Mildred M. Chung

Delivered at Mom's Memorial Service

March 3, 2012

Mildred Matsue Morimoto Chung was born on March 15, 1919 and died on February 16, 2012. Mom was 92 years old. She was the 4th oldest of nine children born to Tatsuji and Koto Morimoto. She is survived by son Ronald, daughter Ember Shinn and sister Jane Midori Watanabe.

On July 25, 1942, mom married dad, Charles Chung. At the time, mixed marriages were frowned upon. I asked mom what her father felt when he returned to Maui after spending 3 years in an internment camp in Santa Fe, New Mexico to find 2 grandchildren. One half Chinese and another half Portuguese. Mom smiled and said, "Father loved his grandchildren". I'm going to miss that smile. I know Jichan loved us because every time he saw us he would say, "Bakatare".

When Jichan and Bachan opened Miyako Sushi in Wailuku, mom went to work at the shop. I used to go to the shop to wait for a ride home with mom. While waiting, Jichan used to stuff me with maki sushi and inari sushi. I didn't realize it then but the sushi would be the best I would ever eat. I remember taking some inari sushi to golf one day. Standing on the tenth tee waiting to tee off, I offered sushi to my playing partners. Two of my partners took the sushi and began eating. They said the sushi was really good. Upon hearing the comment, the other member of our foursome decided to eat sushi also. He looked at me and said, "This is the best sushi I ever ate". Mom continued to make sushi throughout the years.

In 1956 the family moved to Oahu. Mom worked for Easy Appliance, Interior Systems and TV Systems. TV Systems later merged with several other small cable companies to form what is today Oceanic Time Warner Cable. Upon retirement, mom worked as a volunteer at Castle Medical Center until 2001. She was 81 years old. If you visit Castle and walk down the main hallway, you will see a number of plaques on the right wall. There is a plaque for Millie Chung, 5,000 volunteer hours. Mom was volunteer of the month in March 1989.

Mom was a member of Kahului Baptist Church on Maui and later Pali View Baptist Church in Kaneohe. She continued to attend church into her 80's.

In 1947, mom and dad went on a month long trip to Niagara Falls, New York and other places on the east coast. I guess back then it took a long time to travel from place to place. Most of mom's travels with dad and Ember & Alan were in the 1970's and 1980's. Mom did join a tour group to travel to Japan in 1969. I asked mom why she only visited Japan once. She replied, "Yeah, I should have gone more often". This was probably one of her few regrets in life.

Like all Morimotos, mom was a creative person. She enjoyed cooking, sewing and painting. She loved dogs. We always had dogs in the family. Birds, she loved birds. She had parakeets, cockatiels and cockatoos. There was even a bird feeder in the back yard of her Maunawili home. Scrabble was her favorite game. She was so good she was virtually unbeatable. Later in life she enjoyed doing puzzles. I used to go to Shirokiya and buy her beautiful Japanese puzzles of Mt. Fuji, Golden Pavilion, Osaka Castle and girls in kimono. Lucky thing these puzzles were 2,000 pieces and took mom some time to complete, otherwise, I would have had to buy more puzzles and they were really expensive.

Cousin Jerri mentions from time to time that the Morimotos were stubborn. Mom could be really stubborn. After selling her home, mom lived with Ember in Kailua. One day she got into a fight with Ember and jumped into her car and went out. Ember called me and asked if I would go look for mom. I cruised all over Kailua town but couldn't find her car. I waited at Ember;s house for a while before looking for her again. No luck. I returned to Ember's house and began pacing up and down the street waiting for mom. Finally, after 6 or 7 hours, mom drives into the garage. She looked at me and said, "What are you doing here?" I replied that I was concerned about her and was waiting for her to come home. I asked if she was okay. She replied, "I'm fine". I asked her if she was still mad. She said, "I'm still mad!" Mom didn't speak to Ember for days.

In 2007 mom suffered a stroke. She could still read but couldn't spell. With the stroke and developing dementia, mom moved into a studio apartment at Hawaii Kai Retirement Community in April of 2011. She was doing well until a fall in August 2011. Needing more care, mom moved to Palolo Chinese Home. The care was outstanding and she received a lot of attention. About the middle of February 2012, Ember called to inform me that the medical staff determined that maybe mom had about 2 - 4 weeks left to live. In actuality, it was only a few days. I remember visiting dad on the day he died. Dad was hard of hearing and so was mom. Dad had this message board in his room and I wrote on the message board, "I love you, dad and I'm proud of you". I showed him the board and he nodded. When I got home after visiting dad, I received a call from Aloha Care that dad had passed away. I was planning to do the same for mom. I was going to print something in red letters with a big heart and also show mom the collage I was completing. But mom died too soon. So mom, I know you're listening. "I love you very much and you're still, The World's Greatest Mom".