Sandra Serai, diving champ, Punahou coach

Advertiser Staff

Services will be held tomorrow for Sandra Serai, a former All-American high school diver and coach in Honolulu, who died during transplant surgery Jan. 12, in Pittsburgh. She was 34.

SERAI

She was head boys and girls diving coach from 1991-99 at Punahou School.

Serai set a state-meet diving scoring record of 452.40 points in 1983 that still stands. She dove for the University of Hawai'i in 1987-88, until deteriorating kneecaps forced her to retire.

Then she took up coaching at Punahou, "to give back to the sport and help kids learn to be disciplined," said her mother, Roberta.

Serai was forced to retire from coaching when she developed pancreatitis.

Her condition worsened and she went to the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center on Nov. 16 to seek transplant surgery.

A multiple-organ transplant of the liver, pancreas, small bowel and stomach was in progress when she died on the operating table early on Jan. 12.

"I can describe her in one word: Fight," her mother said yesterday. "She said, 'If anybody remembers me for anything, remember that I never gave up. No matter how great the challenge, I refuse to give up.'

"I'll never forget the enthusiasm with which she went into surgery," Roberta Serai said. "She told her dad, 'I'm coming back to you healthy.' "

Sandra Kiyomi Serai was born Feb. 20, 1968, in Honolulu. She is survived by her parents, Roy and Roberta Serai, and her grandmother, Dorothy Serai, 94, all of Wahiawa.

Visitation will be at 5:30 p.m. tomorrow at Mililani Memorial Park Mortuary Mauka Chapel. The service will be at 6:30 p.m.