That night at Kochi on King Street, it was as if no time had passed at all—just the same familiar voices, the same easy laughter, waiting for us to return.
Notes from a Pau Hana
It all started back in August with a pau hana, A Touch of ‘Iolani, and a golf tournament at the Hawaii Prince Golf Course. Names and faces rolled back into my life like waves: Greg Sekiya, Kurt Ginoza, Noreen Takeshita, Robin Hirano (yes, me in the corner of the photo, still awkward), and a long list of classmates whose laughter somehow hadn’t aged a day.
Someone whispered “Big Eddie Kealoha is here,” and it was like a movie entrance. He didn’t get the lead role in The Incredible Hulk, but in our story that night, he was already a star.
Vegas, Sushi, and Study Hallers
By September, the reunion stretched beyond Honolulu and into Las Vegas. We traded our modest stock portfolios (the joke still stings) for bowling nights, slot tournaments, and dinners at Sushi Factory. Someone ordered something called a Buffalo Volcano—a 500-calorie dare wrapped in rice and seaweed.
At one point, Kei Sato found himself debating four marines about the need for an armed militia. I thought, is this rehearsal for Bruce Banner? Vegas does that to you—it blurs the line between character and reality.
And yes, not everyone survived the Friday night fog enough to make it to Saturday morning events. (Sorry, Cec, some traditions never change.)
Why It Mattered
Looking back, the numbers mattered less than the moments. Forty-plus classmates flew in from across the country—and the world—not just to eat, drink, or play golf, but to remember who we were when life was still wide open.
What struck me most was how quickly we fell back into old rhythms. The nicknames resurfaced. The same jokes circled the room. And in that laughter, I realized reunions are less about reliving the past and more about proving that time can bend without breaking.
We didn’t just celebrate twenty years—we carried the echo of who we were, and for a weekend (or two), we got to be those people again.
The past has a way of showing up, not to remind us what we’ve lost, but to remind us what we still carry.