Christie Yanagi and Brian Takemoto lived just five miles apart in San Francisco. But they met at the Ocean Club in Honolulu.

Takemoto was there celebrating his 30th birthday in May 2001. Yanagi was invited to the gettogether by a mutual friend.

"At first, I thought he was cute," said Yanagi, 33, a flight attendant for United Airlines who was born and raised in Kane'ohe but now lives in San Francisco. "But he was a little drunk, and I thought he was a little arrogant. I can't say that at that point I was really interested."

They chatted about San Francisco and promised to meet up in the city. Takemoto handed Yanagi his number.

A few days later, after they had both returned to the Bay Area, Yanagi had a friend coming through town. She thought this would be the perfect opportunity to call Takemoto and ask him to hang out.

"I had a reason now to call him," she said, laughing.

They met up in the city for drinks and wound up talking all night.

"After that, I started to like him," she said. "He was really humble and really a gentleman. He just seemed like a really nice guy. And of course, he wasn't drunk this time, so I could see his true self."

Takemoto drove Yanagi back to her home after dropping off her friend in Oakland. On the 40-minute drive, they talked about past relationships and what they wanted in a mate. When he arrived at her apartment, he asked her to dinner that weekend.

"From that point on, I really liked him," Yanagi said.

She liked the fact that Takemoto, now 34 and a State Farm Insurance agent, was driven, ambitious and hard-working. But what really sold her was his thoughtfulness.

"He would do stuff like walk on the outside of me when we walked down the street," Yanagi said. "I remember one night we went out, and I was putting on my jacket, and he helped me put it on. I thought that was the sweetest thing. He's just a total gentleman."

They continued to go out to dinners and drinks with friends. Yanagi marks the progression of their relationship by the way he said goodnight. First, a hug. Then a kiss on the cheek. Then a peck on the lips.

"I guess that's what told me he was interested," she said.

That July, Takemoto asked her to be his date to a wedding. That made their relationship official.

In the beginning of 2002, about eight months after meeting at Ocean Club, Yanagi moved into his two-bedroom home in San Mateo.

Living together was the test of their compatibility.

"You learn a lot about the other person's quirks," said Yanagi, who's not a morning person like Takemoto. "At first, you tolerate it, then after a while it gets on your nerves, then you just let it go."

The couple never talked about marriage. But Yanagi knew early on that Takemoto was a keeper.

"He's a really good person," she said. "He always had good intentions. I don't think there's anything bad about his character that anyone could ever say about him ... and that's something I really respect."

After a year of living together, they made a serious commitment: They got a dog. They brought home Sasha, a bichon frise, in 2003.

"Then it was a matter of knowing that we would stay together," Yanagi said.

Throughout their relationship, Yanagi and Takemoto visited Hawai'i a few times a year. His favorite thing to do was watch the sunset from a hotel balcony.

In October 2004, they were hoping to head to Maui with her family, but they couldn't get on a flight out of San Francisco and decided to stay home.

Little did Yanagi know that Takemoto had been planning to propose on the trip. He took her out to dinner at Spago in Palo Alto, where he handed her a small ceramic pineapple in which was an engagement ring.

"He started talking about how Sasha can have real parents now and the puppies at puppy preschool won't make fun of her," Yanagi recalled. "At that point I knew."

The couple married on Oct. 9, 2005 — exactly a year after his proposal — at the Kahala Mandarin Oriental hotel in front of 150 guests. They spent their honeymoon at the Four Seasons Resort Hualalai on the Big Island.

The key to their success, Yanagi said, is giving each other space to do their own thing.

Since she travels about three nights a week, Takemoto has time to hang out with his friends and go to the gym. When she's home, Yanagi enjoys having the day to herself, shopping or meeting her girlfriends for lunch.

When they are together, they like to go out to dinner and to Golden State Warriors games.

"I think it's so much better now that we're married," Yanagi said. "People who aren't married might say things like getting married is just a certificate, that it's the same thing as dating. But it's really not. It's a different feeling. Whatever you do you think about how it will affect the relationship. ... And it's nice to know that you will have someone forever."

Reach Catherine E. Toth at ctoth@honoluluadvertiser.com.