So what do I need to do to SUCCESSFULLY move to Oahu?

Lisa From Maui · Aug 8, 2009

a great big hug to you, and 1000 ccs of aloha!

you wrote, "every single day i wish i was back there. every single day i regret ever leaving. i wish i'd done like a friend i had who lived in an empty container on sand island... " please, show yourself some compassion.

things are really hard here right now. when i see what other people are going through, i thank my higher power that my husband has the job he has. the economy isn't bad here. it's horrible. absolutely horrible. tourism is at a 20 year low. it's affecting every one and every thing. hawai'i state just announced a second round of layoffs. and they're expecting a third round sometime in the next year.

everyone i talk to - all the working folk at least - all their hours are getting cut back. i can't help but laugh at the new grad who wants so bady to live here that she'll work as a waitress. what she doesn't realize is that there are 10 people in line for that one waitress job, and all 10 people have lived on maui for years, and a local will get the job first.

you wrote, "i came back to the mainland and it was the biggest mistake i ever made in my life. now i am trying like mad to get back. if i can get into this pa program i'm hoping i'll have a chance to save serious cash and move to the big island." again, show yourself compassion. there are many nurses on the islands who have been laid off & can't find jobs.

stay on the mainland, make yourself strong. get the education. get the work experience. pay off the credit cards and the student loans. learn from past experience. come back strong. with the economy the way it is, if you had to make a "mistake," this is probably the best time to do it... the best time to be on the mainland, in a stable environment.

you wrote, "if you are having financial trouble in indiana, ****, wait till you hit hawaii. you will financially ruin yourself." believe it or not, you showed me compassion when you wrote this. it's been sooooo hard. my husband and i are sacrificing soooo much! i don't have a car, only a bicycle. my life consists of... being at home, taking care of my husband (no ka oi !), cleaning the condo, going to community college, doing my volunteer work.

i have been beating myself up the last 6 months because i'm not working as a nurse. after reading your post, i realize that my honey and i are doing fantastic. we are buckling down and working as a team. we are paying off the credit cards we charged up when we moved here. we're putting $$ into an emergency fund, in case he loses his job & we have to move back. we are getting our bodies in good shape; he's getting fit on the job, i'm getting fit on my bike.

so yeah, thank you for the kind words. life is not going according to my plan (as g*d laughs), but we're doin' okay. we're not ruining ourselves financially; we're making healthy decisions instead. every single day i thank my higher power for what we have. if my husband lost his job, we would be in the same boat as everyone else. there but for the grace of g*d go i...

again, thank you for the kind words. be kind to yourself! -- lisa ;-)

BigIsleBound · Aug 8, 2009

Oh, Lisa! Big hugs to you too! It's so tough right now... I read all the local HI papers online every day, and I have seen how terrible it's gotten out there. Things are bad here in NJ, but nowhere near that bad. Luckily, DH and I have zero credit card debt... even when we put my tuition on the credit card, it's paid off completely when the next bill comes. We are doing okay here. It's my plan to get that master's degree, get the experience and save tons of money. We are used to living cheaply, so that's not a problem for us.

Luckily we also know how to grow our own food... in HI we'll have a climate better suited to doing that all year round. I know it sounds extreme to wish I'd lived in a container instead of here, but to me it's worth that sacrifice. I only pray that things get better for all of us who are suffering to make a dream come true.

BigIsleBound · Aug 8, 2009

Ceteris Paribus: Ok, HI might pay more than Indiana but the COST of living is WAAAAAAAAYYYYY higher than anything you will find in the midwest. Can't speak on FL. I met lots of folks from the midwest when I was on Oahu and oftentimes they had mental breakdowns over the cost of living. Folks who are used to a 3br home costing 200k could not concieve of a tiny condo with 1br1ba costing 250k. People who are used to a gallon of milk being $3.50 would literally flip out in the grocery store when they saw the prices. So yeah, the pay might be more but it will buy you a lot less.

