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S.S. President
Coolidge Halfway between Honolulu and Yokohama
Dollar/team/hipline Sunday Feb.3,1935
My dearest All,
This is a beautiful boat -a contrast
to the President Monroe. I have an excellent cabin-much bigger than my room in Eryl and good company at
meals. It is about 5 times larger than the Monroe, is very luxurious -excellent drawing rooms
etc. and we have a cinema and tea-garden and an orchestra..
At table I am most lucky. I sit with a
charming young Chinese with a great sense of humour and his young son, aged 3½ whom he has
called PAX !! Pax Cheng is the youngster's name and he can only speak French- no-Chinese. Mr Cheng was
for years at the League of Nations Secretariat hence the child's name . We also speak French at
the table and young Pax is always talking about Mickey Mouse and "Le mechant coup".
Mr Cheng is very worried about the
banks failing in Shanghai and he has sent a cable from the boat telling the bank to pay out all his
account in cash to his father-inlay. He told me that a friend of his was
very fond of "sta—te". I imagine this to be some strange Chinese drink but finally discovered that he
meant "stout".
Wednesday
I went to bed on Sunday night and woke
up on Tuesday morning! What do you think of that?
The reason , however wasn't sleepiness
but the crossing of the meridian.. We missed out Monday Feb 4th and jumped from the 3rd to the
5th.
Yesterday we had one of the worst
storms the Pacific has had for a very long time. The waves were mountainous and it was exciting to
watch-as many people watched for hours - the huge monster coming towards us and then to see the
boat going right up and down again. Sometimes the whole vessel would crash while bumping on
two waves so I couldn't do much yesterday.
At night there was a fancy dress party
but just as the dancing began a wave made the boat lurch and a number of people got swept from the
middle of the floor to the end and there was a mass of people lying on top of each other. Tables
collapsed and it was lucky that no one was hurt .So they gave up dancing.
I saw the film "Bulldog Drummond
Strikes Back " and it was very exciting.
We shall be late arriving in Yokohama
and won't I be glad to have mail.
The Hawaiian family was most kind to
me and the native meal was an experience .We ate with our fingers and the dishes were most
strange .We had octopus (a luxury which tastes like tough chicken) raw salmon, mullet in "ti"
leaf, pork with spinach, Kuikin nut, abalone fish, taro and coconut pudding,
poi, sweet potato and roasted
bananas..
Next to me sat a girl who was three
parts Chinese and one part Hawaiian and her name was Maria Kawahinepoaimoku Wong.
After dinner we sang Hawaiian songs
with Guitars. There was also a girl there who was half British and half Hawaiian !
The Treadways (my hosts) came to see
me off when the Coolidge sailed on Wednesday night from Honolulu...
It was a great sight to see the
thousands of coloured streamers thrown from the boat to the pier. I was presented with Leis (wreaths of
flowers to put round my neck). As soon as the boat left Honolulu , the Cinema began.
The American minister to China is on
board. As far as Honolulu, the film actress Ann Harding was a Passenger.
There is a nice wood-cut in my cabin
which is not unlike the view looking up from Cwmfforest .1 shall look forward to going to Cwmdu when I
come back .What I enjoyed so much was the trips with Siriol to ride in Southern
Down when she
distinguished herself on "Saucy" .
TOKYO Sat. Feb 9th Hurray! Here we are at last -after
days more violent storms See the enclosed cutting and photos "not by me"
Delighted to get the letters.
Cariad Cynhesaf Gareth.
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