Several years later, my mother took me down to Laurence Hata's photo shop down on the DeRussy end of Waikiki's Kalakaua Avenue. Hata, well known in the island's photography community, guided me to a manual camera that would force me to learn all the basics of exposure and camera handling, from f-stops to depth of field.

I ended up with used Kodak rangefinder, although I can't recall the specific model.

The theory worked, I guess.

I later graduated to a Pentax Spotmatic, and adopted a 35mm or 28mm lens as standard.

Virtually all these photos were shot with Tri-X film, hand processed in our bathroom.

Unfortunately, they were then stored under less than ideal conditions, and their condition varies widely. Luckily, at the size and resolution appropriate sharing via the Internet, those defects don't really show.