I don't know which specialties are hot in the islands right now... but so many nurses are past desperate, they are willing to work as CNAs for CNA pay. So I'm pretty sure that there is no golden ticket, no one area where you will make a living wage and not live in fear of the axe... or else the RNs who are already in the islands would have done anything necessary to get into that field.(Am I right, Lisa?)

Have you tried looking at job postings in the local newspapers?

Ceteris Paribus · Aug 9, 2009

Well keep in mind my goal "move date" is five years out! Two or three years ago the nursing job situation in Hawaii was signficantly, if not radically different and I dare hope that it may again change for the better. In fact one of the things that made Hawaii have better than average job prospects was the fact that it is significantly shielded from large amounts of illegal immigration from South of the border (on the other hand that illegal immigration also helps nurses in places like Texas and Arizona by putting pressure on the demand for healthcare). With all of that said I would submit that my "sample budget" (listed in a different post) IS at least somewhat reasonable. Indeed, if given the power to make the decisions I believe that I could feed my family of three for about $50.00 per week (and we would be healthier for it). How? First we would eat ALOT of soups. Vegetable, cabbage fish, ect. We would also eat things like eggs, vegetables, and oatmeal (indeed there was a period in my life where I ate allmost nothing besides Ramen noodles, brown rice, and cheap apples, and cheap multi vitamins spending about $2.00 per day on food, plus I would water FAST and eat nothing every other day saving even more money). Anyone who has read Thor Hyerdahl's Fatu Hiva Return to Nature will learn that it is POSSIBLE (although not easy) to subsist allmost entirely off the land (albeit such an attempt would involve a certain amount of tresspass in most parts of Hawaii). Heck if one were truely willing to give up everything (including their family/careers) to live in the islands as nomad/bushmen in remote parts of the island(s) it could probably be accomplished to one degree or another it's just a matter of HOW FAR are you willing to go to achieve your goals. Did anyone see the movie about that guy who gave up everything (including an Ivy League education) to go live in the wilds of Alaska (perhaps not the best example since he died a miserable, lonely death, still he largely achieved his goals at least in part however misguided that most people might judge those goals to be). Another man who wrote the book Worldwalk literally WALKED AROUND THE WORLD living allmost entirely on the generosity of others (he was nearly killed on several occassions).

WindwardOahuRN, RN · Aug 11, 2009

We've lived here going on ten years now and I learned long ago that no matter what you tell some people from the Mainland about the cost of living in Hawaii and what it's like to live here they will stamp their little feet and remain convinced that they are right and you are wrong.

Bear in mind that we moved here successfully. We came here debt-free. We bought our home when the home prices were half what they are now (even with the recent slip in home prices) and I came into the job market when facilities were begging for experienced critical care nurses.

Were things easy? Not always. Others here have pointed out difficulties that go beyond financial issues so we won't get into that.

Hawaii is a revolving door, relocation-wise. Studies have shown that the average stay for a PROFESSIONAL who relocates to Hawaii is about two years. They are not talking about your basic beach bum.

One of the most common exclamations that one hears from newcomers (who have all intention of "living in Hawaii forever") is "we can put up with anything---who cares---WE ARE IN HAWAYEEEEE!!!"

They love love LOVE everything about Hawaii---absolutely EVERYTHING!!! For about six months or so....then the slow chipping away of the honeymoon begins.

Then they start ripping apart everything (unfairly, IMHO---but I've seen this so many times), from prices to attitudes to distance from "home." Even the glorious weather, lol---jeez, the minute you open a box of cereal it starts to go stale---damn humidity (duh---it's an ISLAND)!

Ya know what I do? I just tell anyone who wants to come here to come on over. Give it a fling. Maybe it will work for you, maybe it won't.

But don't ask for advice and reject it because it's not what you want to hear or doesn't fit in with the image you've created of the place. :clown:

Best of luck and mucho aloha!

