Ricky Castillo was in second grade when his dad, Mark, took the household on trip to Hawaii.
For the Castillos, the journey had particular which means.
Mark Castillo (pronounced Ca-still-e-o) was round Ricky’s age when he briefly lived in Kauai after his dad and mom, Orlino and Lydia, returned to the island from Southern California to stick with Lydia’s mom within the city of Hanamaulu, close to the Lihue airport. On the west aspect of Kauai sits Kaumakani, the place each Orlino and Lydia labored on sugar cane plantations with their households after immigrating from the Philippines post-World Struggle II.
For Mark and spouse Kim, each academics, it was an opportunity for his or her three youngsters – Derek, the oldest; Ricky, the center baby; and Kelli, the youngest and solely woman – to expertise their hardscrabble roots.
“I simply keep in mind being grateful simply seeing the homes that my grandparents lived in,” Ricky remembered. “They had been rundown. … It wasn’t essentially the most wonderful life. It was type of soiled and previous, however they made it work and labored exhausting for us to get to the place we’re immediately.”
Added Mark in a New York Occasions article in 2020: “I wished our children to see the plantation earlier than they tore down the homes. I wished them to know the individuals who got here earlier than us labored very exhausting so you might have what you may have.”
Ricky Castillo, now 23, finds himself, for the primary time since that household trip, again in Hawaii for this week’s Sony Open on Oahu, the island simply east of westernmost Kauai. It’s not Castillo’s first Tour begin – the previous All-American and Walker Cupper out of the College of Florida performed within the 2020 U.S. Open and final season’s Valspar Championship – but it surely’s his debut as a full-fledged member after graduating from the Korn Ferry Tour final 12 months.
Ricky credit a lot of his golf success to Lydia, who was a relentless presence on the boys’ junior golf tournaments. When Mark and Kim wanted assist funding an costly nationwide schedule, Lydia would deal with the invoice. She’d additionally decide the children up from faculty most days and drop the boys on the golf course to apply till their dad and mom obtained off work.
Lydia Castillo handed away in 2014 at age 71, when Ricky was in center faculty.
“She was tremendous, tremendous influential on my life,” Ricky mentioned. “You already know, unhappy that she just isn’t right here and may’t be right here to observe this. I’m blissful that my first begin goes to have the ability to be out right here in Hawaii and really feel like part of her is at all times with me.”
It often is. When Ricky was 5 years previous, Lydia as soon as introduced a puka-shell necklace again from Hawaii. Whereas the necklace has been changed a number of instances through the years, Ricky has not taken the puka shells off. It’s grow to be his trademark.
“I get some backlash from it at instances,” Ricky mentioned, “however I really like sporting it, and it’s cool that I at all times really feel like she’s proper right here.”
Mark and the household deliberate to fly out Wednesday morning from Yorba Linda to Waialae Nation Membership in Honolulu, the place they’ll reunite with Ricky and Derek, who hopped on his brother’s bag final July, and a few family members who nonetheless stay in Hawaii, together with one in every of Ricky’s uncles.
“There’s a bakery that’s actually near his place, and I’m having him deliver some ensaymadas,” Ricky mentioned, referencing the favored Filipino pastry.
Much more to make him really feel at house.
