Posted on: Friday, August 27, 2004

HAWAIIAN STYLE

By Wade Shirkey
Advertiser Staff Writer

When Kenso Okazaki was born, Roosevelt was president. Theodore, not Franklin Delano.

Seventeen more administrations would come and go before the Nisei son of Japanese immigrant parents in Ha'iku, Maui, would have to decide on George W. as his presidential choice in 2004.

Of course, it wasn't a hard decision: Kaiser, as he was popularly known, had preferred the Republican ticket over almost a century's time now — and besides, George and Laura had recently sent him that card marking his 100th birthday last Friday.

When he was born, Hawai'i was a territory — he wouldn't have had a vote. Hawai'i petitioned Congress for statehood just the year before, 1903. Orville Wright had flown for the first time that year.

Tea bags were invented by Thomas Sullivan the year he was born, but Albert Einstein's "theory of relativity" and Kellogg's Corn Flakes would have to wait a couple years. Edison's moving pictures wouldn't come until he was about 6.

In his lifetime, the centenarian would see the arrival of the nuclear age, men stepping on the moon and people living with other people's hearts beating in their chests. And, of course, rap music and "The Simpsons."

Okazaki was fifth in a family of 10, eight boys and two girls. His father hauled pineapple by horse-pulled wagon. An eighth-grade education would see him through life.

He'd work a variety of jobs — pineapple, truck mechanic, railroad — to support his family: wife Sumiko, 13 years his junior, and children Robert, now 64, and Naomi Tokuhisa, 61.

"He was one rascal, real bad boy!" his kolohe wife still says kiddingly. Traditionally, Japanese-style, theirs had been an arranged marriage between the 22-year-old Sumiko and the guy who was hanging out at the movie theater where she worked.

After Okazaki retired in 1972, the couple moved to O'ahu. But he still worked part-time at "this and that" before hanging up the daily routine, about eight years later.

He settled back to a life of enjoying his family — and his other love: fishing across the highway at Waimea Bay — papio, moi and his favorite, halalu, baby akule.

Now, living in the same immaculately maintained three-bedroom home, he still rides a bike — albeit a stationary exercise cycle now — mows his own yard, walks the neighborhood, and, amazingly, according to next-door neighbor and friend, Isamu Abe, 85, still completes The Advertiser's Jumble puzzle each day.

Looking not a day over 75, Okazaki shrugs off any "secret to long life." His parents lived to their late 80s and 90s, the Japanese diet of fish and vegetables probably helping, he said. As for himself, he has sworn off rice for its high sugar content and, except for social occasions, now swears off the juice, as well: "Too old to be drinking!" chides Sumiko.

"I don't miss rice" a bit he says. "I eat wheat bread!"

He walks 20 minutes a day and drove until he was 95. "Keep on moving," he said. "Don't stay home (and) watch TV!"

Now, with a cane, he misses walking on the beach. A pacemaker is about his only concession to modern medical science. He doesn't even wear glasses.

He has eschewed the Internet, the computer and the cell phone, television being his only modern vice.

He'd like to live another four or five years. "I never think about being 100 ... as long as I can get along," he said.

Any unfulfilled dreams or uncompleted goals? "Not so far," he says, still a sparkle in his old eyes. "God's been good to me!"

Wade Kilohana Shirkey is kumu of Na Hoaloha O Ka Roselani No'eau. He writes on Island life.