Swap meeters with Randy

A long awaited day arrived this morning at the Kam Swap Meet with  Art and Kay of Musings and Jalna & sisters of Photos by Jalna.

This was an EARLY morning meeting, which Aunty is NOT good at, but, when the incentive is there, Aunty manages to crawl out of bed with the chiming of an alarm, down her cereal and coffee, gather what needs gathering, and out the door in many minutes flat.  Having tattooed eyeliner is a huge time saver (a future post).

NO traffic at 6:50 am from Kaimuki to Pearl City!  Zoom zoom zoom!  Parking was easy enough if one wasn’t picky, and the Kam Swap Meet is free!  That was a pleasant surprise, and well worth the price of admission, snark snark!  Money saved in order to buy more stuff.

Jalna and her sisters are swap meet regulars and know EVERYone.  We all stopped by Randy’s Knick Knacks in stall 17.  He seemed to be everybody’s favorite vendor with a simple roll up mat and little plastic bagged treasures for $1.

Aunty found a few glass dishes and bought 7 yards each of great upholstery material at $1.50 per yard!  Holy moly, for $21, Aunty got 14 yards of fabric.  Just a week earlier at Fabric Mart, 5 yards costed Aunty almost $50, and the swap meet find was just as nice or better!  It was heavy carrying it around, which made a drop off trip to the car a must.

Aunty also scored a very old French book “Un Sejour a Hawai” published in 1881 for $2.  Another vendor had what looked like a wonderful original watercolor of a plumeria lei, but upon closer look (Aunty put on her glasses), this was a reprint and so Aunty saved some money.  A really cute Louis Vuitton bucket purse also escaped from Aunty because the vendor had left by the time Aunty was on her second pass around.  Aunty saved money.

Actually, what Aunty did spend money on was food.  Filipino food that called out and tantalized Aunty.  So she bought pork lechon, cut up and packaged with a tasty sauce for $12.50 (very yummy), pancit – Filipino stir fried noodles that are good with kalamansi limes (though Aunty prefers it with vinegar),  and pinakbet – vegetable stir fry with shrimp or fish (but this one didn’t have shrimp or fish).  Banana lumpia would have made it complete but by this time, Aunty was hot, tired, and wanted to go home with her goodies.

It was a potentially dangerous day at the Kam Swap Meet.  The lure of things that Aunty did not need and the anticipated promise of so much more temptations – all at prices too good to pass on.

It was great to see Jalna and her sisters, and Kay and Art, each of us finding our own little interests in various vendors, then meeting up at the end of each row before exploring the next.  Sweet Didi gave Aunty her own special salt mixture concoction – which will be used on the next perfect steak.  Jalna gave some of the special fresh Waimana eggs that she swears by.

This fun day will be haunting.  What treasures can be found there next week, or the week after?  The only way to know, is to be there.