" talk that has smothered the media this past weekend. Check the link below if you haven't yet heard of it for yourself...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/22/rapture-harold-camping-end-world

I'm mostly sad because this has become an excuse for people to take their eyes off of Jesus. Kind of like the boy who cried "wolf" time and time and time again until his plea lost it's truth and no one took him seriously anymore. Yes, the end of the world IS near. Jesus WILL return to take up the church and there IS an eternal judgment day coming.... but I can assure you, that is no grounds for the kind of campaign we just saw, and you can't put it in your weekly planner.

The Bible says in Matthew 24:14 - "And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come." Nations in this verse literally means "ethnical groups" from the Greek word ethnos. See? Everything comes back to being a God adventurer :)

Do you really want Jesus to come back?? Then you need to get right with God and get out there and preach His Gospel! Do you realize there are still 6,898 unreached people groups!? 2 Peter 3:12 says that we can actually speed up His coming! Of course, by preaching HIM!

I have readers from all over the world... so let me explain this clearly...

"The rapture" or Jesus coming back for His "bride" - those who have a relationship with Him - is no joke. You must prepare. The Bible (which is the true words of God) says that we have all sinned and fallen short of God's perfect standard. The only way to get back to God is through His Son Jesus Christ who lived a perfect, sinless life and then gave it up through death on a cross for the salvation of the whole world. He died for your sins so that you wouldn't have to! Three days after dying though, He raised from the dead! Death couldn't hold the CREATOR and SAVIOR of the world! Confessing that Jesus is the Lord of your life and believing in your heart that God raised Him from the dead will save you from an eternity of punishment and give you true life. That's all you need to do. Confess Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead!

If you're still not sure... if you've heard some other message that says something else... just ask God to reveal the truth to your heart. I promise He will. He doesn't look for perfect religious people... just honest hearts that long for a real relationship with Him.

Here are a few verses to encourage you. They never get old! ...

"For God loved the world so much that He gave His one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent His Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through Him." -John 3:16-17

Jesus told them, "This is the only work God wants from you: Believe in the one He has sent." -

John 6:29

“Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him and we know that this indeed is the Christ, the Savior of the World." - John 4:42

“And I saw another angel flying in midheaven, having an eternal gospel to preach to those who live on the earth, and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people." - Revelation 14:6

…"He has put eternity in their hearts…” - Ecclesiastes 3:11

"He will rescue the poor when they cry to Him; He will help the oppressed, who have no one to defend them. He feels pity for the weak and the needy, and He will rescue them. He will redeem them from oppression and violence, for their lives are precious to Him." -Psalm 72:12-14

"I look up to the mountains—does my help come from there? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth!

He will not let you stumble; the one who watches over you will not slumber.

Indeed, he who watches over Israel

never slumbers or sleeps.

The Lord himself watches over you!

The Lord stands beside you as your protective shade.

The sun will not harm you by day,

nor the moon at night.

The Lord keeps you from all harm and watches over your life. The Lord keeps watch over you as you come and go both now and forever." -Psalm 121

I'm in love with Jesus! He's changed my life... now I live for Him!

Date PM/AM

It was a date night for Samuel, morning for me. Sweden is exactly 12 hours ahead of Hawaii. He dressed up, lit candles and moved some of flowers around to make it more romantic. I guess this is as good as it gets for now. Still waiting for immigration to let me go home.

Hawaii is lovely though on this sunny Sunday morning. I'm sitting on a bench beneath some palm trees. The deep blue ocean is off to my right, there is a mountain of black lava in front of me and the birds are singing some wildly happy songs! I love how GREEN everything is... that's what I missed the most in Ethiopia... a patch of squishy green grass to sit on.

... the flowers yesterday afternoon...

Mauna Kea

Sunset from the top of Mount Mauna Kea...

(4,205 meters - 13,796 feet)

Enormous and amazing satellites in the background...

Snow in Hawaii! They brought a chunk back to put in the freezer...

Moon rise...

The stars were incredible from up there... we were able to see the ring around Saturn, the Southern Cross(Hawaii is the only possible place to view it in the United States) and even a glittering cluster of stars from a former galaxy that has blended in with our Milky Way!

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Dad dedicated this song to me the day I got married... Somewhere Over the Rainbow/Wonderful World sung by IZ, a famous Hawaiian musician who passed away... it's amazing!

(the original version of this song starts out, "Hey! This song's for Gabby!" truly!)

So today.... in honor of my dad's 48th birthday and the fact that he has moved to his beloved Hawaiian island just 7 months ago... I got him a ukulele so he can create some aloha spirit! And yes, Aloha really is a spirit of the heart! It's not something that can be described... only experienced... only here...

Tonight we're going to the top of the tallest mountain in the world ... Mauna Kea...

Mauna Kea - observatories in the Hawaiian snow © iStockphoto.com by Dan Schmitt

Mauna Kea:
The "Tallest Mountain"

Mauna Kea has an altitude of 4,205 meters (13,796 feet) - much lower than Mount Everest. However, Mauna Kea is an island and if the distance from the bottom of the nearby ocean floor to the peak of the island is measured, then Mauna Kea is taller than Mount Everest.

Mauna Kea is over 10,000 meters tall compared to 8,848 meters for Mount Everest - making it the world's tallest mountain.





Mauna Kea rises over 10,000 meters above
the ocean floor making it taller than Everest.

Who gets to play a ukulele on the highest mountain top?? I even created little homemade umbrellas for our hot coco and mom fixed the coconut dessert! The largest telescope is up there as well... so we'll be doing some of the greatest star gazing on the planet! This island - the Big Island - doesn't have regular street lamps and parking lot lights... just so that the view of the stars from the top of Mauna Kea won't be inhibited! Only dark, snowy, star light in Hawaii tonight!

Happy Birthday dad!!

Shoe shopping?

Spring or summer SHOE shopping?? For each pair of TOMS you buy, one pair will be given away to a person in need!

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Cliff jumping

We packed a picnic today... and hiked down to the end of the world.

Then we went to the mouth of a deep cave... and jumped in...

Dad...

Me...

It may not have looked like that far of a fall... but about half-way down, I was wondering... okay, so when am I going to hit the water?? And then I did hit it. Hard. I have bruises on my legs and lost my nose ring... but it was so fun! Who wants to come to Hawaii and join me??