ABOUT RON

Ronald Patrick Agor Gosé was born in Honolulu on August 18, 1965 to parents Lawrence and Patricia Gosé who were also born and raised on Oʻahu. Ron was the second of four children. He is survived by his Mom and Dad, older brother Lawrence and younger sisters Cheryl and Carol. Ron felt he had a pretty normal childhood. He was known as the Responsible One. He made sure everyone finished their homework, did their chores, and cooked rice before his parents came home from work. He was also known as the Sensitive One. As a child, Ron had a lot of empathy for people who were either sad or angry.

Ron attended Waimalu Elementary School, then ʻAiea Intermediate School, and graduated from Damien Memorial High School. He participated in many speech contests and was a member of the National Forensic League, Student Council, JPO Program, and Chinese Kempo Karate. However, Ron’s first love was art.

After high school, Ron worked at many jobs including a temp agency, Fast Stop, dog walker, and at Kaiser Medical Center just to name a few. In the fall of 1988, he left to see the world with his then partner Steven. He lived and worked a multitude of adventurous bohemian jobs in New Zealand, Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand before returning home to Honolulu in the spring of 1990.  

Upon his return, Ron worked as a Human Resource Specialist at Bank of Hawaiʻi from 1990 to 1996 until he decided to further his education. Ron graduated from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa in 2000 with a Bachelor of Arts in Communication with distinction.

After graduating from college, Ron worked as a district sales representative for Marchon Eyewear based out of New York selling brand name prescription eye glasses and sunglasses covering all of Hawaiʻi, Guam, and Saipan. During this time, he also met Koji, partner extraordinaire, who helped Ron acquire his first Acura. He had 16 in total. His first was a 2003 Acura MDX and his final car was a 2021 Acura TLX A-Spec.

By the end of 2004, Ron was ready to move on from the eyewear business and plunged wholeheartedly into the real estate field. He obtained his real estate license and launched his career with Hawaiʻi Resource Realty in the beginning of 2005 as a Real Estate Salesperson and Property Manager. In 2010, Ron accepted the position of Director of Operations for Jack Tyrell & Company which specializes in luxury condos and homes. During this time, he also earned his Broker’s license. 

Life was good for Ron. He enjoyed his career in real estate, did a lot of traveling, and a re-established great relationships with his family and friends. He really loved traveling to Las Vegas and Japan. Ron was very lucky in every casino he visited. He also tried his luck in casinos in San Diego and always walked out a winner.

In February 2017, Ron was thrown a devastating curve ball and diagnosed with cancer.  He continued to work in real estate but decided to slow down a bit while he was going through treatment and joined Coldwell Banker, Pacific Properties. After a short time there and realizing that it was challenging working as a realtor given his health concerns, he decided to look into other opportunities where he could use his knowledge of real estate. Ron accepted a job with Hawaiian Telcom as their Real Estate Portfolio Specialist. He actually enjoyed the change of scenery and returning to a job with regular 9-5 hours. Although working in the office was fine, he especially appreciated working from home during the COVID shut down.

Ron was employed with Hawaiian Telcom until his passing in August 2021.

During his journey fighting cancer Ron wrote:

I think mostly everyone starts off not knowing who they are or the kind of person they want to be. So we try out different personas that we like from TV or movies, or we read books and attend motivational seminars. I also think LIFE happens and affects each person’s perception of how people see them and how they see themselves.

I spent the majority of my life daydreaming of the perfect me and my perfect life all while living life in real time. It has only been in recent years that I realized I wasted so much time daydreaming, and just when I was able to truly accept my life as it is, life presented me with an unexpected situation—metastatic stage IV cancer. And just to be funny, the powers that be didn’t endow me with a disease that would take me quickly; instead, I started my fifth year fighting an increasingly aggressive cancer.

With reflective insight, Ron wrote:

As an adult, I still empathized with people because I wanted to be of help if I could. I believe it’s a trait that best defines me as a person.

He was so right.