Post #242043 by Humuhumu on Mon, Jul 10, 2006 12:37 PM

We found this great postcard from the Waikikian yesterday, it has a nice view of the iconic lobby. It has no date on it, so it's a bit hard to peg. The cars in the lot can probably be dated right away by some of you lovely gearheads (how would we date our postcards without you?), but the way the photo has been cut into a picture of a sunset makes me wonder if the postcard is not as old as the photo.

As lovely a view as that is, the back is even better. It appears to have been used by someone as part of some sort of trip diary, rather than being mailed. The upper left corner has a numeral "2", as if it was one in a series describing her trip. I get the feeling reading it that she's trying hard to not have fun in paradise, but Hawaii is getting the best of her. It makes for much more interesting reading than the nearly-ubiquitous "the weather is great, having the time of our lives, don't want to come home!" stuff you typically see on the back of Hawaii postcards.

Here's my effort at transcription:

2/ And here is the Waikikian - built like the prow of a nature ship - where I spend my final week in a "jungle suite" + my "half gone native" room mate with her Hawaiian boyfriend hovering. Now that I've moved to the centre of tourist activity "on the strip" I begin to be glad of the Waikikian week - believe it is rightfully the best surviving proponent of old Hawaiian hospitality - despite the bell boys who persistently put an arm across my shoulder + an obsequious manager who persisted in addressing me as Miss Jones! The "Jungle" tapers off to a bay lost beyond this picture - to the right beyond the glaring electric sign. Lobby illumination so "full of atmosphere" too dim to even read newspaper headlines.