Former Miami Dolphins wide receiver Nat Moore is the coordinator for the annual youth clinics

A few that remain ingrained in my mind are meeting Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Feller and seeing my hand disappear into his mammoth right paw, sitting behind Giants defensive end Michael Strahan at a baseball game, and having former NBA player and coach Byron Scott watch some pickup hoops at my high school. (I always found it hilarious that when Scott, whose daughters attended my high school, came into the gym, everyone started to play harder as if the then-coach of the New Jersey Nets would think to himself, “I think that 5-foot-4-inch kid who just banked in a three can really help us against Kobe this weekend.”)

Kaua’i's youths get to create those types of memories each year as the NFL Pro Bowl Youth Clinic brings professional football players around the Hawaiian Islands and makes an always highly anticipated stop at Vidinha Stadium. This year’s free clinic took place Jan. 27, with NFL players and cheerleaders leading football drills and a cheerleading clinic.

It’s much more than just tossing around the pigskin the primary goal is reaching each child on a personal level.

“One main focus is linking the importance of school and education,” says Marleen Duarte, economic assistant for Kaua’i Economic Development Board, one of the program’s sponsors. “They talk about staying in school, staying off drugs, remaining on the straight path.”

With the clinic open to boys and girls age 9 to 18, the faces typically range from current KIF superstars to Pop Warner neophytes who one day dream of donning a high school jersey. Even if they are just coming out for a day of exercise and rubbing shoulders with some pro football stars, the athletes they meet have been specifically chosen for more than just their ability.

Former NFL player Fred McCrary leads a drill during the 2011 NFL Pro Bowl Clinic at Vidinha Stadium. Photos courtesy Kauai Economic Development Board

A few of the NFL players back this year have been mainstays with the Hawaii clinics, including former running back Fred McCrary, safety Nick Sorensen and current Oakland Raiders fullback Marcel Reece. The familiar faces provide a connection to the community and give the kids a few more role models.

One such local example back with the clinic this year is offensive lineman Vince Manuwai, who was born in Honolulu, played for the University of Hawaii and was a third-round draft pick of the Jacksonville Jaguars in 2003, where he spent his eight-year career.

“That kind of gives a message to our kids: Hey, that can be you,” says Duarte.

Former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno died Jan. 22. It’s unfortunate that a man’s final 75 days overshadow his previous 30,000, but that’s how this is playing out in the eyes of many observers.

It’s not my place to determine if that perspective is justified or not, but as a Penn State alumnus, it’s no less sad.

Paterno is a prime example and model of how to live a productive, innovative, charitable life, and also how any moral lapse can have extreme consequences on others.

He should be remembered completely and fairly, with his overwhelming good aligned with a momentary silence that had devastating repercussions.

Billy Currington’s I’m Pretty Good at Drinking Beer:

I’m not the type to work in a bank, I’m no good at slappin on paint,

Don’t have a knack for makin motors crank, no

But I’m pretty good at drinkin beer

Aaron Lewis in Country Boy sings that:

I like my jeans and my old T-shirts, And a couple extra pounds never really hurt.

‘Cause a country boy is all I’ll ever be

Well, if I ever heard a song of no ambition that’s it. But he also says he has no need for the government to hold his hand. I doubt he’ll be singing that when he’s in his 70s and in need of Social Security and Medicare.

Or the grammar in Steve Holy’s hit: Baby, love don’t run Baby, love don’t hide That’s doesn’t, Steve!

But I guess if Iz can get away with for you and I, then you can skate with don’t.

Have your heard Tracy Byrd’s Ten Rounds With Jose Cuervo? Tells of 10 glasses of tequila and how smashed you get. Just like another song I heard about going to church on Sunday, then playing a ball game with the guys, hitting the bar and drinking “right through to the next day.” I heard a country-song woman singing “I should kill you right now and do the whole world a favor.”

