The Honolulu Marathon and Katie Save

 

 

My niece, Elnaz aka Ellie, is in Hawaii, and sent me a bunch of photos which I’m sharing here. The hotel upgraded her room to an ocean view because she was participating in the Honolulu Marathon. The reason she is there is a friend of hers committed suicide due to mental health issues. Her parents set up a charity called KatieSave. My Niece is helping raise funds for the charity to bring awareness about anxiety, depression, and mental health issues among students. A bunch of us are making donations based on each mile Ellie ran.

 

The first day, she took some pictures and basically crashed. She usually zonks out on an airplane, but she said that there was a father/daughter duo, the girl had too much to drink, and talked loud as Ellie learned about her entire life story. Then the two people seated next to her had to constantly pee, and she had to keep getting up. So, yeah. No peace for her until she got to her hotel.

 

On the second day, she registered, and then went out to eat her favorite food, poke with octopus. She also sent a photo of a vegetarian/vegan place which looked yum.

Surfer boys around Ellie’s age. She loves Hawaii and the people. In fact, my family used to vacation at North Shore all the time. I’ve been to Honolulu, Hilo, and Kona, but never to North Shore. My brother keeps pushing me to go. But I’m more of a city person than an island person, and like to travel on my own. When we were younger, my family and family friends used to take beach vacations and had an amazing time. So, who knows? Maybe one of these days I will join him and his family to revisit Hawaii or go somewhere tropical.

Ellie is an exceptional athlete, but she lost her mojo for a longtime. She is extremely competitive. Even at five years old, she would get upset if she was losing.

Her competitiveness helped her win many awards, and her room was always packed with trophies. She even won President’s award for educational excellence, and attended NYU as a premed student. But her competitiveness eventually caught up with her, and at some point, got in her way.

She is doing much better now, and instead of always pushing to win awards, she is taking time to balance her life. She was not prepared for this marathon, because she hadn’t been running much lately, but she was okay with that. Also, sometimes she would sabotage all her hard work the night before a race. This time she did everything right, went on a moderate hike, loaded up on pasta, hydrated, and got plenty of R&R before her big day.

On Sunday, December 10, in honor of the marathon, Honolulu started with fireworks at 4 a.m. before the start of the event at 5:30. Ellie sent me a link, and shared her location as she ran. I’m not a morning person, but got up early to support her. She ran at a comfortable pace. Her goal was not so much to win, but rather to start, enjoy the journey, finish, and raise funds.

About 8 miles before the finish line, she texted me and said that she was dying. I threw numbers at her about how close she was to finishing. The last mile and a half were super hard because it was all uphill. Imagine running for 24.5 miles, and all the sudden you must run uphill. But she made it, and at the end, she was both exhausted and excited that she did it. Now it's time for all of us to pay up, in memory of Katie.