Aloha Kona!

Many people told us that Hawai‘i is beautiful: Colleagues, TV shows or films, and vintage postcards, etc. But they were all wrong. Hawai‘i is simply STUNNING!

The flight from Los Angeles LAX over the Pacific took 5,5 hours. The only color combination we saw during the flight was blue-white-blue, ocean-clouds-ocean. Flying to a random island in the Pacific Ocean is indeed a bit different from flying from continent to continent. Our first sign of Big Island was the dark blue top of the Mauna Kea, the highest mountain and volcano of our destination. The mountain top throned majestically above a sea of water and clouds in the yellow afternoon sky. As we got closer, Mauna Kea revealed its real brown color and we got a clear view of the observatories on its summit. We flew around the island to see fresh green grass, waving palm trees, and dark lava fields from the early 1800s eruption until we landed at the airport which is a mere agglomeration of tropical pavilions.

Tropical Paradise by the Sea: Kona Magic Sands Resort

Our crib Kona Magic Sands is located right next to the Magic Sands Beach with its own swimming pool and palm-tree lined terrace. It is as close to the ocean as you can get, as you can see. In fact, we heard this complex could not have been build as it is today, because new tsunami-related construction rules supposedly exist. At least we have tsunami sirens and the hills are right behind us ;)

Almost to Ourselves, Especially During the Week.

The Pacific waves are very prominent at this ocean-front condo, they put us to sleep at night and wake us up in the morning. Alice, our landlord provided us with everything we need: spices for meals, snorkel gear for the beach, and even a medium-sized library with all things Hawaiian. The first book we both read was Mark Twain in Hawaii: Roughing It In the Sandwich Islands, a collection of newspaper essays he wrote during his stay on the islands in 1866. Even the fridge was filled with two beers and sparkling wine. Whoever claimed „Es gibt kein Bier auf Hawaii“ was just fundamentally wrong and did not know what he was talking about. Our crib is absolutely fabulous and upon entering the condo, I already thought about when and how I could get back here in the future.

The Adjacent Magic Sands Beach at Night.

La Frontera/Borderlands: Observations in El Paso, TX.

Before we post more on our Hawai’ian dream getaway, let me quickly wrap up the last stop on my Texas Trail. El Paso is the Western-most part of Texas, squeezed between the cactus-littered Franklin Mountains, the state of New Mexico, and the country of Mexico. Poor El Paso! Indeed, the 650,000 people city does not really feel like Texas or at times even the United States for that matter. The landscape looks like it was taken from a Western movie, the language and the street signs are predominantly Spanish, and almost all of the residents are Hispanics. The desert city is certainly a lot different from the Metroplex Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, but also San Antonio.

“Western Landscape”: Franklin Mountains.

The border was the most defining spacial marker during my stay in this sprawling desert city. When I met up with my dear friend Beth’s brother Kevin and his wife Vicky for dinner in the northwestern part, the bus drove on the I-10, which runs along the cute Rio Bravo/Rio Grande, the river that marks the U.S.-Mexican border. It is amazing to see how close the border is while it keeps people apart at the same time. The 1.3-million city Cuidad Juárez right across the border basically forms the other half of this giant sprawling ocean of low-rise houses sparkling in the sun.

Borderlands: El Paso (lower left) and Ciudad Juárez (upper right) Divided By the Concrete Channel of the Rio Bravo/Rio Grande.

El Paso and Ciudad Juárez are like urban desert twins separated by a huge concrete channel aka. the border. Although they appear to be from the same family, they are radically different in their characters: The former is one of the safest cities in the United States, the latter is one of the most violent and dangerous cities in Mexico.

Highrises of Downtown El Paso, Ciudad Juárez in the Background.

The drug war, which has violently erupted in 2008 after newly elected Mexican President Calderón had declared to fight the drug cartels, has pretty much put an end to the endless flows across the border. While in early 2000s, the border constituted this constant ebb and flow of locals, workers, military personnel, and tourists going back and forth between the two countries, this stream has pretty much dried out in the wake of the drug war.

Crossing Over? Friendship Bridge between El Paso and Ciudad Juárez.

Nobody I spoke to prior to my trip recommended me to go there. In fact, one of the business men I met on the airplane to ELP even urged me: “I REQUIRE you not to go across the border.” My Austin host Ariam explained it would be difficult for me as a White person going over because of the kidnapping industry in addition to the countless shootings and senseless killings. The Border Patrol which can be distinguished from other police cars by its signature white and green-colored SUVs is lined up every hundred meters on the border to ensure that the drug war does not spill over to the U.S. It is shocking to see what happened to the great country that I traveled to in 2002.

Border Patrol SUVs at Good Neighbor International Bridge, El Paso.

