want some inside scoops? a lot of people don’t know, but Billabong International Ltd. (Australia’s largest surfwear company), was recently trying to sell the company. TPG Capital offered Billabong $906 million to buy it. Billabong said “no thank you.” along with the company’s board, the founder and largest shareholder Gordon Merchant rejected the offer. instead, he chose to wait it out and in the meantime, close 150 of its 677 stores worldwide by june 2013. and they will also cut 400 jobs. they will also sell 51.5% of Nixon watches (owned by Billabong). that means, things are going to get interesting in the near future. if you have a job with Billabong or Nixon, you better work harder! and if your a sponsored rider by Billabong or Nixon, you better get off your ass and start charging big Pipeline and Backdoor. if i was the team manager, i would know exactly who to keep, and who to let go. it’s pretty simple. hawaii is the proving ground and if you can’t prove yourself here, your career won’t go very far. the surfers these days have to work harder for every dollar but that’s a good thing because my generation of pro surfers got it too easy. lucky for me, i took my job seriously.
anyway, the thing that fascinates me is Gordon Merchant owns 14.8% of the stocks for Billabong. want me to do the math? ok, i will. 14.8% of $906 million (73.3 billion yen) is $134 million (10.9 billion yen). Gordon just turned down $134 million dollars!!!! i guess his heart is still in his company because most people would take the money and run. Billabong’s shares reached a record high of $19 a share in 2007. then fell 90% since then. it’s barely worth $4 a share today. and the bummer is that the economy is expected to go even further down.
but this made me think about something. if somebody offered me $1 million to take over Go-Naminori, now way i would sell. there is just too much heart into this website and not even a million dollars is worth it. but $134 million? SOLD! haha. then i would buy my dream boat and take everybody around the world! then my dream will finally come true!!! haha. somebody wake me up! hearing strories like this make me want to work even harder. Ganbaruzo!

This is the Ala Wai Canal NOW!
Heavy rain = Heavy rubbish.
ゴミスゴイ。

where is the line? i’m not talking about the ass crack line, i’m talking about where’s the line of legal and illegal? i saw this girl riding her bike in the day along diamond head road. everything looked ok, until i saw her butt crack. yes, she looked like she was riding her bike naked. i was surprised. surprised, but thought i’d share this so i took out my camera and captured the moment. see that little boy sitting at the corner? he must have been surprised too. even the volkswagon van in the front was driving by slow because he wanted a peak of the action.

as soon as i was going to put away my camera, she stood up and gave me a full moon shot! OMG! i was wondering what the front of the bikini looked like so i sped up and crashed into the red volkswagon van. OMG! haha. i’m just joking. but my question is: “where’s the line? between legal and illegal.” if i rode my bike with a small bikini like that, i’d get arrested for sure. why is it ok for girls? discrimination? don’t get me wrong. i’m not complaining. i’m just wondering what the heck i’m going to see next. Welcome to Hawaii! ENJOY THE MOMENT! haha.