Ted Hamano:  

Life I've been in California since 1967 and haven't visited Hawaii nearly enough. I retired in 2002. I flew to Maui on 5/14/08 to check it out and see if I could live there. I found Maui way too slow for me and have abandoned plans to move there. I have become urbanized. Look me up on Myspace by doing an e-mail search for dragon-lair at msn dot com User name: Tsunami. In May 2009, I visited KAUAI with my girlfriend. We had a good time for 9 days in Kauai. I'm beginning to think that I have this thing about going back to my roots in May, my birthday month. I am pretty active physically for a senior. I work out at the gym three days a week. I also play tennis at least twice a week and sometimes play tennis for two hours and then go to the gym for another hour. Another pastime I like is to occasionally walk around Miramar Lake her in San Diego. It is a 5-mile walk around the lake. My ritual is to walk the lake only in a pair of shorts, no shirt, rubbed down in tanning lotion and earphones plugged into my ears listening to smooth jazz and off I go, walking along the lakes edge on a trail around the lake. It takes about an hour and forty minutes on the rough trail but it is a nice way to get within yourself if you walk it alone. After I quit smoking, I ballooned up to a hefty 212 pounds. So, I went on a weight loss regimen of exercise and eating less and am now down to 169 pounds. It took me 2 years to do it. My local hangout, divebar is called the Tom Cat Express in Mira Mesa. It's a pretty cool place, good food, cheap drinks and mellow without riff raff looking for fights . . . .except at late nights when the zombies come out. I visit with the happy hour crowd from 4:00 - 6:30 and then visit with the zombies around 10:00PM till closing. Party hardy! School Biggest crushes - Patricia "Cookie" Rose, Patricia Nakasone, Juliette Higa Most inspirational teacher was Ruth Kanno who followed me from 7th grade all the way through 12th grade and made sure I learned English. Just couldn't get away from her but she made sure I learned. I started out at university of Hawaii Manoa but dropped out after one semester. My head wasn't in the right place at the time to make the most of education. After getting out of the Marine Corps, I got an AS degree in Criminal Justice and one in Electronics Technology. I wonder what happened to my buddies Richard Ha, Richard Nakamoto, and Edwin Medeiros. I've tried locating them to no avail. Military Enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1967 for four years. I was a cryptographic technician 2817 by MOS. I spent 8 weeks TAD to Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas attending a Crypto school. Within one month of returning to Pendleton, I was one of five Marines who were nominated and meritoriously promoted to Sgt E-5 by a battalion promotion board. Go figure that one out! I had only been in the Corps for 13 months when this happened. Semper Fidelis - Always Faithful Retirement I retired in 2002 after my second time being axed because of a corporate buyout. The first time was in 1991 after 16 years with a company. The company was sold and the new owners came in and cut expenses by cleaning house. The second time happened in 2002, again when the company I worked for was sold. At least my contract with them gave me a pretty good chunk of cash when the company was sold. I learned from my first experience and made sure I got a piece of the action on the sale of the company. But then I said, "I'm not going to start all over again" and retired. Life Today - Second Wind It took me two years after my separation to finally get my divorce. I tried dating at first but found it cumbersome so after about 6 tries at it, I concluded that I felt better just going out stag and meeting various people. That worked out real well for two years until I met Linda. In my eyes, she is beautiful and smart to boot. She has a law degree from USD. She is a Democrat and I am a Republican. Maybe there is truth to the saying "Opposites attract". We are sexagenarians that are as active as 18 year olds. Like magnets, we are drawn to each other. Hikes, dinners, concerts, plays, dancing, tennis, laughing, swimming together or just hanging out at the shore watching the sunset. This is the best time of my life so far and I'm loving every minute of it. To all that remember me from those good (??) ole school days, Aloha. I used to look through my yearbooks periodically over the years and bring back the nostalgia. When I heard news of someone back in Hawaii, I would break out my yearbooks to see if I remembered them. Unfortunately, I lost all of my High School Yearbooks in the Oct 2003 Cedar fires that burned my house to the ground. You know, you can replace a house but you can't replace memories that were contained in those books. I go to L&L Hawaiian everyonce in awhile and read the local papers they get from Hawaii to see what is going on back there. Check out my Facebook page under Tsunami. Update 10/22/08 Didn't make it to reunion this year although I was planning on it. My lady went to Argentina for two weeks and I just couldn't bring myself to go off to Hawaii and extend the time we were apart. Going to Puerto Vallarta in November '08 for about a week to visit a friend. Update 1/11/09 - On Thursday, 1/8/09, My lady and I hiked up Cowles Mountain, the highest point in San Diego at 1,592 feet elevation and 1.25 miles one way. It took us...Expand for more