TEDxHonolulu was held today at the historic Hawai’i Theatre in Chinatown. The theme was entitled “Cultivating Community.”

This year, I was a volunteer instead of an attendee. I volunteered from 7am to 6pm. The staging area was across the street at The Arts at Marks Garage. We also brought our officers from our TEDxYouth@Kamehameha student club.

I was assigned to the production crew as a stagehand. My key responsibility was to make sure that Kenny Endo’s taiko drum did not fall off of the hydraulic platform.

Registration was staged outside at the Sun Yat Sen Memorial Park, behind the old Indigo Restaurant.

The event got kick-started with a traditional dragon dance. There was a great lineup of speakers. Unfortunately, I spent most of the time backstage. Fortunately, I got to see the production side of things. The production team was very professional. I also met a lot of nice people. It was interesting to see that accomplished speakers get nervous too.

“Lunch roulette” was a cool concept. Your lunch ticket was good at participating restaurants in the Chinatown area. Each had a choice of three different menu items. I selected HASR Bistro because of its charming courtyard. I had always passed by on my Saturday morning walks. The Pesto Chicken Carbonara was ono.

The highlight for me was seeing our students experience real-world learning. They were awesome! They were also able to collaborate with students from Punahou and ‘Iolani. We are very grateful to have had this opportunity.

The afterparty was held at theVenue at BambuTwo Café and sponsored by Toyota. It was a long, but an extremely worthwhile day.