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STAR-ADVERTISER / AUG. 12, 2008
The television show "Wheel of Fortune" filmed on the Big Isle of Hawaii with Pat Sajak and Vanna White in 2008.
LIHUE >> A pair of best friends who grew up on Kauai fulfilled a dream when they appeared on "Wheel of Fortune."
But their 15 minutes of fame grew when a video of the pair went viral online because host Pat Sajak was laughing so hard he walked off stage.
The Garden Island reported best friends Trinette Kaui and Audrey Bonilla were determined to get on the show when it came to Hawaii.
The former Kauai High School cheerleaders did well on the show, winning $10,350.
A video of a moment when they gave a wrong answer got thousands of views on YouTube, and they’ve been bombarded with texts and phone calls.
"Trinette called me (Tuesday morning) and said, ‘Did you know we’re going viral?’ I said, ‘What?’ " Bonilla said. "It was all over MSN, YouTube, Good Morning America, CNN — just tons of websites."
With only one "N” on the board, a competitor to the Kauai women guessed that the answer should read "riding a brown horse."
That was wrong, so the Kauai friends guessed "riding a white horse," which sent Sajak offstage and the audience into fits of laughter.
"Who said anything about a horse?" Sajak asked when he returned.
The friends say they were a little embarrassed, but if they were able to make people smile it was worth it.
"I’d rather be embarrassed by saying the wrong answer rather than saying nothing and regretting that it could have been the right answer," Kaui said. "I didn’t take it personally at all. So when the whole thing took off, we were like, ‘What’s the big deal?’ "