The songs about loving God, family and the USA are OK so long as they’re not to exclusion of tolerance for atheists, gay families and countries posing no threat to us. But I get the sense most of that is about exclusion. It seems that if you have a tractor and a pickup truck but little schooling, you’re a country boy hero in current songdom. No money? No problem. And the worse your jeans or booze habit the more the girls will love you.

So I keep hoping that most of the listeners are not our up-and-coming generation, which needs something more inspirational than:

I smoke a little weed.

I still live in the sticks where you wouldn’t go,

In a town of 12 hundred off an old dirt road.

And a country boy is all I’ll ever be.

And finally another one from Billy Currington:

Baby, I Want You To Love Me Like My Dog Does.

YEEEE-haw!

KP2 enjoys a swim in a holding tank at the Waikiki Aquarium

Stretching as far back in history as the Hawaiian Islands archipelago itself is the aquatic life that teems at its shores. That ancient symbiotic balance between land and sea has always included the Hawaiian monk seal, until the 1800s, that is when whaling ships arrived seeking fur and oil, and depleted the species that had been thriving in the main chain of Islands.

Though they’ve filtered back down from the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands and are breeding again on our shores, with fewer than 1,100 monk seals in existence, they’re still critically endangered.

“People often aren’t aware that there are seals that are native to Hawaii,” says National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries’ David Schofield, who oversees a network of coordinators and around 500 volunteers who act as the eyes and ears of NOAA’s seal management efforts. “We’ll get tourists calling our response network saying, ‘I see a manatee,’ or they’ll think it’s a California sea lion or a grey seal, but the only ones we have here are the Hawaiian monk seals.

“Even people who live here have a difficult time believing that they’re from here, and it’s understandable because their parents didn’t see them and their grandparents didn’t see them. We have our uphill battle with the recovery of the species, getting people to realize that it’s been here before any of us showed up in the Hawaiian Islands. The main message is coexistence.”

Two attentive, warm, brown eyes and a pair of whiskers are the face of that awareness effort in the form of KP2 (Kauai Pup No. 2), Waikiki Aquarium’s newest inhabitant. Last month, KP2 or Ho’ailona (sign from the sea), the only monk seal ever successfully raised by humans, arrived at the aquarium as an ambassador of his species.

Monk seal program intern Christiana Mandina is greeted by a very friendly KP2, also known as Ho‘ailona Nathalie Walker photo nwalker@midweek.com

“He’s adjusting well and he’s an absolute magnet for people he’s as interested in you as you are in him,” says aquarium director Dr. Andrew Rossiter. “It’s hard not to get some affinity or affection with this particular animal, so people start reading our information board. He’s doing his job.”

The board lists the dangers that face juvenile seals: declining food resources, pupping beaches lost to erosion, sharks, human disturbance, entanglement in marine debris. And it lists some solutions: Become a volunteer, leave monk seals on the beach undisturbed by maintaining a distance of 150 feet, remove debris from beaches.

Ho’ailona’s is a cautionary tale. His journey began when he was born in May of 2008 on Kauai, and was the second pup his mom abandoned. Attempts at handrearing had always ended in futility, so NOAA approached the experts at the Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito, Calif. (marinemammalcenter.org), who rehabilitate hundreds of Mainland seals and sea lions every year. Schofield was on the team that offered round-the-clock care feeding the pup his “salmon oil and squid milkshakes.” After seven months he was healthy and weighed enough to be transferred by the Coast Guard to a shoreline pen at the Marine Corps base in Kaneohe, before being released back into the wild at Kalaupapa.

“Kalaupapa is one of the most important birthing places for monk seals in the main Hawaiian Islands,” notes Schofield. “We met with community members and Hansen’s disease patients, and they welcomed the seal to their peninsula. They felt it was a kindred spirit because the seal had been abandoned and, of course, they have their own story of abandonment.”

KP2 is taken from the beach by David Schofield and Shawn Farry after his mother rejected him

For a time, Ho’ailona prospered and interacted with other seals, but when he made his way to the less solitary Kaunakakai pier on Molokai and began interacting with humans, NOAA once again had to intervene.

