John Komaru Twelve Years Later

This is a haiku in memory of our friend John on his birthday, December 29.  It has been 12 years since he was taken from us all too soon.

John, you continue to be missed by us all.

Please check out the link below and consider donating to an organization that embodies John's love of fishing.

An Ode to John D. Komaru

Reeling and reeling

all for Rollo's Kids at Sea

to see the beauty

Please consider donating to Captain Rollo's Kids at Sea.

John's Birthday Today...

Happy birthday John.  You didn't miss much this year with football. Basketball is going a little better but the competition will be greater than last year. Bay Bridge new span opened this year and your Mustang was one of the first to make the crossing.

Getting Ready for Cal Basketball

Maybe this will help you Cal Bears fans forget about the awful football loss yesterday at Cal's return to Memorial Stadium...maybe not. Or for others like me, this should help you get ready for the upcoming basketball season.

This was probably one of the top two or three games that John and I ever attended in our 18 seasons or so of attending Cal basketball together, especially so because the comeback was against Stanford. The best part was that the comeback took the entire game to accomplish, which lengthened the suspense even more. Imagine a good novel with the reveal at the very end. Once the comeback started, it wasn't a certainty that the Bears would make it all the way back. It was not like Stanford played poorly. They were just in a boat with a slow leak.

Remembering Uncle John

We visited Uncle John earlier this year.  He was the biggest Cal Bears fan that we knew.  Red flowers are very common at grave sites, but blue ones are not.  So we took some pictures and touched them up just for John.  First here is the untouched picture.

The following are the touched up photos.  Just what did we change?

Go Bears!

This is for you John...

http://www.yahoosportsradio.com/shows/rivals/jeff-tedford-7229/

One Year Later...

It has been exactly one year today now since our dear friend John Komaru passed on. Life has gone on, but certainly it has been different without him. We still think about him often and from time-to-time his name will come up in conversation.

One of his colleagues yesterday at John's former engineering firm sent out a very nice email. The email simply stated "All – just take a moment today to remember John Komaru. His unfortunate death a year ago tomorrow was a shock to us all. I still think about the good times we had on the 237/880 project and how John brought so much to our team. He was a good friend to us all and a skilled professional." ~ Jack Tone

In another recent conversation, we were talking about our backgrounds. One person mentioned that she is now a chief deputy in her agency but does not have a college degree. She was able to get to where she is because of a unique state program to train people who have no formal engineering education to become engineers. I shared John's story with the group. His undergraduate degree was also not engineering related, but he did graduate work in an engineering field. John persisted to pass the Engineer-in-Training test, which admittedly is probably the harder exam because it covers subjects spanning a wider range. Following this he sat for and passed the professional civil engineers exam. I always greatly admired John for this achievement.

I understand that John was also remembered at the Institute of Transportation Engineers conference that was held last week in Anchorage, Alaska.

Over the Memorial Day weekend, we were able to visit John at his resting place. Here are a few photos from our visit.











The following are places where donations can be made in John's memory:

Cal Opportunity Scholarship
http://students.berkeley.edu/finaid/home/donate.htm

Friends of Rollo
http://www.friendsofrollo.com/

American Heart Association
http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/

BAFFLE 2011

This was the 20th year for BAFFLE, the Bay Area Fantasy Football League for Engineers. This is longer than the run that "Cats" had on Broadway. According to one site, the year that we started BAFFLE in 1991 was also the start of the modern Internet with a user friendly interface. Our initial foray into fantasy sports was decidedly user unfriendly to a certain extent.

We would pore over the sports section of papers on Monday mornings to try to estimate how our teams had fared over the weekend. We got pretty good at quickly perusing the box scores to estimate what we needed in the Monday night game to win or lose if we were so fortunate to still have players going. Tuesday was the big day if we were lucky enough to be able to download the official stats from the service that we used. I say lucky enough because the stats came over a dial-up connection to the one computer in our office that had a connection to the world wide web. It would take what now seems like hours to get the entire week's stats downloaded. Then there was the chore of printing copies of the results for all of the team owners. This was made possible by the efforts of our initial league commissioner, Eric Eby.

This year of BAFFLE was the first without our dear friend John Komaru. John was one of the original team owners in our league. That first year for some reason he and Mark Spencer decided to be co-owners. I remember them bickering like an old married couple during our first draft on which player to pick.

