My six-day visit to Kaua'i had been a moderate disappointment, and I was looking forward to seeing my friends in Waikiki again. I had a good 8 or 9 hours to kill between flights, so before I left for Kaua'i we had made plans to go to a fancy Luau.

I arrived in Honolulu in mid-afternoon. I was hoping to check in all my luggage for the flight to Vancouver, but the airlines weren't open yet. I paid a few dollars to stow my bags and bike in a locker, and then hopped a bus to Waikiki. The bus slowly wound its way through the traffic towards the beach but I got tired of sitting so I hopped off at the first stop -- a big mall in the middle of downtown. The mall was big but I wasn't in the mood for shopping. I made a quick tour through the throngs of Japanese shoppers then got out of there as soon as I could.

I thought I was near the beach when I got off the bus but it turns out I was a about a mile off. I meandered through downtown, heading in what seemed like the right direction. When I eventually found the beach it was time for me to meet up with my dates for the evening so I took a taxi up to the University.

Three beautiful women were waiting for me in Petra's apartment. They were dressed in their tropical best, and I felt a bit conspicuous in my haven't-been-washed-in-10-days shorts. I'd purchased a new t-shirt while in Kaua'i so at least the top half of me didn't smell too bad. We piled into Susie's car and drove out to Germaine's Luau, about 30 minutes west of Honolulu.

I had my cynism turned up at maximum as soon as we arrived. This was tourist trap central. I fully expected to be treated like a herd animal with a wallet, and I wasn't too far off. We had our photos taken by the staff photographer, watched the unearthing of the great pig, then found a table and watched the show. It was hosted by rather rotund Hawaiian versions of Donnie and Marie Osmond. They sang sappy songs, they told bad jokes, and they smiled way too much. They were an advertisement for Prozak.

The show itself wasn't too bad -- the performers took us on a whirlwind tour of the South Pacific, demonstrating dances from Fiji, New Zealand, Indonesia, and a bunch of other places that I dream about visiting. There was a decent amount of audience participation, with hula lessons for the girls and kisses for the boys. About a third of the way through the show dinner was served. Before that, though, the two MCs bid us all hold hands while they gave a blessing.

I'm sorry to say, but the blessing they gave was the single cheesiest part of the entire show. They started off with thanks, and then wished for world peace, and then followed that up immediately with a request for blessings on the military. At least they had the decency to include Canadian and Australian soldiers in with the Americans.

The blessing was spoken over a very typically Hawaiian, Don Ho-style instrumental piece. After the spoken part the hosts broke into song, singing in Hawaiian to a funky beat. I could feel my soul cringing.

The kahlua pork, fresh out of the ground, was good -- but the rest of the meal was pretty low quality considering the cost of the tickets. There was a sampling of traditional Hawaiian foods such as lomi lomi salmon (pretty good), poi (blah), and macaroni salad (a modern Hawaiian staple). They had fried rice, and chicken rice noodles, and deep fried Mahi Mahi. I felt like mooing as I stood in line with my oversized paper plate, waiting to fill up at the trough.

The night came to an end and we followed the crowds back to their tour buses. Susie drove me to the airport and, once again, I said goodbye to my Hawaiian friends.