Miscellaneous

Here's a list of most of the vendors we used for those googlers who may be planning a Hawaii wedding.

Wedding Coordinator: Sugako Johnson (Bliss Bridal) - Sugako was great. She hooked us up with vendors in our price range and made it possible for us to get married only 5 1/2 months after getting engaged, in a location where we didn't live, couldn't visit, and had no contacts. All of our vendors were booked through her and so far we've been satisfied with all of them including the florist, cake supplier, musician, nail salon, makeup artist, limo, mini-bus, audio-visual guy, etc. all of whom we used sight-unseen (the jury is still out on the photographer and videographer since we don't yet have the album or video). Sugako did a lot of extras for us that she didn't have to do such as picking us up at the airport, putting together welcome baskets for our guests' hotel rooms, and booking our rehearsal dinner cruise. She also put up with our difficulty in making decisions and changing our minds many times over.

Videographer: Scott Williams (The Big Picture) - Scott was nice to work with. I can update this later after we get the video.

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Photographer: Randilyn Miyagi (Randi M. Photography) - Randi was also good to work with and the way she posed us made us think she knows what she's doing. We just received a CD with about 900 photos she took, many of which are very good. I can update this after we get the album.

Officiant: Kahu Bruce Ah Leong - Kahu Bruce is a very nice guy and we were glad he performed our ceremony. He's Christian (part Buddhist) but kept the ceremony non-denominational for us. He has fairly strong opinions about how the ceremony should go but if we insisted he relented. For example he thought that for our personal sentiments we should repeat after him. We didn't think that made sense and just said them to each other without him. He also asked me some questions 2 or 3 times because he didn't remember but in the end he was fine.

Sheraton Waikiki - The wedding reception went well and I have no complaints. OK, one small complaint: they wouldn't give us a discounted rate for a hotel room. We would have preferred to stay there but had to cut our budget somewhere and we couldn't justify $250/night. If they would have knocked off $50/night in exchange for us dropping thousands of dollars on the wedding we would have stayed there which would have been nice.

Phil's Tux Shop - I wasn't crazy about Phil. First he had emailed me that he needed my credit card info to hold the tux. Fine. But then he charged it for $75 without informing me. Then when we went in to get fitted he seemed rushed and didn't spend much time with me which I found disconcerting.

Star of Honolulu - We were really happy with our choice of taking the dinner cruise. It was fun, the food was good, the entertainment was good, and the scenery was beautiful.

The Ilikai hotel (Waikiki, Oahu) - We saved about $500 by staying here instead of the Sheraton. I think it was worth it but it definitely was not as fancy and in fact they don't change the linens or towels during the stay (which we knew). The biggest inconvenience was the schlep to the Sheraton.

Kona Seaside Hotel (Kona, Big Island) - Terrible. It was cheap and we got what we paid for. I'm just glad that Yumi booked it and not me.

Inn at Kuliapili (Hilo, Big Island) - The location next to the waterfall can't be beat. The place itself is ok - they cut some corners in the construction (gaps in the baseboards, etc.) but it was fine. As for the owners - I like the husband and disliked the wife. Breakfast was a bonus although we got a bit of attitude because we came down at 9:05 am and breakfast was served 8-9 am (even though it wasn't posted anywhere that I saw).

Kahana Beach Resort (Kahana, Maui) - I thought that this place was fine. Yumi was disappointed. I didn't mind that the bed pulled down from the wall as we had a small kitchen, living room and plenty of space. The location was a bit out of the way.