"I think we should pick this guy."

"No, I don't like that. We already have enough running backs."

I think they had Jim Kelly as their quarterback that first year. Kelly was a top quarterback with the Bills in the midst of their run of four straight Super Bowls. John and Mark came close to winning that first year, but lost out in the end to Bill Dietrich.

Two years ago, John, Mike and I were the only remaining team owners to never win in 18 years. As it turned out, Mike and John made the finals in year 19. Mike won. So John and I talked about one of us having to win in year 20. Although neither of us won this year, we wanted to make it so that John's name would be on The Eby, our BAFFLE champion's trophy.

The Eby


Here's a closer view of the lower righthand corner of The Eby. The picture is slightly blurry but it says:

Dedicated to the memory of

JOHN KOMARU
1962-2010

Go Cal Bears!



Finally, for those of you who might be interested here's this year's presentation by last year's winner to this year's winner, Peter Dwyer, yet another first time winner. There's always next year for the rest of us.



Peter mentioned that he was going to be donating his winnings this year in John's memory. If you're still interested in doing likewise, the following are the donation options designated by his family:

Cal Opportunity Scholarship
http://students.berkeley.edu/finaid/home/donate.htm

Friends of Rollo
http://www.friendsofrollo.com/

American Heart Association
http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/

The Bear Man

John, this photo is for you.



The rest of the story...

When John and I first started going to Cal basketball games back in about 1990, we noticed the man in the picture above. He sat near us and attended nearly every game like we did. He almost aways wore the same outfit as he is wearing in the above photo. Before the start of the game and halftime, without fail he would stand or sit and read his newspaper.

Then at one point we stopped seeing him. John and I would look for him, but to no avail. So we made a bet. The first one who got definitive proof of the Bear Man would be owed a dinner. The photo above was taken at the Cal women's NIT championship game earlier this year. I told John about this, but never got a chance to show him the photo.

Here's a photo of the Bear Man reading his paper.

Eulogy from John's Service

The following is the eulogy given by John's college roommate, Geary Chun.

Childhood:
John was born in Los Angeles on December 29, 1962. He was the youngest of 3 children born to Haruso (or Harpy as he was known to his friends) and Gladys Komaru. John had two older sisters: Karrie and Leslie Komaru. Their family was always close and enjoyed many activities together. Karrie and Leslie remember taking family vacations every summer which included road trips to Las Vegas, San Mateo and Denver.

John was a collector and hobbyist from a young age. He loved collecting comic books and would seek out the rarest ones he could find. He had 3 or 4 aquariums filled with fish of all kinds and an endless number of pets including dogs, cats, turtles, mice and even a salamander.

John learned to love sports from his dad. They would often spend their weekends together watching football, basketball and baseball games. And they, along with sister Leslie, frequently attended USC football games, as it was their dad’s alma mater.
In High School, John was a member of the football team and his family would regularly attend his Saturday games. During that time, John also began his punk rocker phase and turned Leslie into a lover of the music too. Together they would head to Melrose Avenue where they could find their favorite music albums along with the clothes and culture of the punk rock era.
After graduating from Loyola High School in 1981, John attended El Camino City College. It gave him time to pursue his many passions and to hang out with his two best friends from high school. It also gave him time to think about the future and to decide what to do next.

Much to his family’s surprise, John decided to attend UC Berkeley instead of hometown favorite, USC. Leslie says it was the best decision he ever made.

College:
John spent the next 5 years attending Cal where he earned his Bachelor’s degree in City Planning in 1986 and his Master’s in Transportation Engineering in 1988. In those 5 years, John became a die-hard Golden Bear fan with season tickets to both football and basketball.

Professional:
In 1988, John began his career as a traffic and civil engineer. According to his friend Kevin, he really enjoyed solving traffic problems and working closely with others on his team. John has been described by his supervisors as technically one of the best they have ever worked with. He was one of the most respected professionals in his field by virtue of his professionalism, technical ability, and uncanny knack for making those around him feel good about themselves.

In 2005 John requested a job transfer and moved from Oakland to San Diego. The move brought him closer to some of his favorite fishing spots and closer to his dad whose health had been declining. On weekends, John would drive from San Diego to Los Angeles to be with his dad and to visit with his sisters. Together he and his dad would watch all of their favorite sports, just as they had always done when John was growing up.

