When the dust settled, Purple came away with a narrow win. Hope awarded LTD( or,“ The Duck Finders” as she called them) with the MVT for the Pink team, and the MoFO to The Brotherhood Paintball Team. Heaven gave the MVP to Lukela Soriano for his relentless efforts. MVT for the Purple team went to East Coast Hunters and honored Argent Force for their efforts with a MoFO.
But, according to Rivera, unlike tournaments or other major scenarios, the scoreboard felt secondary.
“ If you go to this event just to play paintball, you missed the point,” said Rivera.“ This event has to be at least a week-long vacation. Two, if you can afford to make it happen.”
He described some of the excursions that he encouraged everyone in attendance to experience- breaking some of their thresholds for fear in the process. Of the hundreds of players in attendance, about a third of them came from the mainland U. S., and they organized to climb Mount Haleakala, to zipline over the lush rainforest, and to cliff dive into the Pacific from Black Rock in Ka’ anapali together.“ I had to leverage my eight-year-old daughter to convince some of these guys to go ziplining,” Rivera said.“ She shamed them, telling them,‘ I did it when I was six!’ until they finally relented. But it’ s amazing to watch people start the course, from the first line, in sheer terror. And by the eighth line, they are thirsty for more, asking to go back and do it again. Watching that kind of joy, that invigoration, that’ s everything to me.”
For Hope, she may be looking to seek a rematch when Honu brings the production back in 2028. The loss didn’ t sit well with her.
“ It was all right. We were looking forward to playing together since this was our first time going back on the field in like forever, but it’ s okay. It was nice to see my sister be competitive in at least one sport, and she beat me in it,” she said. As for Heaven, she walked away with a fighters spirit.
“ My sister is a great-player, so I knew going against her wasn’ t gonna be easy, she said.“ I knew I had to challenge her but also myself to become a better commander. Overall, I’ m still very proud of my baby sister, but I would love to command again- anytime and anyplace. I have to defend my title.”
In the end, OhanaPB proved once again that this was more than a game; it was an experience.
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