Ceteris Paribus · Aug 11, 2009

It's not that I was rejecting the advice. However, moving to Oahu was essentially my raison d'etre for going to nursing school! Call it a substitution for drugs, sex, prozac or food (although not really food I guess since it was only during nursing school that I magaged to drop from 270 to about 180 before going back up to 200)! No doubt my general attitude about life often bordered on severe clinical depression, but I would always comfort my dispondency with the mantra "if I can just hold on I can make it back to the island at least I will have the beach and no one can take THAT from me". That dream kept me going even when I quit nursing school halfway through a BSN program (my mother was terminally ill and the two hour commute each way with no sleep on my cinical days was killing me) only to start again from scratch to claw my way through an ASN program.. It continued to sustain me when I lost my first "dream" critical care nursing job because they said I "didn't have the stuff" to be a critical care nurse and it motivates me today on my PCU unit to give 110% each and every shift. Even when my relationship was on the rocks, my 300K+ car faultering (and no heat here in Indiana winters with a 30 minute commute is no laughing matter), my central heat in my home not working, bathtub cracking into the crawlspace (the list sadly goes on and on) it sustained me... Now, despite my best efforts that dream seems as far away (perhaps further) than ever and the only thing advancing is my age. I'm 40 and I truly do hope to take a crack at learning to surf on the North Shore before 50 (or die trying!). If push comes to shove at some point I very well may follow Thor Hyerdalh's example and take a stab at living off the land in the backwoods of Oahu, Molokai or Kaui until the local authorities lock me away for vagrancy. Perhaps my greatest fear is that I might indeed one day obtain my dream, but do so at an age that renders the endeavor moot. Even more I fear that you are all correct and that THIS is as close as I will ever get to my dream http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ltAGuuru7Q&feature=related . Sometimes however the pursuit of a dream can be as or even more important than its realization. I guess you could say that I'm a bit sensitive when it comes to this particular area, but I mean no one ill and wish you all the happiness that still seems to elude me. God bless.

Lisa From Maui · Aug 11, 2009

dear bib:

you wrote, "so many nurses are past desperate, they are willing to work as cnas for cna pay. " yes, bib, i see that. you wrote, (paraphrasing) "if there was a golden ticket... the rns who already live in the islands would have gotten into that field." yes, bib, i agree with you. there are many rns who can't find work, so there must not be a golden ticket.

and now i'm gonna get on my soap box. in my humble opinion (imho)... i think there is one and only one way to be recession proof. if my honey and i had a house that was paid off... no mortgage... no hoa fees... and we had two cars that were paid off... and we had zero credit card debt... we would be recession proof. if the economy took a dive for 5 years, we could both work close to home, be paid minimum wage, and be financially just fine.

people today want someone else to give them job stability... their supervisor, their company, congress, the president. they want someone else to make them recession-proof. i realized long ago that it's a lie. the only person who can make us (honey and i) recession-proof is us.

go $20k in debt to get a bsn? you've got to be kidding!!! i don't want that monkey on my back! what's easier to get rid of? a crystal meth (ice) addiction, or $20k in student loans? i've seen people get clean from ice, and i've seen them pay off student loans. both of them are d***-near impossible to do. look at ceteris. he sounds like a mafia boss. he's in so deep, there's no use in trying to change his life, he's never gonna get out. and it's not just him. it's almost everyone i know.

we've been here 6 months. we make smart financial decisions. (thank you dave ramsey. you're my hero.) we're spending almost no money, paying off the credit cards we charged up when we moved here, and building an emergency fund. i can't remember the last time we fought about money. 3 years? 5 years? i honestly can't remember.

advertisers try to convince me that if i bought their product, i would be happier, prettier, more successful. that idea is poison. if it was up to the advertisers, i would have a new car, designer clothes, expensive jewelry, beautiful furniture... and be fighting with my husband every day because we don't have $20 to go out to a movie. or, we would both be working 60 hour/week to pay bills, and fighint because we never see each other. give up peace of mind and destroy a wonderful marriage? for an suv? no thank you!

