MY WONDERFUL LIFE AT 15 CRAIGSIDE

If you're old, you can live alone, with family or in some kind of senior's residence.  I have now been 11 years at 15 Craigside, up Nuuanu Avenue from downtown Honolulu.  Not exactly cheap to live here, for I hate the thought of my travel partner and I paying $12,000/month to the administration just to be away on a trip.  At the end of the year, we will fly to the Tokyo, spend a few days there, then take back to back cruises before returning home in the middle of January.  Our travel bill, thus, is $24,000 for the two of us, just to be away.  But there is no other option if you want to travel, for the end is near, and I have to do this now.  As they say, you can't take it with you, even if you get to Heaven.

See the tall building below?  That is not 15 Craigside.  It is a condominium adjacent to our smaller blueish building to the right.  I lived in a penthouse of that bigger Craigside for 32 years.  So I've now been on this same block for 43 years.

As you know if you are a fan of this blog, that I am in a retirement community, safe and thankful.  The following activities and lifestyle are typical of my life here, and should continue into the foreseeable future, interrupted by some memorable journeys to further experience the world.

We regularly are entertained by organizations doing charitable work, for ensembles such as the Royal Hawaiian Band, or Jake Shimabukuro come to perform here, for free.  Turns out that we too service the community, for members volunteer to work at hospitals and we host an educational camp for the children of staff who work here.  This summer, 15 or so came to 15 Craigside for  three full days, and were taught some of the activities with which we get involved.

The president of our association, Irene, teaches the flower arrangement class.

Next, a bon dance class.

A video was put together of the above activities and shown in our theater for residents.

15 Craigside organizes a golf tournament every quarter.  We just went to the Barbers Point Golf Course.  The chef prepares a bento bag of spam musubi and other delicacies.  I bought a Bloody Mary to go along with the food.

We have a regular foursome that go to the municipal courses most Wednesdays.

Various organizations come to entertain us.  In celebration of their 250th anniversary, the Waihona Winds 111th Army Band came.

Some of my apartment meals.  Unagi with sashimi and sake.

Bento plate, otoro sashimi, taruzake and beer.

Monthly luau, featuring home-made poke, with Kirin 17-year old Japanese whisky, which costs around $450/bottle.

My breakfast is minimal.  Mostly just have some fruits (as seen just below--something I accumulate when I pick up a lunch or dinner) with milk or yogurt.  In fact, I haven't been down to the dining room for breakfast in a decade.  Not even to pick up food for $1.50.  Except that this week I decided to get croissants, so added some other edibles, too.

This was a day for fried rice, barely visible to the right.

I have a papaya with yogurt once or twice/week.

You ask, isn't this a terrible waste of money?  Especially as I'm paying for it through our monthly $6500 fee.  If we have guests, the cost/person is $21 for breakfast, $27 for lunch and $35 for dinner.  The only meals we have in our dining room are dinner on Tuesday and Thursday.  We sit with five different residents each time to keep up with what's happening here. 

• Yes, it is, indeed, it seems foolish to only have two meals/week in the dining room. On the other hand, we do as we please for this supreme sense of freedom.  
• I have made calculations, and in my 11 years here at 15 Craigside, I have just had a meal in the dining room around 20% of the time.  
• I do now and then go down to pick up food, for which they charge me $1.50.  It should be the other way around, for they don't need to pour me water or take away and wash my dishes/utensils, etc.  But, such is life.
• As I indicated, we do have two dinner tables where we eat in the dining room.  But even then, we had a two months absence because we were away for a month, began to avoid residents two weeks  before we left and, returned to learn that there was a COVID-19 outbreak, so avoided open-mask environments for another two weeks.  Mask wearing remains mandatory today (there are cases of COVID-19 among a few residents and staff), except when we're at the dinner table.  One danger if that if one of the diners at you table test positive, everyone on the table will be quarantined in your apartment for a few days.
• So what do I mostly eat?   I like to enhance the food I pick up.  I go to Marukai for sashimi, wagyu beef, etc., and Ala Moana Foodland from foie gras, caviar, special vegetables, etc.  Not many days left, so I eat to a luxurious max.

We do have special meals, like Father's Day dinner, where guests are charged $55.

Dessert.

Then just yesterday, our annual 4th of July luncheon.

Then, last night in our Solarium, we were entertained by a resident band, the No Names.

This was a prelude to 4th of July fireworks provided by the Oahu Country Club.

My lanai garden is doing well.  Calamansi, Basil, Plumerias, Anthuriums and Green Onions.  Notice how gigantic one of them is.  It is a couple of years old.

I close with a double rainbow.  What is that white duck-looking thing beyond the mountain?  

Don't know.  Maybe a reflection from the window.

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