“When he’s small and cute, it’s fun to play with him,”

Rossiter points out, “but when they get up to 400-

500 pounds and are 6 or 7 feet long, it’s a completely different prospect.”

“Friendly” adolescent and adult seals, in fact, become a public safety hazard, says Schofield, when they “don’t want you to leave the water and they want to continue playing.” Ho’ailona was retrieved with plans to relocate him to an isolated area of Niihau, but his eyesight was found to be functioning at only 20 percent. He was deemed non-releasable to the wild and sent to the marine facility in Sausalito, where he contributed to research on the species over the past couple of years.

The Hawaiian monk seal is a curiosity because most seals prosper in frigid climes. So, what with this tropical seal that basks in the sun? One point of discovery was that, though huge, monk seals’ metabolism requirements are much lower than other marine mammals meaning they eat much less even than other seal species, consuming only 5 to 8 percent of their body weight per day.

Ho’ailona also helped with another important aspect of research. He was one of the first trial recipients of the morbillivirus vaccine. Every so often, morbilli and other viruses decimate seal populations, and because Hawaii’s seals are isolated and therefore susceptible to germs, if an elephant seal were to swim over from California which has happened and a virus were to spread, it could quickly wipe out the entire population.

Ninety percent of the population lives in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, but that population is declining at 4 percent per year, which is unsustainable. The remainder of the seals live on the main islands, and their population is growing by 6 percent each year.

“We’re still not out of the woods,” says Schofield. “The foothold that the species will get, if any, is its ability to survive in the main islands. And that’s why we all have to be careful not to create another KP2. The beach or near-shore waters are our recreational area for surfing or lying on the beach to catch rays, but it’s the monk seals’ bedroom. They’re coming in from a hard day’s work of feeding all night and they’re trying to sleep, so we have to be respectful of that.

“KP2 offers a bittersweet message. Yes, he was the first Hawaiian monk seal to be raised by people, but we don’t want people interacting with seals to the point that they have to be removed from the population and therefore they’re not a functional part of the recovery of the species.”

To learn more, visit waquarium.org, monkseal.ucsc.edu, or look up Ho’ailona at noaa.gov or on Facebook.

Goodman and friends. Photo from Kimo Akane

FORGETABOUTIT … This Valentine’s Day, seven couples will be chosen to get hitched in the “Married at The Mob Museum.” Your ceremony will be officiated by the mob’s legal eagle Oscar Goodman, who later became the carpo di tutti capi (the boss of bosses) for North Las Vegas. Winners also receive shopping sprees at the Fashion Show, a Cabana Suite at Bugsy Siegel’s old place “The El Cortez,” brunch at the Mob Bar, flowers, etc. Enter to win at Vegas.com/weddings, and a mob name like “Junior Lollipops,” “Tony Bagels” or “Hootie” is optional.

IF YOU scour the earth in search of the man’s best brew, then Public House in the Venetian is a must-do. Among the more than 200 different suds, 24 taps and rotating casks of unpasteurized ale heaven, you’ll find the only cicerone in Las Vegas. As a graduate of the Hawaii public high school system I had to look it up, but in this case a cicerone is a “beer snob,” unless you are a beer snob, then they are known as “certified beer servers,” whose mission is to improve beer quality via knowledge and tasting skills … as Uncle Don used to say, “Suck ‘em up!”

AFTER 500 YEARS, Leonardo da Vinci makes his Vegas debut … The Palazzo has unveiled the only authenticated sculpture by the Renaissance man who would have been at home in Sin City.

LAS VEGAS-BASED online retailer Zappos got hacked, and 24 million customer records were comprised. Financial data was not involved, but you might check your credit cards and change your password just in case.

A SIGN OF hard times is when people do desperate things … An armed gunman entered an employees-only area of O’Sheas casino and took an undisclosed amount of cash from workers.

