 Hi, I'm Rusty Kamori and this is Beyond the Lines. We are broadcasting live from the beautiful Think Tech Hawaii TV studio in the Pioneer Plaza in downtown Honolulu. This show is based on my book which is also titled Beyond the Lines and it's about leadership, creating a superior culture of excellence and finding greatness. My special guest today is the general manager of the very popular local boutique swimwear stores, a former member of the French Airborne Forces and he is the consul of France in Hawaii. He is Guillaume Maman and today we are going beyond France. Guillaume, great to have you here today. Thank you very much for inviting me, we've been talking a lot about that. I'm very pleased to be here today and we had a lot of impressive guests so I'm honored that you asked me to come. You're very impressive and I love when I see you working out at the Honolulu Club because you inspire me to do more weight or extra sets. Well that's good, you inspire me as well. The coach Rusty is here so I've got to make sure that I do my best and you're right that I do start my day every day at the Honolulu Club and it's very good because it helps me build discipline and it takes me out of bed. I wake up early in the morning, make sure that I get all my exercise before I go to work. It sets the day for an energetic and fun day. We love Honolulu Club. We do and we have all our friends, you know it's not only, we don't only go there to work out which is definitely the number one priority we have but it's like Cheers where everybody knows your name, we talk to people, we tend to network a little bit, it's always fun to see you, we joke around and we work out. Guillaume, how was it for you growing up in France? Very good, I would say, I come from a normal, you know, a regular family in France, I was very fortunate to have a good family core, great education, I always talk very highly about the French education, high school and college, I did a lot of sports because I've always enjoyed it, swimming, judo, I know soccer is very big, I didn't play much soccer but always very active. Okay now, I've never been to France yet but I want to go. When I go, where do I need to go when I'm in France? That's a wonderful question. First of all I'm very biased because I'm from Paris, I'm a many generation Parisian so I absolutely love Paris, I think Paris is one of the most beautiful, exciting city in the world. I was fortunate to travel a lot around the world and of course I love Hawaii, I would never live anywhere else than Hawaii but I have to say Paris is very exciting so please stop in Paris, you'll enjoy it tremendously, if you like good food I always say you cannot have a bad meal in Paris, wherever you go. But there are so many other things too, that's what I love about France, the Monsaint Michel which is a beautiful UNESCO site to visit of course, if you like skiing I think the out, the Savoie region is gorgeous and of course you heard of Provence and the French Riviera where Cannes, Nice, Saint-Tropez, Monaco is actually I'll be there in a couple of months so so many places to go. Next time you go, if you go please let me know and I'll make sure I'll set you up for a good trip. Oh I'm going to let you know Guillaume. Now you're also a member of the French Airborne Forces. Correct, that's part of my life that I truly enjoyed so I was there in 1985 and you have to volunteer to be in the French Airborne Forces so what we say we have to sign and so I did my time there, it was truly a great experience for me and I always talk very highly about it because I learned a lot and once again I love sports, I love jumping out of airplanes believe it or not, I always remind people 72 times out of my life I took off with an airplane but I didn't land with it, I was impatient, I got it early and when I said 72 is actually very unusual because most during your service you do about six jumps a year I was able to do a sports training that allow me to do much more during my service. I was very excited about that, it's something that I really enjoyed. So what's the best and worst part of being in the Airborne Forces? The worst part is that you don't sleep much and there's a tremendous amount of training and you're really really stuck, you can't go much anywhere especially during training it is gruesome but it's interesting because although it's the worst part it's the best part also, I truly enjoy the athletic part of it, the camaraderie that you develop with your fellow teammates, etc. As a matter of fact I have several of them, still very good friends of mine, we communicate on a regular basis, social media, etc, etc. and it was also a very active lifestyle and as you know I really enjoy that and I have to say jumping out of airplane, I love it, it's a fantastic experience, not the first one, the first one is scary. Guillaume, what is there anything that you fear? I fear many things Rusty, I think it will be a foolish not to fear many things but no longer jumping out of airplane, I'm hopeful my parachute will open but I have to tell you the first one, I always say that is very scary because your body reacts automatically as what are you doing, what is wrong with you, don't jump out of a perfectly good airplane, once you do it it's a fantastic experience, I recommend everybody to do that. So how did you end up coming to Hawaii? Very good question, I came here in 1987, October and I came here and it's pretty cold in Paris in October and I came here for three weeks, I didn't have much money in my pocket because I wanted to windsurf, one of my dream was perhaps to become a professional windsurfer, I windsurfed a lot of France, I studied in the south of France, I was able to windsurf there and I fell in love with the islands, the ocean truly brought me here, I fell in love with the ocean, I fell in love with the beauty of Hawaii and after a while it's actually the people of Hawaii that kept me here, I was able to meet the person that I married, we had our children, so I stayed here, I started to work in Hawaii and so 1987, that's many many years ago, 32 years ago and I'm so grateful that I made that decision, that was a challenging