Search Results for: blog visiting honolulus chinatown

Ask a Food Blogger: Corn Pudding

Question: Do you have any good recipes for corn pudding? I love it but can’t find a recipe I like. When you’re looking into local cuisine on a trip (or in our case in a different neighborhood) it’s good ‘street sense’ to watch where the natives go. For example, when we go into Chinatown we don’t look for a place popular with the tourists, but instead opt to follow the locals down into what seems like a little dive in a hole in the ground for some of the best egg rolls, lo mein around. If it’s good enough for … Continue reading →

Chinese New Year Fun

Gong Hey Fat Choy! Happy 4710! You don’t have to be Chinese or have Chef Chu’s on speed dial in order to celebrate this festive event.  Today kicks off Chinese New Year, a holiday commemorated with fireworks, feasts and plenty of family fun. Chinese New Year is celebrated for 15 days until the Chinese Lantern Festival.  This gives you two full weeks to ring in the Year of the Snake with your loved ones.  Even kids can get in on the action by creating these simple and affordable Chinese New Year-themed crafts: Dancing Lion:  If you can’t make it to … Continue reading →

Where to Rock Chinese New Year

I snapped this photo a couple of years ago as my daughter got up close and personal with a dancing lion at a Chinese New Year parade that snaked its way through Hilo, Hawaii. It’s tradition for parade-goers to feed little red envelopes stuffed with crisp one dollar bills into the lion’s mouth in order to receive a bit (or hopefully, a lot) of luck in the New Year. Celebrating Chinese New Year in Hawaii is a unique experience that will stay with you for a lifetime. While the 15-day celebration culminates on January 23rd, there is no shortage of … Continue reading →

Celebrating the Year of the Rabbit

I used to live on the fringes of Honolulu’s Chinatown when I was in my 20s. Loved the waterfront location and close proximity to Aloha Tower Marketplace, but I dreaded Chinese New Year. Don’t get me wrong, I respect the Chinese culture. Love, love the food, music and cultural traditions, but the endless firecrackers that my neighbors set off ALL.DAY.LONG. was enough to make me move to Wisconsin. Okay, that’s not the real reason I moved, but I digress. The point is that if you are looking for a rockin’ place to celebrate the Chinese New Year, Honolulu is a … Continue reading →

Dance with Dragons and Lions

Last year my family spent the Chinese New Year in Hawaii. My then 5-year-old shimmied in the streets at a local New Year’s festival while feeding dollar bills to colorful dancing lions and dragons. This year Chinese New Year falls on February 3rd and we’ll be roughly 5,000 miles away from the sunny streets of Hawaii where we enjoyed phenomenal parades, a fantastic fireworks show and some of the best homemade Chinese food outside of China. Sadly, we won’t be spending the kick-off to the Year of the Rabbit in my hometown. However, there are many cities across the country … Continue reading →

How Safe is Your City?

I am a sucker for lists. For some reason I can’t resist scanning “Best of” or “Worst of” lists, be it a column itemizing the “World’s Best Ice Cream” or the “Worst Movies of 2009.” So when Men’s Health magazine recently published its list on the “100 Safest American Cities for Kids,” I was drawn to it like mold to moisture. Love the list… and not just because my family lives near the safest city in the United States (according the magazine). Love it because my family spends a ton of time in the top TWO safest cities in the … Continue reading →

Family Travel: Festive Christmas Displays

Last weekend my family traveled to Madison, Wisconsin, to take in the city’s spectacular Christmas displays. My kindergartner squealed with delight at the botanical garden’s annual gingerbread mansion and holiday train show. She was equally thrilled when we headed over to the State Capitol building’s rotunda to view the stunning 60-foot Christmas tree decorated with thousands of twinkling lights and handmade ornaments. Finally, her jaw dropped when we got to the city’s popular outdoor Festival of Lights event featuring more than 250,000 colorful Christmas lights strung on elaborate moving displays. It was a great way to get into the Christmas … Continue reading →

Airline Bombshell: “Aloha” to Aloha

I took my very first plane ride nearly 30 years ago and I remember every detail as though it was yesterday. I was seven years old and my flight was bound from Hilo to Honolulu (where my family and I would then transfer to another plane en route to New Jersey). My mom bought me a new outfit for the occasion—-a pair of pale blue pants, a red, white, yellow, and blue striped short sleeved shirt (it was the ‘70s after all) and a white sweater. We were booked on Aloha Airlines Flight 160 (I still have the ticket stub … Continue reading →

Celebrating Chinese New Year in Hawaii

Maybe it’s because I was born in Hawaii. Or, perhaps, it’s because I was born in the Year of the Rat. Either way I can’t think of any place else I would rather celebrate Chinese New Year than in Honolulu. The Year of the Rat doesn’t officially start until February 7th, but the party is already underway in Honolulu’s Chinatown. The “Month in Chinatown” cultural celebration kicked off tonight. Take a look at all of the FREE events open to the public and then click on the links I’ve provided below to read more about the place where tourists and … Continue reading →

Do You Live Near A National Park?

I grew up on the Big Island of Hawaii. It is two islands south of Oahu, which most people know as the home to Honolulu, famed Waikiki Beach and Pearl Harbor. The Big Island is not nearly as populated as Oahu, but it is still home to one of the most visited national parks in the country—Volcanoes National Park. Hawaii Volcanoes National Park is about a 40-minute drive from my childhood home. It was nice having a resource like this in close proximity, but to be honest we didn’t visit that often. We’d go maybe a few times a year. … Continue reading →