WORLD SERIES of Poker champion Josh Duhamel was beaten and robbed of more than $100,000 in euros and Canadian money in his Montreal home. A Poker Stars watch and a WSOP bracelet also were taken during the home invasion. Auwe … At the arraignment, evidence proved that his 20-year-old exgirlfriend was the mastermind behind the theft and beating.

IN MICHIGAN, a Bank of America coding error allowed a gambler to withdraw an unlimited sum of money over a 16-day period. By the end of his spree, he had withdrawn $1.54 million from casinos in Detroit and Las Vegas … Big mahalo from the guys who fill the machines for the OT. Did you know there are more than 1.2 million ATMs in operation and on average fewer than 30 are stolen in a year?

The groundwork we completed, as early as the 1990s when our federal government granted visa waivers to visitors from Japan and then in Congress’s passage of the Travel Promotion Act of 2009, has now resulted in one of the most significant actions by the federal government in years, if not decades.

Last month, President Obama signed an executive order charging the departments of Commerce and Interior with co-leading an interagency task force to make recommendations for a national travel and tourism strategy to promote travel and expand job creation, and to coordinate these administration efforts with those of the Corporation for Travel Promotion, the nonprofit organization established by the Travel Promotion Act to promote travel to our country, and the Tourism Policy Council to ensure private sector involvement. One focus of the task force will be promoting visits to national treasures, such as our national parks.

The departments of State and Homeland Security have been given targets of increasing non-immigrant visa processing capacity for China and Brazil by 40 percent in 2012, ensuring that 80 percent of these visa applicants are interviewed within three weeks of receipt of application, and stepping up efforts to expand the visa waiver program. Chinese travelers, a growing market for Hawaii, have complained that visa requests can take months for approval.

The same agencies will establish a pilot program to simplify and speed up the non-immigrant visa process for certain applicants, including the ability to waive interviews for some very low-risk applicants, something I’ve been calling for.

The federal government also will expand and make the Global Entry program permanent. This program, created as a pilot in 2008 to facilitate expedited clearance for pre-approved, lowrisk travelers upon arrival in the United States. Global Entry has been a publicprivate partnership that used kiosks in 20 airports to speed the admission of travelers, saving inspection time for customs and immigration officers.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also has requested that Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano add Taiwan to the list of 36 countries now on the visa waiver program.

The significance of all this is that the federal government is acknowledging what we in Hawaii have long-appreciated: Travel and tourism can be a key source of revenue and jobs. While other nations recognize the importance of tourism and have devoted the resources to promote it as a national economic priority, the United States has lagged.

The U.S. tourism and travel industry represented 2.7 percent of GDP and 7.5 million jobs in 2010, with international travel to this country supporting 1.2 million jobs alone (and thousands in Hawaii). The industry projects that more than 1 million American jobs could be created over the next decade if the U.S. increased its share of the international travel market. According to the Department of Commerce, international travel resulted in $134 billion in U.S. exports in 2010 and is the nation’s largest serviceexport industry, 24 percent of service exports.

These developments will mean great things for Hawaii as we seek to expand our appeal to new nations and new travelers. It will enable us to compete in a very tough global market, with the backing of our federal, state and county governments. And as I have long advocated during my travels to Washington, D.C., and for tourism promotions on the Mainland and elsewhere, Hawaii can and should serve as an example for the rest of the country of how we can make this national goal a reality.

MUFI’S VISITOR HEROES

Kaimi Kaneholani

Position: Door Attendant
Location: Saint Regis Princeville Resort

Kaimi Kaneholani is one of the visitor industry’s best representatives, which is why he was second runner-up in the Hawaii Lodging & Tourism Association’s 2012 Na Po’e Pa’ahana awards program in the bell/valet of the year category.

Kaimi’s job title is door attendant for the Saint Regis Princeville Resort, but he fills in as a valet, bellman and house car driver when the need arises. So dedicated is he to representing the resort and to making every guest’s stay enjoyable, he’ll even use a day off to help visitors. In one example, Kaimi bumped into two resort guests at Ke’e Beach. He found parking for them, advised them on things to do and coached them on snorkeling. Another time, he loaned a young couple his family’s stroller to use during their stay.

