Posted on: Friday, July 26, 2002
Hawaiian Style
Disabled young man to find joy as festival paddler
• Dragon boats will compete Aug. 3-4
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| The dragon boats fill up quickly with paddlers and passengers after the annual blessing at the Hilton Hawaiian Village. As many as 30,000 people at Ala Moana Beach Park are expected to watch the dragon boat races Aug. 3-4.
Cory Lum • The Honolulu Advertiser |
Isaac Lau has been a prisoner in his own body for all of his 20 years, a bundle of hopes and aspirations that cannot break free.
"My body is broken-down and old," Lau says.
"But my mind is young."
His is a life lived vicariously. "When I close my eyes and listen to classical music," he says, "I see myself skating and doing gymnastics."
But for a flew fleeting moments next weekend during the AT&T Hawai'i Dragon Boat Festival, Lau will slip free of the confines of his wheelchair — and his life's impossibilities — and into the abandon of racing one of the dragon boats.
Along with the the annual festival's sharing of things cultural, Lau wants to add the realities of being disabled.
Water has always been an escape for Lau, who, since birth, has coped with a multitude of disabilities — including ataxia, a degenerative nerve disease — that rob him of agile movement, clear speech and independence.
"I can't walk, but when I'm in the water, I go for it!" he says, the enthusiasm almost spilling out his soul.
"He does somersaults" in the water, said his mother, Joann, proudly.
For her, the disease presents a double whammy: Daughter Tammy is similarly afflicted. Joann cares for both full time to ensure a stable and loving environment.
The dragon boat races will be the first time this young man of more energy than ability will be able to participate in any team sport, said Sandra Sagisi of Stryker, Weiner & Yokota Public Relations, the event's publicist.
On shore Lau will have his own cheerleading contingent of family and friends.
He will celebrate his accomplishment the next day — his 21st birthday.
For all his limitations, Lau has already become a man of accomplishment: a 4.0 honor student in both special and mainstream education; not only a participating Boy Scout, but an Eagle Scout; and the honoree of a special mayoral "day" proclaimed for him.
Lau speaks five languages — Mandarin, Japanese, Korean, English and sign — and is working on Hawaiian, a Filipino dialect and a smattering of Spanish.
"When 'walking people' get bored, they do sports," he explains. "I learn a language."
Writing with limbs that refuse to obey his commands is another story.
"Everyone says Chinese characters look like chicken-scratch," he joked as he slowly, ever so laboriously, forced the words from his mouth, even as the humor in his eyes beat him to the punchline.
"It's my English that looks like chicken-scratch!" he says, laughing.
One day he wants to put his linguistic proficiency to work as an English/Japanese translator. He has already committed to memory more than 500 of thousands of kanji characters.
Lau not only readily accepts the cards he's been dealt, he also harbors hope for the future. He speaks not of disabilities, but "limitations."
As for the question "why me?" Lau becomes pensive. "I was (made) this way to make people realize what they have and not take that for granted.
"There is sooooo much I want to do! 'Walking people' (tell me) 'You can't do this. You can't do that.' I prove them wrong!
"'Outside people' are narrow-minded. They see me (in the wheelchair) as a crippled person. They only see one side — if they'd look inward they'd change their mind."
To show people that unseen side, he chose the rigors of the dragon boat race, in which his AT&T-sponsored boat will be up against competitors of other corporate-sponsored boats, including Zippy's, Nokia, a Honolulu Fire Department team, and paddlers from the Honolulu Police Department Special Services Division.
Lau says he wants to add a new dimension to the annual festival that attracts more than 30,000 people.
In future years, Gifford Chang, chairman and director of the Hawai'i Dragon Boat Association, hopes that a revitalized Ala Wai Canal, similar to San Antonio's Riverwalk, and the recent city improvements at Kuhio Beach, will offer an improved venue of waterside restaurants, kiosks, artists' stands and entertainment for the event.
Next year, Chang wants to add another dimension to the festival's diversity. "We want to invite (as an annual participation) cancer patients worldwide to come race," he said.
The idea is particularly personal to Sagisi, a recovered cancer victim.
"I expect to see a lot of pink ribbons," on the intricately carved and painted canoes next year, she joked.