decision to stay here, to live away from your family, my entire family stayed in France, I did not speak the language at all so that was difficult but truly a decision that not only I don't regret but every time I go to Lanikai, which is in our background right here, I'm very thankful that I made the right decision. And you have two sons, and what are they doing now? Yes, I have two sons, which is interesting, so my two sons were born in Hawaii but at an early age they went to a boarding school in France and that was kind of the deal, they went to a boarding school that's near a surf spot, so we send them actually in the long region, so they studied, they went to high school in France and then they came back here to go to college, both sons went to UH, my oldest son graduated from UH and is still studying, he's a very serious studious gentleman, he's 28 years old, I'm very proud of him, he is studying environmental engineering, so hopefully he will get his degree soon, my youngest son, I'm also extremely proud of him, I came back to Hawaii studied a little bit in Hawaii and then moved to San Luis Obispo whereas now he is the technical director of a theater there and he absolutely loves what he's doing there's also a big wine region in San Luis Obispo so he's surrounded by... We love wine! We love wine! French people love wine in general, yes we do. So I'm very proud of my two sons, they've been a tremendous source of inspiration actually for me and so I sent them to France, I think that's a good question because I wanted to make sure that they have American culture, Hawaiian culture because that was important to them, but also French culture they were able not just to speak but to understand the culture and the spirit of France that is very dear to me so it was also a challenge for them but once again I think that was a very wise decision. It's great to experience that. One thing that I did with my sons very early and people to do that is I only spoke to them in French at the beginning of their life so with mom you use those words in English with dad you use those words in French and when you're young your brain develops you don't realize there are two languages and so that's how they were able to be bilingual extremely fast and I'm hoping that we'll serve them well in their life. That's the secret, huh? And then how did you end up meeting your wife Teresa? So Teresa it's interesting I've known her for quite a long time and I understand you've known her for quite a long time too and wonderful lady very much very much happy with the decision that we made to be together I met Teresa quite a long time ago she used to work for my best friend who was a senator at the time and so I used to visit him at the Senate at his office and she didn't care much for me actually 20 years ago I've got to be honest with you she used to tell my friend maybe you should hang around this guy I'm not so sure but we got to know each other better and of course we fell in love and so we'd be together for almost 10 years we got married in Paris it was a wonderful celebration with my family we actually had some dancers that did hula for us so we were able to integrate both cultures Parisian culture and dancers from Halao here in Manoa actually and they have a school in Paris so we were able to do a wonderful ceremony but yeah I've known Teresa for quite a long time and we're very happy she's a wonderful wonderful lady we're above my league You guys are absolutely perfect together so the Honorary Council of France in Hawaii yes yes so that happened about a little more than 4 years ago actually more than 5 years ago I was approached by the Honorary Council at the time there's an age where they need to retire so she contacted me and asked me if I wanted to take over I was very honored to get that phone call it took me a little bit of time because I wanted to study and make sure that I don't take on a duty I'm not going to be able to do the right thing so I studied a little bit it took 9 to 10 months of checking because you have to do an interview with the French government then it goes to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs then you have to be vetted of course by the State Department because they give you credentials you become basically a diplomat here in the State of Hawaii so I accepted the position and after 9 months I became the Honorary Council it's a tremendous honor and truly a great pleasure I do that with great fun for the love of my country and for the love of the people here that I serve we have about 3,000 residents here in Hawaii French residents in the entire State of Hawaii it's hard to determine the exact number because people move in and out they don't all register at my consulate and we have about 24,000 visitors every year so quite a lot of people actually come through Hawaii so we have to deal with a lot of people what are your responsibilities as the consulate? if I have to define it in one sentence it's basically to fulfill the mission of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in France when I first started it was called Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Economic Development which is called the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs which is basically the equivalent of the State Department in France so fulfill their mission, their diplomatic mission to represent France but mostly to promote and protect the interests of France within the State of Hawaii what it means is helping a French citizen whether they reside here or they are visitors and helping them and protect them in many ways if they get hurt if they get arrested if there's a national disaster it's our role actually to make sure that we guide them and receive tremendous training in terms of that if there's an earthquake when we had for example some problems in the big island with the volcano fortunately it was not as bad as the media showed it but of course there was some concern in Paris so they were contacting me and saying what can we do to protect the French citizen and also to protect and then promote the interests of France so we here to help also with the interest