Standing ovation for final encore

THE MEMORIAL SERVICE

PERHAPS only in the entertainment business can a private memorial service be held on a public beach and broadcast over the airwaves, but then Donald Tai Loy Ho was perhaps the best-known Hawaiian of all time. His passing affected all of Hawaii, the epicenter of an emotional tsunami radiating out around the world.

A few hundred friends and family attended the semiprivate service for Ho, the chablis-voiced entertainer who created the modern, sophisticated image of Hawaiian entertainment, and in the process, helped Waikiki grow up. About a thousand more fans waited on the beach to bid aloha to Ho's ashes, scattered at sea -- beyond the reef -- by a fleet of outrigger canoes.

During the brief service, atop the Sheraton hotel's beachside hula platform and sandwiched between a Japanese wedding party and tourist kids cannonballing into the hotel pool, Ho's daughters and friends sang acoustic worship songs. Pastor Tom Iannucci offered a memorial prayer and reminiscence, and revealed that, as a former Marine serving in North Africa, he learned that Ho's music was a common feature at embassy "luaus."

"The world is a better place because of the gift he brought forth -- that's aloha," summarized Iannucci. "Don Ho is not dead; he's just changed locations."

John Tilton of Tihati Productions said the event symbolized the "Sheraton and Hilton hotels coming together." Ho, at one time or another, was a featured performer in each of the chains. The Hilton Hawaiian Village Guards, dressed in red uniforms, trooped by to pay respects, as did several dozen Hilton employees who crafted a 76-foot lei to drape over the canoe bearing Ho's ashes.

Another lei wasn't nearly as large, but it was made with love undiminished. Helen Hong, an old friend of Ho's for more than 40 years, made a new lei for him every day to wear at his shows. "Now I've made my last lei for Don," she said, eyes damp. "He was so nice, so down to earth. He had me bring him a new lei every night, and said he was proud to wear it. The last one I made ... it must have been for his birthday last August. Now this really is the last one. ..."

Daughter Laurie Hong, one of the paddlers in the canoe fleet, delivered the pikake lei.

"HE WAS a tremendous representative of the people of Hawaii," said Beriah Brown of Kailua. "Recognized worldwide as a symbol of aloha -- you know, beyond the usual show-biz schtik."

Jim Roach, a record producer working on daughter Hoku Ho's next album, said that Ho "was really a kind man, a straight-up kind of guy. And an amazing golfer! I got to play golf with him, as well as a little bit of music."

"I was just a girl working as a cocktail waitress in Waikiki," recalled Barbara Saromines, an art professor. "It was 1967. Palani Vaughan was the doorman. An hour after he introduced me to the owner, I had a tray in my hand, serving drinks. I couldn't understand what anyone was saying. Don Ho took me aside, said that Hawaiians throw a pile of $20 bills in the middle of the table, and just keep bringing Primo until all the 20s were gone. It wasn't much, but helped me keep my job."

U.S. Rep. Neil Abercrombie was subdued. "He told me once that the bigger you get, the smaller you need to be. That's advice I've tried to follow all my life, but it's difficult. The only other guy in Ho's league was Gabby Pahinui. Real gentlemen."

There was a shattering volley from the Air Force honor guard, a 21-gun salute.

And then family members, led by an emotionally staggered Haumea Ho, his widow, marched in procession onto the beach, carrying Ho's ashes in ti-leaf wrappings, flanked by conch blowers who had difficulty finding breath, ranked by citizens of the vast pool of humanity whom Ho befriended, many of them weeping, all respectful, making way for the family walking heavily in the damp sand, and then, one paddle, two paddle, setting to sea under a lowering sky to make Donald Tai Loy Ho one with the ocean he loved.