Although I could not cross the border, Mexico was everywhere in El Paso: In the shops that sell Mexican soccer shirts, on the streets where the dusty and rusty cars have predominantly Mexican license plates, and at the El Paso Museum of Art which had an exhibit on Mexican Modernism. Reading on the recent U.S. Census in the Dallas Morning News which announced the historic shift that White births are in the minority for the first time in U.S. history, El Paso already foreshadows how the US will continue to transform towards the latter part of the 21^st century.

Just Another Regular Kona Sunset

View From our Condo.

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Texarre: “Please DO NOT …

… SIT in this Pretty Chair.”

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Where the West Begins: Fort Worth Stockyards.

Fort Worth Stockyards: Cattle Drive Down the Exchange Ave.

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Who Shot J.R.? A Trip to Southfork Ranch.

Writing the headline, I just notice how much violence is connected to Dallas: JFK shot, LHO shot, JR shot, …

The TV series Dallas did not only shape 1980s America, but also my teenage years in the early 1990s. During the summertime I would watch re-runs on German public television ZDF and ARD on weekday mornings. Believe it or not, the Dallas family saga around the unscrupulous oil baron J.R. Ewing, his alcoholic wife Sue Ellen, and his handsome brother Bobby shaped much of my pre-high school imagination of America.

It was therefore important to me to visit the Southfork Ranch. The first and major problem the European backpacker faces is the lack of public transportation to the ranch which is located 25 miles/40 kilometers north of Dallas in Parker, TX. That left me with only a few options: Either take the public train DART to the last possible station in Plano and then jump into a cab or get on a bike for that matter. Well, bike was not an option. I decided to ask my Airbnb host Duriye instead if she knew someone in her group of friends who would be willing to take me. Her friend Glenetta, a wonderful waitress in the famous Balcony Club in the Lakewood neighborhood, agreed to take me. She had been there a couple of years ago and thought it was fun to revisit the ranch. So the two of us had a girls’ afternoon at the famous Southfork Ranch.

The Southfork Ranch, Parker, TX.

Just like the Statue of Liberty, the Alamo, or Graceland, the Southfork Ranch is much smaller than expected. The tour of the compound took place in a tractor which had seats in its trailer. The compound also features longhorns, the typical Texan cattle, horses, and gift shops. On our way we passed a strange site which looked like scaffolding from a theme park, but the tour guide explained that one of the former owners decided to drill for oil for his wife on the occasion of their wedding anniversary. Of course, there was no oil in that part of Texas. The wife must have been furious because the few million dollars that the rich husband spent on oil drilling would have made a real big and glitzy diamond ring.

Tractor, Trailer, Oilfield: At the Ranch.

Besides Glenetta and me there was a group of French-speaking visitors among the rather small tourist crowd who visited Southfork. Some of them were really enthusiastic about their visit. For instance, one French man wore T-shirt and a base cap which both displayed his pride in cowboy culture. He seemed especially proud to be there and assured to our friendly tour guide that it not his first time at the compound. Rather, he had been there for the 25-year Dallas reunion party and, “oh, c’est terrible”, complained about the masses of people who had been there. Guessing from his “insider knowledge”, he MUST be the president of the French chapter of the Dallas fan club. I do not accept any other option about his identity.

The Alamo Effect: Southfork Ranch, Exterior.

I really enjoyed the short lecture inside the mansion, because I learned more about the production context of Dallas (Always great for Cultural Studies folks!). Our tour guide elaborate on how the film crew picked the ranch, how the former owner rejected the request initially, and how the film crew used different techniques in order to make the mansion look bigger on-screen. For instance, they used many wide-angle shots of the building, low camera angles to emphasize its height, or inserted screen time when Bobby swims in the very small pool. Since the owner prohibited filming inside, the interiors shots were filmed in Hollywood, on sets modeled after the ranch house. Today, each room is dedicated to a character. The exterior shots were shot during June, July, and August, the only time the former owner would allow the film crew on the site. All of the exterior shots where then filmed for the entire season. Imagine Sue Ellen wearing a luxurious fur coat at 100-110 degrees Fahrenheit for a winter shot underneath the hot Texas sun!

“Hmm, Monsieur Bobby, Oui”: Bedroom Decorated Bobby-Style.

All in all, Glenetta and I really enjoyed our afternoon at the Ranch. We had a lot of fun especially watching the other euphoric European tourists meandering in the house of their 1980s TV dreams. We will definitely tune in when the new season of Dallas premiers June 13 on TNT remembering this great and hilarious day.

Miss Sina at the Southfork Ranch: Proud French Tourists in the Background.

