Fordham University Writing Project for Veterans - R & R in Paradise

R & R in Paradise

I had an excellent gig as the house photographer at the Ilikai Hotel’s revolving restaurant on Waikiki Beach.  My job was to roam the restaurant trying to entice patrons into having their photographs taken, commemorating a happy occasion in a beautiful place.  Although there is the occasional birthday or graduation event, most patrons of the restaurant were either hotel guests, business people, random tourists or the occasional Vietnam soldier who is visiting with his wife or significant other.  It’s a beautiful time of the day as we slowly turn above the hotel, watching the sun set over Diamond Head off in the distance, the green Pacific Ocean, and the lights of Honolulu, depending upon which direction the table faces.

The easiest group to convince that they needed a picture of an event being commemorated are the Vietnam soldiers in Honolulu on their rest and recuperation leave.   At one table sits a Vietnam soldier and his wife on the same seated side, in a booth that looks like a clam shell with a wall covering behind it of various sea urchins and stylized Hawaiian canoes.   The couple seems a bit shy, but happily agree to have their picture taken.

What I first notice about the young man is his heavy tan, his wispy brown mustache, and his sports jacket that seems too big for him.  His wife Mary looks lovely, smelling of Shalimar and has a winning, outgoing personality.  They are holding hands under the table as I took their picture.

Later, when I am developed the picture to be sent to the couple, I take a closer look at the results and notice something different about them that I hadn’t recognized before.  The husband has a tired, unfocused look in his eyes and his smile seems slightly forced.    His wife, through a smile, looks a bit pensive and as if she might be someplace else.  Perhaps they are both just uncomfortable finding themselves in such a strange place. 

Both are young and I have no idea what Vietnam had subjected them to or what might be tormenting them about what is yet to come.  I worry about them as they are pictured, rotating with the restaurant, not quite knowing what to look at, staring out at the paradise of Hawaii, trying to have a good time.

I often attach stories to the people I photograph and I assume the couple on R & R are simply in shock about what has happened to them over the course of recent months.  He, flying in from a brutal combat zone and she, arriving after a long flight from New York to meet someone about whom she is sick with worry.  For them, the ostentatious revolving restaurant is probably just one more stop on a surreal week in paradise.