The kind people at Ocean Resort Hotel had let us check into our room early. We showered, piled into the king-sized bed and slept like people who had spent a day wandering around Osaka and then had been crammed into economy seats for a night flight to Honolulu. We awoke in midafternoon. It was time to discover the joys of dining in Waikiki.

We wandered into a Cheeseburgers in Paradise, a nice open-air restaurant located right across from the beach. I remembered that the name had popped up on Google when I had searched for family dining spots in Waikiki. Yes, I was on vacation. My son looked out the windows toward the beach where black silouettes on surfboards bobbed up and down on the sparkling Pacific. Suddenly my wife nudged my arm, "Look, there's no prices for the drinks!"

Yes, there seemed to be a general lack of drink prices on Waikiki menus, although I was unable to conduct a definitive survey. We called our waiter over for consultation on the price of the house microbrew. "About $3.95," was the reply. My wife rolled her eyes, considering the implications of "about".

The W.C. Fields line sprang to mind: "Never give a sucker an even break, and never wisen up a chump." We were prodded to upgrade our burgers with avacado and orders of fries. My cheeseburger, with avacado, and microbrew were adequate, but didn't live up to the setting. We had better food at Tanaka of Tokyo, where again, drink prices failed to make an appearance on the menu. My wife noticed that the locals sitting next to us, inquired about drink prices before they ordered. Not being a local, I went in on the blind and ordered a Kirin for her and a Sapporo for myself. Her Kirin was "about" 5 bucks; my Sapporo came in at $7, but was in a much bigger bottle.