Hawai'i woman's niece saw Bali carnage
| • | Toll from Bali blast expected to rise |
By Karen Blakeman
Advertiser Staff Writer
When word of the bombing reached Hawai'i, Bonnie Boquer, a teacher at Holy Family Catholic Academy, was on the phone with family members, searching for word from her brother and sister-in-law in Bali.
When it came, Boquer learned that both were unhurt. But her 13-year-old niece remains in shock after witnessing the bombing, and the family plans to leave the island nation they have come to love.
Boquer's brother, Martial Hernandez, a former Honolulu Club restaurant manager, and his wife, Vicki, moved to Bali seven years ago when Martial went into business with Indonesian friends.
They bought a home and raised their daughter, Nicole, who is fluent in the Indonesian language.
Martial had a fishing business, and he and Vicki ran a restaurant in a popular tourist area not far from the spot where the Sari Club stood — until Saturday.
Martial was on another island seeing to the fishing business when the bomb went off, Boquer said. He searched frantically for transportation to get back to his family, but all flights were halted. He finally talked his way aboard a medevac aircraft.
Vicki was at the restaurant. When the explosion shook the neighborhood, she had but one thought: her daughter.
Nicole was in a taxicab with two other girls, returning to the restaurant from an outing. The cab's route would take her directly past the Sari Club, Boquer said. Vicki ran out of the restaurant to look for the kids. The police pushed her back.
"So Vicki took a moped and went in anyway," Boquer said. "Vicki doesn't own a moped, so I'm sure she must have just, well, taken it. I can picture her doing it. She would have done anything to go and look for her child."
Vicki rode into a scene from hell: people running, screaming. The ground was littered with the dead and injured, Boquer said. Vicki found the taxi: The windows were blown out and the driver was dead. The girls weren't inside, so Vicki kept looking.
She finally found them aimlessly wandering the streets.
Nicole is still in shock, Boquer said. She can't sleep and cries all the time.
"She was 13," Boquer said. "She was raised in Bali and it was a very peaceful place. She was just coming home from somewhere with friends and everything was quite safe and peaceful ..."
When the bomb exploded and the driver was killed, body parts rained down on the taxi, Boquer said.
Vicki returned to the restaurant later that night, took money from the register, closed the door and locked it.
"They've lost everything," Boquer said. "They'll give up the restaurant — they'll have to. There is nothing for them now. They catered to tourists, and I don't think there will be any tourism ...
"We were supposed to go there this summer. I guess we won't."
Martial, Vicki and Nicole will probably move to San Francisco, Boquer said. Vicki's family is there, and Martial can still run the fishing business from the West Coast.
"But they love Bali," Boquer said. "It was their home."
Reach Karen Blakeman at 535-2430 or kblakeman@honoluluadvertiser.com.