After the death of his father, John moved back to Oakland in 2009 where he soon re-connected with his many Bay Area friends.

Personal remembrances:
My name is Geary Chun. I met John in college when we were both 20 years old. We became friends almost instantly and were roommates for 3.5 years. And although it’s been about 20 years since I moved from California to Hawaii, John and I remained close friends.

I’ve spoken and exchanged emails with several of John’s friends since we heard the terrible news. We shared some stories about the good old days and wrote down some thoughts about what made John special to us. And now I’d like to share some of them with you.

The Big Kid - Cars
When you come right down to it, John was just a big, overgrown, 47-year old kid. Forget the fancy degrees and prestigious job. John was a teddy bear on steroids. And John loved what all boys love: Cars, sports, fishing, gambling, eating, drinking and hanging out with friends. Most guys might indulge in their hobbies from time to time; maybe the occasional fishing trip; perhaps an old car to tinker with now and then. Not John.

John had more cars sitting around at his house than I think I’ve had in my entire life! According to his friend Ron, John would have had more but he’d run out of places to park them. John didn’t just sort of like cars, he was passionate about them; he loved any type of performance vehicle or 60’s era muscle car. John has owned 12 or more cars and trucks since he left college, some of these included: a Hurst Oldsmobile, a 65 Mustang, and two 65 Chevy Novas. Although John had his pick of these classic cars to drive, he always had what he called a “beater” to drive to work or just beat around in. One time his beater was stolen. It was later found with parts missing, but John still drove it using a screw driver to start the car and open the trunk.

John loved to go to car shows, auto swap meets and junkyards. His trips to the junk yards started out as a need to find cheap parts for his cars. Later it turned into a time to relax or a getaway from the daily stress of work. He was always looking for some “treasure” or special part to use on his cars; or maybe something just to keep, in case he might need it in the future. John didn’t mind getting a little greasy either. One day John and Ron were in a junkyard and had split up, each looking for treasures. John came back to Ron with a little grease and one of those “John smiles” on his face. John asked him, “Do I look Mexican”!!! Ron replied “no, well maybe just a little, why”. John’s reply was, “this guy just came up to me and started talking to me in Spanish, just like I should know what he was saying”. John said that he and the man made a few gestures at each other and then he let the man use a tool that he needed. John was always willing to help other people, even if he couldn’t understand what they were saying.

The Big Kid – Fishing
John’s love of fishing began as a boy growing up in Los Angeles. John spent many hours fishing at the Redondo Pier, hoping to catch some Bonito or some White Sea Bass.

He didn’t have much time to pursue this hobby in college but his passion for it was rekindled when he met Mark Aikawa at the Centennial Engineering firm. They became good friends and soon John was a part of Mark’s fishing fraternity. John enjoyed fishing on the San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean catching Salmon, Striped Bass, Halibut and Rockfish.

Soon after, John started going Long Range fishing on the Royal Polaris out of San Diego. He was immediately hooked for life. This really started a new adventure for John. It was now about catching Yellowfin Tuna, Blue Fin Tuna, Albacore, and Yellowtail. He met many new friends while going on 5-, 8-, and even 21-day fishing trips. And many of those friends are here today. As the trips got longer and the fish he was chasing got bigger, John’s house began to resemble a fishing tackle store. But that didn’t prevent Mark, Leroy and John from making frequent trips to the “Rod Rack” in Hayward. The three of them would go there even if they didn’t need to buy anything, but just hang out with other fisherman.

John had some great expressions when he was fishing. When he didn’t get a bite or wasn’t catching any fish, his lower lip would come out and that pouty face we all know would appear. When John was getting a bite, you could see his face light up with joy. When the fishing was slow and no one was catching anything, John could be heard telling stories. One day while John was telling stories and he wasn’t paying attention to his fishing line, someone tied a pair of pliers to John’s hook. Minutes later when John was winding his line in, you should have seen the look on his face when the pliers appeared at the end of his line. Everyone was laughing, even John.

John’s fishing adventures took him to Clipperton Atoll, which is a 6-day boat ride from San Diego. There John had a chance to catch his first 200 pound Yellowfin Tuna. John hooked a big one, but unfortunately the fish broke the line and got away. Of course, John was upset, but he did manage to become a proud member of the 100-lb club by landing his first big yellowfin tuna.

