Maui

This will be my last blog post for a while. With the rapid spread of COVID-19, I have now returned home to Estonia. It was sooner than I expected and I’m sad I never got to go to Vietnam, but it was the rational decision to make. At least I had a very fun adventure in Maui before I left. Thank you to Malle and Tiiu for taking me in and showing me around!

I left for the airport at 4.30am to take a small Mokulele plane to Maui. It fits only ten people plus the pilots, has a propeller at the front and I sat right behind the pilots so I could see all their screens and everything.

Malle (there’s two on the Hawai’ian Islands, this was Maui Malle) met up with me at the airport, where I got my small Ford Focus rental car and we started driving toward Tiiu’s home in Haiku. If you couldn’t tell by the names, they are both Estonian.

We had breakfast at Tiiu’s, where I also met her mom Ülle, and then we left for the Road to Hana. The road itself is very narrow and windy, through the rainforest on the edge of the mountains and cliffs. It is very beautiful and we were so lucky that the weather was good, because there is a danger of mudslides when it rains. We had clouds and some sun, but no rain thankfully.

We stopped at the Ke’anae Arboretum (I think that’s what it’s called), where I saw lots of banana trees, rainbow eucalyptus trees and they also grow taro there (the purple sweet potato).

It took us all day to take the Road to Hana and drive back on the other side of the mountain. It was cool that we got to go in a circle, since I saw the landscape change from the rainforest to tundra. We passed canyons that were made a lot bigger by the 6.7 magnitude earthquake in 2006(?) that looked gorgeous.

My second day was a lot more chill – in the morning we went for a walk with Tiiu, Ülle, and their friend Stephanie and her daughter. It was very interesting to talk to Ülle, since she and her family had escaped from Estonia in 1944, when she was only 9 years old. The stories from that time are always unbelievably sad.

After the walk we went to the beach with Tiiu and Stephanie, where I actually ended up falling asleep. After I woke up from my little nap, we went to a different beach – Little Beach. Now that was an interesting experience since it’s a nude beach known as a hippie hang-out place and there was a lot of interesting people there. We sat there listening to the drum circle and joined in doing some African dance.

My last day I went to Lahaina, where I just explored and walked around. I could already see the effects caused by the corona virus – quite a few places were closed – but I still learned about Hawai’ian history. Lahaina has the oldest lighthouse and the oldest courthouse in Hawai’i.

As I mentioned before, I am now back in Estonia. As borders were closing in Europe and my 90 day deadline coming up, it was obvious I couldn’t go to Vietnam and in order to not get into any trouble with US immigration I started flying back on Tuesday. Luckily everything went very well with the flights, I even got an upgrade to first class for my longest flight from San Fransisco to Frankfurt.

It was truly an incredible journey and I feel so lucky to have been able to do everything that I got to do. Thank you to everyone who welcomed me into their homes and lives! I will forever be grateful and if you ever come to Estonia, my door is always open. Everyone’s kindness is humbling and overwhelming and makes me think, that maybe there’s hope for us yet.

Thank you!