Lisa From Maui · Aug 12, 2009

dear ceteris:

sounds like you've been hit with hardship in several areas of your life. do yourself a favor. listen to windward. moving to hawai'i would not solve your problems or give you peace. it would amplify your crisis. do yourself a favor. go find a therapist. a good one. one who lives a life of compassion, is financially stable, has a wonderful marriage. someone who talks the talk and walks the walk. go learn from him/her.

you wrote "happiness seems to elude me." try: (1) work on your spiritual side. (2) www.daveramsey.com (3) go to your local library, look up eckhart tolle, don't read his book, listen to books on cd... or try meditation. (4) go to one al-anon meeting a week for a month. you'd be amazed what you can learn there! (5) if you really are close to clinical depression, visit www.neuroassist.com

yes, you can accomplish your dreams, and yes, you can make a better life for yourself. you can find happiness, but you've got to remember...

if you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always gotten.

blessings... and peace... lisa ;-)

Lisa From Maui · Aug 12, 2009

dear winward:

gems! your words are gems! i wish more people on these forums would say it like it is... like how you do. i couldn't agree with you more... on pretty much everything you said.

you wrote, "studies have shown that the average stay for a professional who relocates to hawaii is about two years." i didn't know that. it explains alot; it explains why i can't find a job.

thanks again for your post. -- lisa ;-)

Ceteris Paribus · Aug 12, 2009

Thanks for the input. I would make one point of divergence however. Just because the average stay is two years that doesn't necessarily mean that the trip wasn't worthwhile! I believe that Thor Hyerdahl "only" stayed on Fatu Hiva with his wife for a year (it nearly cost both of them their lives), but it was one of the defining experiences of his life! Those who walked on the moon were able to experience it for a matter of HOURS and yet for many it was THE defining experience of their existence. IF we moved to Oahu (or one of the other islands) for a year or two and ended up coming back to the mainland would we really be any worse off than in our current situation? Would we regret the decision to move out there in the first place? My significant other and I agree on at least one thing we don't plan to EVER retire! Whether or not I live in Antarctica or Hawaii, my plan is to stay in school until I DIE (penniless so that I won't even leave an estate for the government to confiscate). Indeed, one of my "dreams" is to start a "cheaper, online, but accredidated" college where those like myself (in boatloads of student loan debt) could take 6 hours to defer their loans (basically forever), but instead of charging $150.00 per credit hour, get the rate down to closer to $50.00! I know MANY people who started, but did not finish med school or law school who owe as MUCH or even MORE than me, but instead of making 55K per year earn less than 30.

Here's the thing one way or another I'm going to get to the islands the only questions is whether or not it will be living in a nice apartment/condo or in a tent somewhere up in the Ko'olau mountains. An even more basic question is which scenario would ultimately make me happier!

mcubed45 · Aug 13, 2009

So you think it's okay to abuse a loophole in the system and never pay back money you borrowed?

That's called stealing.

How's about building some integrity before moving here. Thanks.

caroladybelle, BSN, RN · Aug 13, 2009

first the OP needs to get his life on an even keel and out of debt before attempting to move to the Islands. Part of that requires becoming more financially responsible, as he is spending waaayy tooo much.

Second, it is nice and all to have a dream, but you have a family (spouse, children), you have a responsibility to them that supersedes those dreams. It is all well and fine to risk YOUR life and YOUR stability for YOUR dream, but dragging your family in with you with a less than stable situation, that is another.

I would love to know what your SO/kids feel about living as a vagrant.

(I am having flashbacks to the story for "The Mosquito Coast" - a man so focused on his dream/fantasies to move to the jungle, that he destroys his family/his self). Most kids will agree with Daddy, but they do not have a choice. Parents often think that moving to some exciting locale, that their kids/spouse will love it, and often the kids don't love it.

I traveled to many interesting locales as a child, I also hated moving so frequently, had trouble changing friends quickly, suffered from depression early, and got a spotty education.

Does your SO want to weigh in on this? In her words, not yours.