This top performer and role model for the Saint Regis dedicates his free time to ocean safety as a volunteer for the Kaua’i Ocean Recreation Experience for the Handicapped and is an instructor for the Kaua’i Junior Lifeguard program.

House Speaker Calvin Say. File photo

It was, as it was a year ago, film noir at last week’s opening of the 2012 state legislative session: No music, no dancing, few flowers, sobriety everywhere. The residents of the so-called “People’s House” were in high re-election-year mode: all business, levity at a minimum.

The Senate’s minority of one, East Honolulu Republican Sam Slom, complained: “Let me say right upfront we (meaning he) acknowledge the majority’s unilateral decision to once again suspend, as was done in 2010, our tradition of making Hawaii’s opening day colorful, special and unique, in order to appear more serious and businesslike. But we (meaning he) respectfully disagree. The lack of aloha diminishes the citizens’ role and ownership of our government. It is their chance to be here and we have marginalized that.”

Hear! Hear!

Whatever one may have felt about pre-Great Recession opening days at the Legislature, they were indeed unique celebrations of Hawaii’s culture, expressions of aloha and marvelously democratic.

Oh, opening day always brought out the paid lobbyists in force, as they would come out every day of every legislative session. But on opening day, company CEOs often walked from office to office as well. So too did union chiefs and university presidents, unpaid lobbyists and, most important, a goodly number of common folk.

The pre-Great Recession opening days could get crowded and sweaty, in days of yore sometimes less than sober, but they were indeed, as the good minority senator said last week, expressive of the “citizens’ role and ownership of our government.”

Is there a more important principle?

Certainly it’s more important than the appearance of being “serious and businesslike.” Lawmakers have 59 other working days to prove themselves “businesslike.”

In his remarks, state Senate President Shan Tsutsui, speaking for the Senate’s 24 Democrats, highlighted “The Invest in Hawaii Act of 2012″ to “address the long overdue backlog of repair and maintenance issues projects that are shovel-ready and permit-ready.”

It’s patented Democratic Party pump-priming: “Projects would be seen in every single one of our 255 public schools, all 10 University of Hawaii campuses, all of our state hospitals, and provide work for painters, roofers, electricians, masons, plumbers, local engineers … in every corner of the state, and in return generate millions of dollars in disposable income throughout our economy.”

So long as all the painting, plumbing and roofing wouldn’t cost anything, Slom would probably agree. But it will, and Slom insisted that a “better day” for Hawaii means, among other things, “no new taxes.”

Where bipartisan agreement could be heard on this all-business opening day was in regard to solar energy. Said House Minority Leader Gene Ward: “We really need to get serious about the sun.” He called for making Hawaii “first in the world” in solar water heating and photovoltaic contributions to the grid. On the Senate side, Tsutsui made a similar plea, arguing that “if photovoltaic panels were installed in all of our public schools, the state could realize a savings of more than 500 millions of dollars over the next 20 years alone.”

In the grimmest and dimmest spirit of film noir, however, House Speaker Calvin Say called for balance and responsibility: “No new taxes for state government from residents and businesses … no major general fund appropriation for the expansion of state programs.” Both, Say insisted, would endanger a fragile state economic recovery.

The Speaker apologized for his “intrusion of reality,” adjusted his green eyeshade and concluded his address.

My wife does more before 6 a.m. than I can do over a long weekend. She’ll wash her hair, feed Buddy our dog, make our daughter’s breakfast and lunch, prepare our daughter’s school uniform and cheerleading outfit. She also cleans the kitchen, does some laundry and even gets in a few minutes of watching QVC.

