the Bad:
- It's freakin' expensive. For a Saturday night in the Monarch Room, there's a $20,000 food and beverage minumum
- Sometimes I didn't get a reply to my emails for several weeks. I waited to get a quote on my wedding cake from the RH pastry chef. With a $2 cake cutting fee per slice, I wanted to make sure I wasn't going to screw myself by going with an outside vendor
- RH doesn't offer tastings, including cake tastings
- One of the waitstaff jacked my vases! He adamantly told my guests to leave the tall fluted vases because they weren't supposed to bring them home. No one told him that. Not me. Not the banquet managers. The guests were supposed to leave only the mirrors. I spoke to the banquet managers a week after the wedding (I only found this out later) who said they would not like to keep such vases because of their fragility and they would have called me by then to pick them up. So that guy stole my vases and I'm not getting compensated for that.
- Some of the items we agreed to on the final banqet event order were missing such as the sashimi that would have made us meet our minimum

the Good:
- location was amazing
- the food was awesome especially the bread pudding which was to die for
- they apologized for the missing sashimi and didn't penalize us for not meeting our minimum
- they allowed me to bring in my X-rated liquor. The corkage fee was $11/bottle.
- We got a free ocean view night's stay at the RH to be booked over the next year.
- I asked the waitstaff to bring out a couple of trays of appetizers for the bridal party while we were taking pictures. They surprised me with a full mini-buffet for us.
- the staff was readily available and quick to respond to a medical emergency. One of my aunties fainted in the bathroom. I heard they got the Paramedics in right away and helped keep the situation calm. My cousin, a surgical nurse who was there to try and "wake up" my auntie, even wrote a letter of appreciation to the RH for the exceptional service they gave my her. (BTW, my auntie's fine. Apparently, she was very dehydrated due to gastroenteritis, which resolved).

We got the 20-passenger Excursion. With my poofy dress, all of our stuff (see below), we were able to fit 10 bridesmaids and groomsmen, one ringbearer, my 2 grandparents, DH and me quite comfortably. Clean. Professional . On-time. The only complaint was that the A/C at the front wasn't working.

Clean. Professional. On-time. Unbeknownst to us and the bus driver prior to the ceremony, they did a bus switcheroo during the Mass so some guests were missing some items they left on the bus. Fely, our coordinator, picked up their stuff the next day and brought it to the day-after brunch for us.

I was so glad that I hired Kaleo. He sent us a questionnaire asking about how me and DH met, our relationship, our families, and our friends, especially the bridal party and sent another questionnaire for the bridal party to answer about me and DH. I felt he got to know us quite well and it showed. It was like having a close friend as our MC. Being from a local Filipino family and DH from the mainland, my main concern was having a comedian that would either offend my family (my parents are sensitive to that stuff and often turn off the radio when the DJs joke around) or make jokes that people from the mainland wouldn't get. He assured me that none of that was going to happen and, boy, he didn't disappoint. He made everyone laugh and have a great time. He did have a tough crowd though and I think he got a little nervous/perplexed with our "kissing vase." More on that later. Kaleo, however, is incredibly hard to get a hold of. I tried to book him several months in advance. We lost touch but reconnected again a couple months before the wedding. He's so busy. He's booked every single weekend, works morning radio (Island 98.5 w/Lanai and Crystal) , and has tons of other projects. He's so funny. I have no regrets at all with booking him as my MC.

At last minute, my band/DJ fell through and I was left scrambling to find a DJ at last minute. Teley, the owner, met with me and I handed him a CD and lists of all the songs that I wanted them to play. I asked Teley if the DJs he would be sending (I already knew Teley was already booked) could remix and mix-up the songs. Listening to DJs simply play songs with re-mixing the songs is a pet peeve of mine. Anyone can just press play. Anyway, I remember the DJ playing the songs I wanted but I don't remember if they re-mixed and mixed up the songs. Per my guests, they played a bunch of reggae in a row and didn't remix the songs. Since I don't remember being bothered by the music (I'm sure I was just ecstatic and overwhelmed with glee ha ha), I can't say I wouldn't recommend this vendor. Overall, I guess they did a good job. My only regret was not getting more lights as part of the DJ package and not having Teley, the owner, actually there.

I loved our cake topper. We sent a picture of ourselves, my dress, my hair and makeup pics, and described the tux my DH was getting. She created our cake topper to our specifications and catered to our requests of my mini-me with a stethoscope, reflex hammer while DH sported a construction hard hat and hammer. She expedited my order and I received my order within a month. She was quick to respond and a joy to work with. I highly recommend her!

I loved my flowers. As expected though, she was difficult to get a hold of. I made a inspiration board on the web months in advance so that she could understand the vision I had for the wedding. This was much different than what we had originally decided on a year before (at our first and last meeting). She, unfortunately, didn't check this until a week before the wedding. We weren't able to meet but she was able to check the website I made. She was great at working with my budget. I wish I could have worked with her on the budget months in advance so that I could have allocated more money toward flowers and maybe threw in my own reception DIY project in to match the flowers and make the centerpieces e.g. adding crystal strands to hang from the tall centerpieces. Oh well. She worked wonders with the budget I gave her.

I worked with Lorenzo who helped me with my lei selection several times. He helped me pick which leis that would look good and withstand the heat. Affordable. This was the only lei shop I found that would let me order flowers. The rest, including Cindy's below, said that I couldn't pre-order because my wedding fell in graduation season. Watanabe has a similar policy but it so happens that my wedding date was outside of their graduation season. The leis were nice and fresh.

Would I use this vendor again? Yes (actually a hell yeah)


Delicious. Fast. The sushi chef brought extra food because I wasn't sure how many people would show up. He not only gave us the leftovers. He wrapped all the leftovers into sushi. It was a great hit!

Mari Netsu, the special events manager, was a pleasure to work with. She was super sweet and quick to reply. The cake was delicious. However, I swear the cake looked smaller than I expected. I ordered a 4-tier cake, with each layer 6", 9", 12", and 16" with each layer 4-6" in height. Unfortunately, no one had a ruler so I couldn't measure it. The cake arrived late but was set up prior to the start of the reception. Mari said the cake fell on the way to the Royal Hawaiian and they went back to make another cake. I don't know how you can make a cake in that short period of time but whatever. I called a week later to discuss the cake and they gave me a $100 for being late. Mari said the 2nd cake was built according to the specs we agreed on. I asked about my cake topper being decapitated and she didn't know that it fell. She also pointed out that they didn't know that there was going to be cake topper. If they had knew, they would have inserted wooden dowels for more support. I thought that I had mentioned it to her at our meeting but it wasn't written down in the contract.