Chillin' with Daddy

So I've been hangin' out with Dad for the last five days while Becky and Julie are partying hard at Disneyland with Kainoa and friends. (yes, I'm a good sister..) It's funny. We Kaai kids have always been close to our parents. I don't know what it is, but it's a pretty unique love that's hard for some to understand. Anyways, more on that later. As you know, Dad has been sick since September. Recently, he's lost his short term memory skills. He can remember the day he graduated from high school, but he can't remember what he had for lunch. We kids get to make sure he takes his meds on time and that he's puffing on his two inhalers correctly. Sometimes he wakes up in the middle of the night thinking it's time for breakfast. This morning I woke up and found the jar of peanut butter next to his bed with a butter knife and a few bread crumbs. Don't worry..it's low sodium peanut butter!

So, the point of this post it to share a few things about Dad that I just wanted to document for family history reasons....Here goes:

1. Dad attended Kaahumanhu Elementary School at the corner of Piikoi and Beretania. It has since been converted to a hospital.

2. Dad attended Iolani High School from 7th to 12 grade. He graduated on June 7, 1948.

3. Mrs. Tanaka was his favorite teacher. She told him.."Most Hawaiians are lazy and slow..you're not!"

4. He disliked Mrs. Webber who was a Hawaiian teacher. He remembers her saying that "you folks talk with a fat lip and mumble your words." Grandma Kaai threatened to beat her up.

5. Dad wanted to go to Kamehameha, but they wouldn't let the "real locals" go. Outer island students had priority. He attended Iolani.

6. Richard Pa'paa was his best friend in elementary school.

7. He attended the Long Island Merchant Marine Academy on Mare Island. He was in the navy from 1953-June 30, 1964. He came to San Mateo after he graduated.

8. Ice cream was 5 cents and hamburgers were 10 cents. A McDonald's hamburger was 18 cents.

9. He was a paper boy as a child and his route consisted of City Hall to Alapai, up to Punchbowl ,up to Lusitania and part of King St. The daily paper was 5 cents and the Sunday paper was 10 cents.

10. After the war, his first "real" job was taking down the "black" in the windows. It was made of denim material and was used to hide out all light from the enemy.

11. He also worked at Hawaiian Pine. He was a tray boy and had to line up 5 rings of pineapple and put it in each can. He was a trucker, supervisory, and eventually left to play football.

12. As a child, he had a white "poi" dog called Prince.

13. He worked at Mare Island Naval Shipyard in Vallejo for the rest of his career.

I'm sure there are more bits of information that I'll be adding to my list. Stay tuned.
Thanks for listenin'