Before Owen Loui passed the CPA exam and opened his own firm in the late 1940's, he worked as a senior accountant at Lambert and Pearson.  He often stayed in Hilo, since one of the big sugar companies was a client.  He became friends with many of the local residents, especially those who played tennis, including ret. Sen. Pat Saiki's father.  One day, he was asked to play in a doubles tennis match against a top navy team who was in town.  The navy men were expected to win easily against the two men who didn't normally play together, but they were beaten by Owen Loui and his partner.  Dad said the navy men were so upset, they wouldn't shake hands after the match!  There's a picture of all 4 of them together  - that must have been taken before the tennis match!  I wonder if the names of the players would have been published in the local paper? 

Our whole family "roughed" it for a week at Camp Gold in the Sonora mountains.   sleeping in bunk beds in a wood-framed lean-to, with just a flap of fabric as our "door".  Meals were served in the cafeteria.   There was a pond and stream that was stocked with trout, and we would patiently trap the fish with our hands, then take to them to the cafeteria where the staff would fry them and serve it for our dinner.   I remember some of the other kids being surprised we spoke such good English and asked if we lived in grass shacks.  

Because Owen Loui ran his own business, he rarely took off from work.  There were two years when he took our whole family of 8 on vacation, but it was multiple trips in the summer of 1969 to the Big Island, Maui, and Kauai.  We stayed at the Manago hotel in Kona and also at an oceanfront hotel in Kona.

This picture of Owen and Marjorie Loui was taken just outside the Kahala Hilton ballroom.  Daughter Jackie and her husband Steve were married outdoors on the lawn fronting the waterfall, just before the lunch reception.  Dec 1989.  

After my brother Tim had succumbed to cancer, the family (Owen and his daughters, granddaughter Maddie, & Tim's wife Glenda) went to the cemetary where many of our relatives were buried. We went to the office to select a niche for Tim and to get the locations of the gravesites of relatives who were buried there.  We were directed to a waiting area, where an 11x14 framed B&W poster for a television documentary "Bittersweet Roots" was displayed.  The couple in that poster is of our grandparents, Owen's in-laws.  Small world! 

This was a May 2005 family gathering with the Owen Loui and his kids and grandkids, sisters Mildred and Lucille, and nephews Stan, Richard, and Jimmy Louis and their familes.  It was held at Yen King, Kahala Mall, hosted by Jackie in honor of Owen's 94th birthday, Auntie Millie's 92nd birthday, and also for Mother's Day.  Goody bags of Godiva chocolate bars were given to all the women for the occasion.  His brother Leighton and wife Molly had a dinner engagement at Kahala Nui, so they were not able to attend. 

My father played second base on the Chinese Amateurs, one of five teams in the Chinese Baseball League in Honolulu in the 1930's. He must have been in his early twenties during those Depression years. I remember his old wool baggy uniform and metal cleated baseball shoes stored in a box in the hallway closet.  I remember the two old baseball gloves that looked like shapeless leaher pads with a rudimentary "trap" between the thumb and forefinger.
When the Kahala Little League first formed in 1961 my dad volunteered to be the one of the first coaches in the league.  Team players were "assigned' to each of the coaches based an initial assessment "tryout" during the signup process.  I thought he got stuck with the weakest players in the league.  There were enough teams so that you would play each team twice during the season. I remember we lost every single game in the first round. We were the original Bad News Bears, or Mightly Ducks.  Because my dad and the co-coach, another Chinese Amateurs ex-player, actually played real baseball as adults, through training and almost daily practices, turned the team around so that by the second round we won all but the last game, which was literally stolen from us by a horrible 6th inning third base call.  He was a great baseball coach; he never yelled at anyone. Few of the kids, 4th and 5th graders, had any baseball experience since there was no previous little league in our neighborhood. He had coached men's tennis at the University of Hawaii for ten years between 1938 and 1948, and I'm sure his experience there helped the team.  He came out every day to run the practices and used his own money to buy bats for team. He was a true sportsman and gentleman.  Those little leaguers are all in their 60's now and I think he provided a great role model and an unforgetable season for them.

Dad was a very proud and indenpendent man. As head of household, he was responsible for everything and managed it quite well until mom's death in 2001. He drove his car to all of his appointments, shopping and dining out 3 times a day, usually frequenting the Kahala and Kaimuki eating places.He bought papayas for his sisters from his favorite vegetable stand in Kaimuki and delivered it to Aunties once a week.  It was the most difficult decision we had to make as a family when we took away his car keys. Don't remember how it was done but it was his family physician who told us that it was for everyone's safety that he no longer drive. He was 93 years old when this happened. He'd call me and Jackie almost daily asking for his keys. It was so difficult to make an excuse as to where his keys were and the caregivers found it equally challenging to be honest with him. He finally gave up on us after a couple of years.  I believe that driving his own car kept his mind alert and active. For someone his age, he was an excellent driver.  Sometime after he stopped driving, I got a frantic call from his caregiver. She told me that dad almost drove off in his car that day. She said she was in the house doing chores when she heard a car start. She looked out the window and there was dad behind the wheel driving out of the garage. She rushed out and ran up to the car window, yelling " Mr Loui, where are you going? You aren't supposed to be driving. " He replied, "Who said?"  She told him, "your daughters Jackie and Liz said so." He answered, "they did?" He shut off the ignition and the caregiver quickly took the keys away. What we have never figured out to this day is where he found those spare keys. We hid the original keys in a place he would not find it. Leave it up to an accountant to find something he wanted so badly. LOL. Dad can now enjoy his freedom in his new life with mom and Tim. And, drive his Toyota Camry anywhere he wants.