of French citizens here French businesses that want to get implanted here in Hawaii a lot of people don't realize but the biggest bank in Hawaii is French the biggest retail company is French I mean First of Wine Bank is owned by BNP I realize that at the moment they're trying to separate slowly themselves I think they're selling their shares but it's a big part of Hawaii of the business environment and then DFS is part of LVMH I'm not saying that have a lot of input in that but I'm saying that there's definitely interest of French businesses in Hawaii and there's vice versa we help a lot with local businesses that would like to do business in France and also in French Polynesia New Caledonia not very far from here because we have a little bit of the same environment and then of course a major part of my work is help with administrative affairs for French citizens here whether we issue passports, passes and that of course it's in coordination with the consulate general of France in San Francisco we're very very closely with them I don't print passports, I don't issue them but we do all the papers to make sure that we do that and then I'm able also to certify certain signatures for important documents not all of them but we have a certain amount of paper that we can do so we serve a little bit as the notary public for all of their documents you do so many things I think it's a win-win situation but we're so lucky to have someone like you here and we're going to take a quick break and then when we come back we're going to continue going beyond France very good, thank you you are watching Beyond the Lines on Think Tech Hawaii with my special guest Guillaume Maman we will be back in 60 seconds Aloha, I'm Gwen Harris the host here at Think Tech Hawaii a digital media company serving the people of Hawaii we provide a video platform for citizen journalists to raise public awareness in Hawaii a non-profit that depends on the generosity of the supporters to keep on going we'd be grateful if you'd go to thinktechawaii.com and make a donation to support us now thanks so much Aloha, my name is Andrew Lanning I'm the host of Security Matters Hawaii airing every Wednesday here on Think Tech Hawaii live from the studios I'll bring you guests, I'll bring you information about the things in security that matter to keeping you safe your co-workers safe, your family safe keep our community safe we want to teach you about those things in our industry that may be a little outside of your experience so please join me because security matters, Aloha welcome back to Beyond the Lines on Think Tech Hawaii my special guest today is Guillaume Maman who is the general manager of the very popular local boutique swimwear stores a former member of the French Airborne Forces and he is the consul of France in Hawaii and today we are going beyond France Guillaume, you are also the general manager of local boutique how did that come about? that's been about 23 years now I joined in 1996 local boutique was created in 1978 and I was fortunate to join in 1996 and we've developed stores in Hawaii Guaume, Saipan, Japan, Korea, Las Vegas so quite a wide network of stores that we've developed the last 23 years some are still open of course some we closed for example in Las Vegas Okinawa also we had one and then we have seasonal stores also in Japan that opened mostly during the summer we understand selling bathing suits in the winter can sometimes be a challenge so we do have a store worldwide I'm sorry all year long in Japan and then we have seasonal stores in Japan and you guys are also a big sponsor for the Miss Hawaii USA pageant yes why did you guys decide to be a big sponsor there? well I thought it was a natural partnership the director of the pageant that well contacted us and we worked in a great partnership with them we sponsored the Miss Hawaii USA and the Miss Teen USA with our swimsuit I think it's the perfect partnership everything is made here in Hawaii it's designed, cut, printed sent to our stores from our location in Hawaii so we thought it was a perfect way to partner and be a Hawaii manufacturer sponsoring Miss Hawaii USA it's great and they all seem to love it you've seen a lot of the young women develop through the years getting more growth, more confidence what do you see the development from these girls in your experience? I think it's a very good question because people think it's just a beauty contest and it's not I think it helps so much more in the development of their confidence of their personality I learned it from Teresa who is a former Miss Hawaii International who is a Miss Aloha Maui, etc and I can see that it helps develop their confidence I see many former Miss Hawaii, Miss Hawaii USA Miss Hawaii International, etc excel in the business world at this moment and because I can see that it helped them build their character, their personality it's not easy to walk in a catwalk in front of many people on TV and to answer all those questions that are tough questions sometimes I wouldn't want to be asked those questions so I actually think it truly goes beyond a beauty contest and that's not the part that we like one thing that that's not the only part that we like the beauty part one thing that we do also with Miss Hawaii USA and Miss Teen is that they also have a contract with us tomorrow for one year so we work with them we do some photoshoots able to have their pictures in our stores very recognizable everybody here in Hawaii as you know know who Miss Hawaii USA is Miss Teen USA is we did shows in Tokyo actually we took a former Miss Hawaii USA and we had about 30,000 people watching the show Girls Awards so it's a good partnership we're very happy we hope to continue for many years I'm sure it's definitely a win-win situation Guillaume you're such a positive person and you're such a great leader and you are a big supporter of my book I mean you bought a bunch of my books what do you like about Beyond the Line you know I gotta say first of all I'm gonna start with you obviously because you have been a great source of inspiration for me your show is number one you're doing outstanding you've always