Where JFK Was Shot … and Where I Got a Ticket: Dallas

Many images come to my mind when I think of Texas’ largest city Dallas. Most prominently the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy in November 1963, but also the widely popular 1980s TV series Dallas, and of course uns’  Dirk Nowitzki playing for the successful Dallas Mavericks basketball team. The 2-million city in the app. 6 million Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex is certainly the highlight of my trip!

First things first: The first trip lead me to the JFK memorial site in the western end of downtown Dallas. I took the opportunity to use my wonderful Airbnb host Duriye’s racing bike to explore the city. As it turns out this was a bad idea for two reasons.

1. Dallas is by no means a city of cyclists! There are no bike lanes but wide 4 lane one-way streets. I felt highly intimidated riding with hundreds of other cars in downtown. My biggest fear was that they would not notice me and hit me.
2. Dallas prevents downtown cycling by giving out tickets to cyclists who do not wear a helmet. Ok, wearing a helmet has been municipal law since 1996. But it is the only city in Texas where the bicycle patrol sharply enforces it while ironically neglecting the safety of some of the bikes I have seen out there.

When I was one block away from The Sixth Floor Museum on Lamar Street, the place to learn about Kennedy’s presidency, assassination, and aftermath, the Dallas PD pulled me over and the cop gave me a ticket for not wearing a helmet. The $10-ticket itself is pretty decent, but the so-called “court fees” are outrageous for my taste: $ 64!

This incident tells me much about Dallas’ spatial politics. On the one hand, the city is toying around with paving parts of the Trinity River in order to build another highway aiming at easing the dense traffic congestion. At the other hand, cycling as an alternative to get around the city is systematically repressed. This incident left a bitter aftertaste over my Dallas trip so far.

But back to visiting the site where JFK was shot in November 1963. Surprisingly, the former crime scene is an ordinary three-lane road today:

Nightmare on Elm Street: Where Oswald Shot Kennedy.

Every once in a while when the traffic light is green, a flood of cars rushes down Elm Street sternly ignoring the big white X in the middle lane where the President got shot three times. On both sides of the street tourists and visitors line up to look at the X and reminisce about what would have been if he had not died that fateful day. They are only interrupted by mostly African American street vendors who sell a historic newspaper that promises to tell the “truth” about JFK’s assassination.

CSI Dallas: Commemorators, Conspirators, and Veterans.

Standing at the Grassy Knoll, the adjacent green square, my gaze goes up the red brick building to the north end of this part of the street (see first photograph). This building is the former Texas School Book Depository where Lee Harvey Oswald positioned himself for the assassination. Today, this very place is the Sixth Floor Museum.

The Sixth Floor Museum starts off contextualizing the 1960s political and cultural climate. Then it introduces the key points in Kennedy’s Presidency before zooming in from hour to hour to second by second what happened on 22 November 1963. The moment of the assassination is mapped by the only available video going from millisecond to millisecond. I liked this zooming in a lot because it slows down time and enables me to imagine how it must have happened. Of course, this slow mapping intensifies the emotional impact of the murder even 49 years after it happened. It left many of the visitors moved and some even sniffed, contemplating, or even remembering that day. After the zooming in on the moments of the murder, it zooms out on the rescue efforts, JFK’s death, Oswald’s subsequent assassination by night club owner Jack Ruby, and the global response to the murder. The museum also features a chart of nine possible conspiracy theories ranging from Soviet agents over fundamentalists (left- and right-wing) to organized crime.

While historians still debate on the legacy of Kennedy’s Presidency (to paraphrase American journalist Walter Cronkite’s words in the last video of the exhibit), he did have a huge impact on the people. Visiting the exhibit and observing the visitors from different cultural backgrounds and ages I am convinced that this still holds true until today. And I include myself: Although the one-floor museum is quite small, I spent three hours there reading all of the panels, examining closely all of the photographs, and absorbing all the videos available.

Kennedy Memorial, Downtown Dallas.

Where in Texas?!

Let’s see how well YOU know Texas, dear readers! I will upload a picture once in a while not telling where it was taken. Guess the place and leave a comment. The person with the first correct answer will receive a postcard from Texas from me. Sorry, dear Texans, but you are exluded from this game. ;-)

Here is the first pic. Where was it taken?

Where in Texas is Sina?!

Keep Austin Honest!

Texas is part of the United States, but it often has its own take on things. Take the Texas State Capitol for instance. It was modeled after the Washington Capitol and it features an impressive rotunda and two wings with offices and chambers to the left and the right.

Same Same, but Different: The Texas State Capitol.

Yet, it also differs from the U.S. Capitol in two regards: It is 6 meters higher. Take that, Washington! And, yes, the color is slightly “off”. Take that, Texas! Is not white, but made out of pink Texas granite to emphasize the regional identity. Both, the size and the color of the Texas Sate Capitol highlight the self-attributed uniqueness of the Lone Star State in the greater fabric of the United States.