Well, the other morning I failed to set my phone alarm. My phone went off, but it was our daughter calling from her room. Still half asleep, I answered, “What is it, honey?” She yelled, “Dad, it’s 6 o’clock, I missed the bus!” I turned to notify my wife, but she was clinging to the bedroom ceiling. She declared the Nagasawa household to be at DEFCON 1. Suddenly clothes, food and Buddy were flying all over. I was in a tornado of madness.

I would have to take our daughter to school before I headed in to work. With full-fledged traffic back in force, both my girls were urging me to get moving. I have a morning ritual, and this situation turned my whole world upside down. It was going to set the tone for my entire day. And I don’t know how she did it, but my wife had our daughter ready to head out the door in about the same time it took me to shave.

It didn’t help that Buddy grabbed my socks and I had to chase him around the house. My wife told me to quit fooling around. Although disheveled, I grabbed my car keys and made for the door like Angry Birds.

It was only then that my wife suddenly realized that it was Martin Luther King Jr. day, a day off for both her and our daughter. Not wanting to waste a perfectly good make-ready, I headed off to work. I kissed both my girls goodbye and asked what they were going to do. Without hesitation, my wife said, “We’re going back to bed. It’s a holiday.”

Zeus was truly man’s best friend

Two years ago, I shared a very personal story in this column about the loss of my dear and loyal friend Zeus. For nearly 15 years, my black Labrador was at my side, always giving, always there.

On Jan. 10, 2010, I had to make the most painful decision of my life when I had to let him go. Zeus was suffering, and saying goodbye left me depressed and alone. At times the emptiness was unbearable, and I often wondered if I could ever love another dog again.

Many of you who experienced the loss of a pet shared your heartfelt well wishes. Some of you expressed similar worries and fears, others gave me encouragement that one day our family would open our home and hearts to another dog. And a few of you said, “It will happen when you’re not looking.” Your words of hope meant the world to me and my family. It helped in our healing process.

Over the last two years, I’ve heard many other “words of encouragement” to move on that frankly left me frustrated.

You know the clichés: “Everything happens for a reason,” “you should be over it by now,” and the granddaddy of them all, “time heals all wounds.”

We just weren’t ready, at least I wasn’t … until now.

On Jan. 14, nearly two years to the day that we said goodbye to Zeus, we opened our hearts and home to Nui. Let me start by saying Nui (which means big in Hawaiian) is truly a gift. She’s not a puppy and she’s not a black Labrador, but she’s absolutely perfect. She is a gentle, 6-year-old ridgeback, who adores my family. And as a few of you predicted, Nui unexpectedly walked into our lives.

Nui has stolen the Mizutani ohana’s hearts. Photos courtesy Michelle Mizutani

Who knew?

On Jan. 14, while watching my son’s baseball game, my wife was busy talking to someone on the phone. Ten minutes and several phone calls later, she turned to me and said, “Honey, we’re going to have a dog. Nui is coming home to us.”

Nui’s owner had shared that she needed a good home, and he was comfortable and confident that we could provide her with a loving environment. I was stunned. I was excited.

I was nervous. I was scared.

A day later, Nui walked through our front door. I could hear her little paws dancing on our floor. But for some reason the excitement I had felt leading up to that moment had turned into apprehension. I felt an uncomfortable feeling of guilt. How could I do this to Zeus? How could I betray him? I knew these were silly thoughts, but I couldn’t help myself.

It took nearly 20 minutes before I walked downstairs, and when I saw her those thoughts slowly faded. She was so beautiful, and it was obvious she was excited to be here.

Her tail wagged as she explored her new home yard, smelling potted plants and trees. She confidently “marked” her areas as I watched from afar in my chair.

Then it happened. Nui spotted me and quietly and slowly walked up to my feet. She looked up with her gentle eyes and leaned into me. I bent over and gave her a huge hug as she licked my nose. She curled up in my arms and my tears started to flow.

It was at that moment that I realized I wasn’t replacing my Zeus. I was opening my heart to another gift.

I said goodbye one more time to my old friend, then rubbed Nui’s belly It was time to move forward.

Welcome home, Nui, we’ve been waiting for you.