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avreliaWe went to Hawaii for a week this last June. It was lovely, even if not an ideal vacation (yes, those exist, I had several).
I wanted the whole family vacation for years, and for a long time if was either me and one or two kids, or just me. Now I finally managed to get all four us together, flying away from home somewhere and then coming back. The dog went to the dog hotel, the bunny went to the friends’ house, the budgies stayed to man the house.
Hawaii to me is a strange place. Yes, stolen by the USA. Militarized (the US military installations are a bit less in your face, but very much there). Devoted to its royalty. Proud to have finished off Captain Cook.
Bringing their language from the dead. Rich in tourists. Locals… well, not so. Endlessly welcoming. Infinitely beautiful. Ideal weather. Active volcano, tsunamis, fires, earthquakes. Expensive. Poor. Strict. Funny. Easy-going. American. Pacific. In the middle of an ocean. Closer than many more familiar places. Full of chicken running around and plumeria blossoms raining down on sidewalks.
Anyway, what I really wanted to talk about is the book I read during the vacation. A perfect beach read if you were, since I could focus on reading and not on whatever else I have to be doing instead.
It’s 1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed by Eric Cline
I liked this book quite a lot. Of course, I expected it to be slightly easier to read, judging blurbs and reviews I read, but really, after slogging through the introduction, it was a smooth and entertain ride through several centuries of Late Bronze Age and lots of names and dates. The conclusion was not surprising either – “it’s complicated” is pretty much all we could say with all the information available to us now, but the author gave a lot of nuance and details to the “complicated” part.
I hardly knew much about the Bronze Age civilizations before this book – a bunch of disparate facts about one place or another. Now I know many more facts, and more importantly, they settled into a system in my head, firmly placed in relation to each other geographically and chronologically.
So I guess, I am exactly the right audience for this book. Yay! Now I shall go and try to remember all the names of the Hittite kings. They are so cool.
And I keep forgetting about the Mittani kingdom. I didn’t know about its existence before this book, and now I keep forgetting about it. Sic transit gloria mundi…
I wanted the whole family vacation for years, and for a long time if was either me and one or two kids, or just me. Now I finally managed to get all four us together, flying away from home somewhere and then coming back. The dog went to the dog hotel, the bunny went to the friends’ house, the budgies stayed to man the house.
Hawaii to me is a strange place. Yes, stolen by the USA. Militarized (the US military installations are a bit less in your face, but very much there). Devoted to its royalty. Proud to have finished off Captain Cook.
Bringing their language from the dead. Rich in tourists. Locals… well, not so. Endlessly welcoming. Infinitely beautiful. Ideal weather. Active volcano, tsunamis, fires, earthquakes. Expensive. Poor. Strict. Funny. Easy-going. American. Pacific. In the middle of an ocean. Closer than many more familiar places. Full of chicken running around and plumeria blossoms raining down on sidewalks.
Anyway, what I really wanted to talk about is the book I read during the vacation. A perfect beach read if you were, since I could focus on reading and not on whatever else I have to be doing instead.
It’s 1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed by Eric Cline
I liked this book quite a lot. Of course, I expected it to be slightly easier to read, judging blurbs and reviews I read, but really, after slogging through the introduction, it was a smooth and entertain ride through several centuries of Late Bronze Age and lots of names and dates. The conclusion was not surprising either – “it’s complicated” is pretty much all we could say with all the information available to us now, but the author gave a lot of nuance and details to the “complicated” part.
I hardly knew much about the Bronze Age civilizations before this book – a bunch of disparate facts about one place or another. Now I know many more facts, and more importantly, they settled into a system in my head, firmly placed in relation to each other geographically and chronologically.
So I guess, I am exactly the right audience for this book. Yay! Now I shall go and try to remember all the names of the Hittite kings. They are so cool.
And I keep forgetting about the Mittani kingdom. I didn’t know about its existence before this book, and now I keep forgetting about it. Sic transit gloria mundi…
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Date: 2024-07-02 07:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-07-03 08:49 pm (UTC)I mean, I still made too many photos and videos of the ocean - what's some more chicken photos?
it was fun to be accidental bird-watchers there - we read about cattle egrets in a pamphlet and then saw them following a tractor. We read about evil bird bulbul, and the smaller kid found one.
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Date: 2024-07-03 11:44 pm (UTC)Whenever we go to Maui, we come back with a LOT of pictures of chickens XD
I'm trying to remember if we've seen bulbul birds -- I think we have, or a similar one? And we've come across nenes, too, in several nature reserve/botanical garden type places.
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Date: 2024-07-03 08:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-07-03 08:50 pm (UTC)the book is pretty cool. I don't think it is the best on topic, but for my level of knowledge and interest, it was great