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Last year when former Halekulani employees held their annual reunion at the hotel, they walked in and found the beloved 129-year-old kiawe tree had fallen to the ground in the wee small hours of that morning.
Nothing as shocking or dramatic greeted the 65 former employees Aug. 19 when they arrived this year, the 100th anniversary of the hotel, for their reunion luncheon, but most of them went to the House Without a Key to check out what was left of the tree.
They were happy to find the massive tree trunk has been left in place on its side, fronting the ocean wall, and is sprouting. The nightly Hawaiian and hapa-haole music and hula dancing continue to be performed next to the tree for appreciative guests.
Halekulani Vice President Patricia Tam arranged for the former employees to hold their annual luncheon on the hotel’s Garden Terrace. The alumni event was founded by the late food and beverage director Kenny Lum some 30 years ago.
This year’s party was again coordinated by Wanda Windrath, June Wong, Debbie AhChong and Bob Finley. Attending was Shigeko Tokunaga, from Yorba Linda, Calif., a former waitress who turns 98 this month. Singer Marlene Sai, who starred on the Hau Tree Lanai with singer Ed Kenney and hula dancer Beverly Noa, is a regular attendee …
SPLASHING ON
Congrats to swimmer Pokey Watson Richardson and canoe paddlers Tim Guard, brothers John and Jim Foti and the late Tommy Holmes for being inducted into the Hawaii Waterman Hall of Fame on Aug. 24 at the Outrigger Canoe Club.
Tommy was one of the founders of the Polynesian Voyaging Society and a Hokule‘a crew member on the canoe’s first voyage to Tahiti in 1976. He died of a heart attack while paddling an outrigger canoe off Waikiki on Aug. 23, 1993.
On Aug. 28, 1993, his ashes were taken out to sea on the Hokule‘a and scattered off Waikiki …
PALAMA SETTLEMENT CELEBRATES
Palama Settlement will honor City Mill owners and executives Steven Ai and Carol Ai May, brother and sister, and Jim and Sherry Walters, owners of Hawaiian Building Maintenance, and their son Jarrett Walters at the annual Malama Palama gala fundraiser Saturday at the Sheraton Waikiki.
The Ai siblings’ grandfather Chung Kun Ai founded City Mill in 1899. He and Palama Settlement social services agency founder James Rath worked together to improve conditions in the Chinese community.
The settlement, established in 1896, is a nonprofit, community-based agency serving the Kalihi and Palama neighborhoods. The organization offers a wide range of educational, recreational, athletic, cultural, social, health and community-building programs and services for children, youth, adults and senior citizens. All three Walters have served on the Palama Board. They arrived here from Oklahoma in 1994.
The fundraiser gala stars singer Albert Maligmat. There will be dancing and a silent auction. Tickets are $250; call 848-2532 …
BURGER YUM
I’m a hamburger lover, and one of the best teriyaki burgers I have ever devoured was from the Mermaid Bar in Neiman Marcus recently. Delicious sauce, excellent beef and huge. I eat one or two meals a week in the Mermaid.
I told new Neiman executive chef Lawrence Nakamoto, a local boy from Kalani High and the Culinary Institute of the Pacific at Kapiolani Community College, about my joyous find, and he said he will pass the word when they make the specialty teriyaki burger again.
I’m looking forward to that …
Ben Wood, who sold newspapers on Honolulu streets during World War II, writes of people, places and things. Contact him via email at bwood@staradvertiser.com.
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