been tremendously positive every time I see you you're always very positive so it shows truly in your success then I was able about a year ago when you published your book I was fortunate to be one of the hopefully the first one to purchase your book I read it and it but I learned so much about you're talking about building character you're talking about the character for champion and you're talking about like the title says Beyond the Line thinking outside the box in order to help you inside the box and so I got a lot out of that I think you have been a tremendous source of inspiration for me and I know for many many business people in the business community here in Hawaii so I'd like to thank you I'm glad I'm coming here for the inspiration that you gave us well thank you Guillaume now you're a great leader what do you think the greatest leaders do one word inspire I think to me I always it's important to follow a leader that inspired and if you look in history most of the leaders whether they're head of states or military leaders I'm a big fan of Marquis de la Fayette famous battle of 1781 at Yorktown that defined America we are now on a great admirer of naponians and I think those leaders were able to inspire their people if you talk about naponians it's not easy to walk to Russia fight Russian army British army etc etc and then walk back you've got to be an inspiring person to do that and so to answer your question I think the number one quality is to inspire you too I love hearing that and you can only inspire them but it's up to them to really motivate themselves now what is what's been like the biggest challenge in your life that you have to overcome well interesting fact to remember the biggest challenge was probably coming here in 1987 not speaking the language and I was a little bit lost it was you know I came here just for three weeks I was supposed to come Windsurf take some pictures perhaps for some potential sponsors you know and then come back and so when I started liking it I said I'm going to stay a little longer then I met many friends I decided to stay and then I realized well I might have to make my life here and so that was a challenge because I left my family you know in France they were very supportive by the way I'm very glad that they said you know do whatever is the best for you and so learning language and starting a new life will offer I think that was perhaps one of the biggest challenges but it's good I welcome challenges and I tell you why Rusty because interesting you asked me what my biggest challenge although that was my biggest challenge it also was the best decision I've taken so sometimes a tough hurdle if you're able to go over it is going to be your biggest achievement I totally agree with you and what do you think Guillaume is your like a lesson that you've learned in your life that really impacted you you know I have an experience in my life that I think impacted me and I always think about it I think it was in the early 90s I was actually a young businessman I tried to open our own company it was a virtual reality company it was not doing well at all and I remember I was completely out of money I invested everything in it it was not doing well I remember being very depressed on a Sunday night and you know Sunday that's when the newspaper comes at the time it was the advertiser I looked at an ad it was a side ad for a vice president for a company and I responded to the ad I was called on Monday I was hired on Tuesday on Friday actually on Thursday I was sent on a trip all over Asia 18 different country and I landed in Hong Kong I've never been to Hong Kong and I stayed at the Mandarin Oriental at the time they sent you a beautiful car it was like a stretched Mercedes and I was in my early 20s and they served you champagne and I remember thinking a week ago I was completely depressed and didn't know what's going to happen with my life and now here I am drinking champagne like a millionaire I was not a millionaire by the way but drinking champagne going to a great hotel meeting some new people starting a new adventure traveling in a place that I've always wanted to visit so actually it was a tough but good lesson knowing that and I always remember that word the darkest hour is the one preceding dawn and so when you in your darkest hour look at the light look at the bright the bright side I relate to a windsurfing also when you windsurf in big waves and you get washed in the water one of the trick to know is open your eyes in the water and make sure that you go towards the sunlight not down so make sure that you're able to go up so apply that to my life and apply that to business and everything else to make sure that there is a light at the end of the tunnel make sure that you continue to go towards it because you are going to reach it inspiring hope is such an important thing I mean like you said you're so depressed but just one week later everything just turned around exactly and it can it can take time I'm not saying that everything's going to happen in a week but it can also change on a dime and I think it's important to remember that and not you know sometimes we all by the way get worried and depressed worry about what you can control I always say that so control your life control the action that you do don't worry about things that you can do anything about it work for what it is and what you said is very true hope I think it's a wonderful powerful feeling having the right mindset and perspective and I really appreciate you sharing all of your perspectives and the positivity I feel the positive energy with you every time I see you and vice versa I always feel it thank you Rusty thank you for being on the show today appreciate it and thank you for watching beyond the lines on Think Tech Hawaii and a special thank you to my clothing sponsor Ilani Incorporated for more information please visit RustyColore.com and my book is available on Amazon Barnes & Noble and all Costco stores in Hawaii I hope that Guillaume and I will inspire you to create your own superior culture of excellence and to find your greatness and help others find theirs Aloha