He returned to San Diego without the elusive 200 pounder, but was more determined than ever to catch one the next time. That summer, Mark went on a 5-day fishing trip and caught a 135 pound Blue fin tuna and got in the club too! Mark said he knew John was happy for him, but also knew that John was a little perturbed since it only took him a 5-day trip to join the club while it had cost John thousands of dollars more. Once again, the lower lip appeared. But, not to be outdone, John caught two Yellowfin Tuna of over 200 pounds. He was in heaven for he was now in the 200-lb club.

The Big Kid - Sports
As you all know, John was a sports fanatic. He grew up as a big fan of the Angels , Cowboys, Lakers.

In college, John always played on our intramural sports teams. And at work, he was also a regular on his company’s softball team. John loved playing so much that he kept playing even when the younger guys started ribbing him about his age. When he was working in San Diego, a few years ago, he proudly told me that none of the young guys could believe how old he was. They wanted to know what year he graduated from High School and couldn’t believe he was a dinosaur from the 80’s! John did look pretty young; with his black slicked-back hair and always fashionable work clothes. But I think that they were really commenting on the excitement and joy he brought to something as simple as a softball game.

But the thing I’ll remember most about John was his passion for his Golden Bears! It didn’t matter to John if the football and basketball teams were good or bad. And when John arrived at Cal in 1983, they were pretty bad. The Cal football team had been to just one bowl game in the last 25 years. And the basketball team hadn’t been to an NCAA Tournament since 1960.
But John was the eternal optimist. He’d pour through the Cal media guides looking up info on his favorite players and the latest crop of recruits. He’d refer to them by their jersey numbers as if everyone would know exactly who he was talking about.

John sent me copies of the Cal football media guide every year until it became available for free on the internet. I think it was so he’d have someone else to rant and rave about his beloved bears with. He always talked about how this year was finally going to be Cal’s year. With John, every year was going to be “the year” for something.

Last football season, John was convinced that this time, it really was Cal’s year. They were going to the Rose Bowl. They had Heisman Trophy candidate Jahvid Best coming back for his junior year. And of course, they had Coach Tedford who had saved Cal after years of mediocrity. Tedford had paid his dues and this was finally his year. This was our year!

John emailed me to see if I might be interested in travelling with him to an Away game. You see, John was kind of hoping to go to ALL OF THE AWAY GAMES! Of course, as all Cal fans know, the wheels fell off of Cal’s Rose Bowl hopes early in the season. Cal got thrashed in their first two PAC-10 games by Oregon and USC. They lost by scores of 42-3 and 30-3.

For John, it was just a minor setback. He called me about a month ago with exciting news: “Hey Geary, this is going to be Cal’s year. USC’s on probation cuz of Reggie Bush. This will be the year! Or maybe it’ll be next year. But it better be soon! USC’s bowl ban only lasts two years”

John and I had planned to go to the Cal vs. Nevada game in Reno in September. It was the perfect combo. Sports and Gambling! To be honest, they don’t look so great this year. They might even lose the Nevada game. But John would have been rooting for them loudly, celebrating every great play and complaining about every bad call. And he’d be having the time of his life. Win or lose.

How to describe John?

John’s sports and hobbies were a big part of his life. It brought him so much joy and it was a gift that he could share with his friends. But, to me, it didn’t define who John was as a person.

I talked to several friends. None of us could easily sum up who John was but we all used the same adjectives to describe him. We might have chosen adjectives like smart and professional; or competitive and hard-working. John was all of those things and more. But the ones that first came to mind, the ones that really mattered were: playful and enthusiastic; kind and considerate; good-natured and generous.

Enthusiastic

Our friend Kelly wrote to me and she said:

- It's hard to describe John. You know how some people light up a room when they walk in? When I remember John from our college days, I think about how he was one of those people that would warm up the room when he walked in. He had a shy, understated way about him that, combined with his big smile and passionate talk about "boy hobbies", made you feel like you should maybe take a second look at car engines and fish guts.

I loved the way John described things too. Things weren’t good. They were awesome! If it were a restaurant, John would say something like “Hey Geary, I know this great place! They make this awesome [whatever it was]. I’ll take you there next time!” So the next time we’d go there. And the thing was, it really didn’t matter if it was good or just okay. It might have been a greasy Tommy Burger down in LA, which is just okay; or maybe a slice of Zachary’s deep dish pizza which actually is really awesome.

