Posted on: Sunday, November 21, 2004
AFTER DEADLINE
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By Dan Nakaso
Advertiser Staff Writer
The day after Thanksgiving marks the 11th anniversary of the day I walked into The Advertiser newsroom to begin a new adventure in newspapers.
Since then, I've worked in almost every newsroom department as a reporter or editor and have been blessed with a job overflowing with fascinating people and amazing experiences:
There were the humbling days and nights spent at Kalaupapa on Moloka'i, where gracious hosts shared their memories of being banished to the Hansen's disease colony decades before as children; a whirlwind 12 hours riding in George W. Bush's presidential motorcade through the streets of Honolulu; scuba-diving trips into shipwrecks more than 100 feet down.
For two weeks, I tracked down outlaw marijuana growers in the Puna District of the Big Island and listened to their theories on why Hawai'i was losing the war on drugs. I shimmied up the 3,922 rusted steps of the "Stairway to Heaven" just before they were renovated, and hauled myself up a creaking rope to get around missing stairs — all the while wondering if my death would be worthy of an obituary in the next day's Advertiser.
I sprinted alongside pig hunters pursuing a kill — food for the family table — in the Ko'olaus; rode on horses and inside helicopters. And I have attended far too many funerals for children and police officers.
I once showed up late for an interview with the governor after being diverted by the city desk to cover a house fire. I finally arrived at the governor's office with smudges on my face and the smell of a charred three-bedroom, two-bath house pouring from my clothes.
So after 20 years as a newspaper reporter and editor, I figured I was more or less prepared to handle whatever stories needed to be told in The Advertiser.
Then I was assigned to the business department.
My thoughts immediately turned to earnings reports, CEOs droning on about "synergy" and "stakeholders" and powerful people clawing to protect their financial interests.
It didn't seem like it would be as interesting as covering the president or looking at the world through a dope dealer's eyes.
But beyond the numbers and press releases, business stories are often about dreams realized and lost, power plays and miracle turnarounds.
Covering business in Hawai'i means writing about a thriving economy that nevertheless leaves thousands of people out of work.
It's about picket lines, fortunes at risk, the occasional scam artist and lots and lots of hard-working folks trying to find their place among it all.
Business reporting means trying to understand — and explain to readers — how Hawai'i's largest airline can file for federal bankruptcy protection and then rack up 17 consecutive months of profits.
It requires interviewing every conceivable person and business who was hurt — or profited — by this year's 58-day concrete strike.
It means standing for weeks in a row next to a garbage bin at the Teamsters headquarters or sitting down in the carpeted, koa-paneled boardrooms of some of Hawai'i's most powerful companies.
But I'm happy to say that I continue to meet interesting and complicated people whose stories are worthy of our readers' time.
A few business leaders have used the tired line that their "greatest asset (the employees) walks out the door every night" — then refused to let me interview any of them. Others run their operations on a shoestring but treat their workers with the heart of a poet.
There was Tom Shizuru, "the soul of Tom's Place" I wrote, whose plate-lunch restaurant in Kaka'ako went under, like so many other family businesses in the Islands. Shizuru had no regrets that neither of his sons wanted to carry on his business. His thanks came from the praise offered by decades of customers.
One woman started a successful business after years of frustration at a government job. Her devotion to the business cost the woman her marriage of 19 years.
And then there was Randy and Billie Lueder, two college-educated workers who couldn't get ahead in an economy with the nation's lowest unemployment rate.
Billie, a full-time career counselor at Kaimuki and McKinley high schools, had to work four part-time jobs during her summer break. Her husband, Randy, brought home a smaller paycheck than the one he earned as a college student three years before.
They're young, ambitious and willing to work hard. They're also thinking of leaving Hawai'i.
After more than two years writing about business in the Islands, I'm still trying to figure out how that can happen.
Reach Dan Nakaso at dnakaso@honoluluadvertiser.com or at 525-8085.