When I toured the Capitol’s various rooms, such as the rotunda, the Senate, the House of Representatives, the Supreme Court, the Secretary of State’s vault, or the Governor’s Victorian-style reception room, I noticed two things.

The existence of former Governor and former U.S. President George W. Bush was not as present as I expected. After all, he was the last TX politician who has made it to the White House. His portrait was featured in the gallery of ex-governors of course.

Remember Me? Governors’ Gallery with “W”.

But everything else I saw pointed to current governor and ex-presidential candidate Rick Perry. For instance, the Reference Library featured a glass case with memorabilia of inauguration ceremonies. One glass case displayed a 1957 ceremony, the other one Rick Perry’s.

Inauguration Memorabilia: Rick Perry.

Charts at the Senate displayed former legislatures. Interestingly, they all started in the early 2000s after Perry had been elected as governor. Perry, by the way, is the longest-serving governor in U.S. history. Things in Texas are not just larger, but also longer than elsewhere in the United States.

Historic Chart: 2003 Senate Legislature with Governor Rick Perry (Notice the Kids in the Middle – They are Honorable Members!).

Even when I talked to service personnel, they spoke highly of the older Bush for his humor and wit, but were quite reserved about W. It seems even in his home state, officials do not want to associate themselves with George W. Bush. In that regard politicians in Texas are very much like politicians in Washington, ha!

Secondly, I noticed the immense effort to restore and preserve the Capitol. Later when I walked through the new underground extension reading the newspaper clippings and looking at the photographs on the wall, I found out why: There had been a devastating fire in 1983 which killed one, injured several, and badly damaged the east wing. However, this fire is hardly mentioned in the official leaflets and guides. The fire leaves a strange void when reading about the official story of the Texas State Capitol. Is that void Trauma? A Texan nightmare?

Keep Austin Weird!

Loser-chic attire, bohemian flaneurs flooding the streets, alternative city cultures, the epicenter of the U.S. green movement, a Democratic hotspot in the midst of Republican Texas: How much does Austin hold up to its myth? The third stop on my Texas Trail led me to this city.

This time I do not stay at a hostel or a motel, but I stay privately with Brian and Ariam whom I met at the Airbnb website. Both were very welcoming and especially Ariam offered me a ride here and there, took me out for lunch at the famous Juan in a Million, and was generally a great and very welcoming host.

My Host in Austin: Ariam.

The 790,000 people city is not only the capital of Texas but also the home of the presidential library of the 36^th President of the U.S., Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ). If you wonder, LBJ was not just any U.S. President, but he was the one who followed President John F. Kennedy into office after the latter was tragically shot in Dallas (more on that later). Johnson was also the President who signed the Civil Rights bill, thus, ending segregation and enabling African Americans equal rights as citizens in the 1960s.

Therefore, my first stop was the LBJ Library at the campus of the University of Texas at Austin. The researcher eager for knowledge finds hundreds of thousands of documents, books, newspaper clippings, and photographs about Johnson’s Presidency in this 1960s Modernism temple. Unfortunately much of the building was closed for renovation, but a replica of the Oval Office during LBJ’s Presidency was accessible and the exhibit on his wife Lady Bird Johnson. I liked how she redefined the role of the First by initiating different programs against poverty, for education, and for agriculture. She seems to be quite a feminist for a First Lady.

Passion for Wild Flowers: Lady Bird Johnson.

Since it was raining cats and dogs, I went to the Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum which is also conveniently located at the University of Texas campus.  At his massive 3-floor museum I learned about the history of the state of Texas from the first Native tribes all the way to the 20^th century.

My most favorite parts were the ones that talked about the different representations of Texas. The first one was a short video which traced the development of the cowboy figure in American literature and cinema. It examined the changing role of the cowboy from the early dime novels to silent films (The Great Train Robbery) to Giants all the way to late 20^th century cowboy deconstructions and subversions.

Cowboy Deconstructions: The Bull-Dogger.

After watching the video, I feel like teaching a seminar on the construction of the cowboy figure in American culture. I know that this is a well-researched topic, but still: So interesting! Secondly, I learned by walking through the exhibit that the dominant imagination of Texas as a place of cowboys and cattle was pushed during the 1936 World’s Fair, Texas’ Centennial Exposition, which took place in Dallas. According to the museum, the image of Texas has been connected to this stereotypical imagination since then. The reason for the overt advertisement as Texas a land of cowboys and cattle lies in the closing of the frontier which happened a couple of decades earlier in the late 19^th century and the subsequent romanticization of it as a consequence of it disappearance.

1936 World’s Fair: Posters.