But the point is: if John said it was awesome, you believed it. How could you not when he got so excited about it?

Smiles and Laughter
Lots of friends reminisced about John's funny side. One time he and our roommate Wayne played a prank on CeCe and Ann, the neighbors below us in our apartment building. They lowered a weight over our balcony and used it to knock on the girls’ window pane while laughing loudly at their shrieks and screams. Another roommate, Paul, reminded me about the time we broke into our friends’ apartment and added food coloring to all of their food. In fact, John and Paul liked it so much that they started putting food coloring in our own food.

Wayne remembers John teasing me about my hair. He said that when I woke up in the morning it looked like the hair from one of those troll dolls that were popular in the 70’s. You know, the kind with the bushy hair that sticks out in all directions. But as you can see, that was a long, long time ago!

Of course, John was never malicious with his pranks or teasing. He’d always have a big smile on his face. Sometimes it was sly and mischievous, but it was always genuine.

Always had time for a friend
We all remembered how generous John was with his time. Our friend Carol reminded me that John had this old beat up Datsun pickup truck when we were in college. In those days, he was one of the few people we knew with a vehicle. Every week he would come by the apartments and one or two people from each apartment would climb into the back of the truck and he’d take everyone to do their grocery shopping.

John’s truck was our sole source of transportation for many years. We’d all pile in and John would drive us over to Fenton’s for ice cream; or to haul supplies for our annual Luau; or even to go down to Stanford for the Big Game. John was always willing to help. Anytime a friend was moving apartments, John was the first one there.

Over the years, John has helped me in so many ways. When I was planning to attend grad school at UCLA, John drove down to help me find my first apartment there. When I needed a better wardrobe, he’d take me shopping at Nordstoms. When I got married, he stood by me as a groomsman. And when I had kids he’d always remember to buy them little footballs or t-shirts or jerseys.

We weren’t able to get together as often as we would have liked. We weren’t great at exchanging emails and rarely spoke on the phone. But that never changed our friendship. I always knew that the next time I’d see John, we’d pick up right where we had left off.

The kind of person that you hope your kids will grow up to be like

I can’t pinpoint what it was, but there was always something about John that drew people in. You wanted to get to know him. You wanted to be his friend. And I think it’s because you just knew that you’d be a better person for having John as a part of your life. I’ve always considered John one of the finest people I’ve ever known. He was the kind of person that I hope my kids will grow up to be like someday.

John lived his life to the fullest. On the day of his passing, John had just returned from a 5-day fishing trip, still basking in the simple pleasure that it brought him. That’s the John I’ll always remember.

We will mourn John’s passing today and for many more days to come. But we should also remember to take time to celebrate his life. And we should remind ourselves how lucky we all were to have been a part of it.

In Memory of John Komaru

Our dear friend John passed away on July 16, having just returned from a weeklong fishing trip.

We will remember him for his smile (he always had a smile no matter what), for his passion for all things Cal (most know about his passion for Cal football and basketball, but he was a huge supporter of all things Cal), and for his ability to see humor in the smallest snippets of life.

He was taken from us much too early and we will all miss him tremendously.

The slide show includes photos also provided by Ron Freeman. If you have any photos to share, please do so and I'll add them to the slide show.

Cal Basketball Game

We made it a family affair this past weekend when the Cal Bears played the Princeton Tigers. The Bears won the game rather handily, but perhaps the highlight for our kids was seeing a couple of their Ygnacio Wood Seahorses swimming coaches (current Coaches Brian and Anna and former Coach Matt) at the game. It turns out Anna's brother is a starting guard on the Princeton team. So naturally his family and friends were in attendance in number under the name "The Marcus Fan Club."

After the game, we went courtside to say hello to Anna because we saw her sitting courtside during the game. That's Anna on the left in the photo below.



Back to the game. We had two tickets because Uncle John was not attending. Then when we were buying our tickets we scored a freebie so we only had to buy two tickets. What a deal!

Here's a photo after the game from near where we sit. It shortly after this photo that we turned around and Ryan was flying down to the court to say "hello."



Here are a couple more photos from the game.