Swiss honorary consul in Hawaii: ‘Helping others is deeply rewarding’
Series The Swiss honorary consuls,
Episode 6:
From helping injured students to supporting people affected by devastating wildfires, Theres Ryf Desai is the first point of contact for Swiss citizens on the island paradise of Hawaii.
Reaching someone by phone in Hawaii from Switzerland takes some coordination. I call her at 8am on a Thursday morning. Where she lives, it is still Wednesday evening – and already 9pm.
A native of Bern, Desai has lived in Hawaii on the island of Oahu for 36 years. She studied architecture at the federal technology institute ETH Zurich and worked in the field for many years. At 64, she is now in the process of winding down her career in the property sector.
Since 2010, Desai has been volunteering as Switzerland’s honorary consul. “I like helping people. It is deeply rewarding,” she says. “And I am happy to give something back to the country that gave me an excellent free education. Living abroad has made me appreciate that now more than ever.
When the Swiss foreign ministry originally contacted her about the role, Desai had to ask what an honorary consul actually does.
“I knew my predecessor, Niklaus Schweizer, who held the post for 38 years until he reached the age limit. But I had no real sense of what the job involved,” she says.
It took almost a year before she was formally appointed at the end of 2009. The entire process involved applications, personal interviews, and approval by the Swiss embassy and the US State Department. “Approval by the US authorities is by no means a given,” she says.
No such thing as routine
The day-to-day reality of the position is demanding. “I thought I had seen it all, but there is always something new. It is incredible what has happened over the past 15 years, from accidents involving tourists to social problems affecting the Swiss Abroad that live here,” Desai explains.
The chain of islands that make up Hawaii form the 50th and southernmost US state. Many Swiss visitors who come are here for a language course. Desai points out that 6.6% of international students in Hawaii come from Switzerland, ranked fifth behind Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, and China. “That is quite something,” she says, comparing “little Switzerland” to the much bigger countries.
Most of them come to the tropical paradise for just three months to learn English.
During their stay, some underestimate the risks. On several occasions, Desai has had to help injured young people arrange a safe return to Switzerland.
She says it’s not possible to put an exact figure on the amount of time she spends on her duties, as this depends heavily on the individual cases she deals with. Her workload “varies enormously, from nothing to well beyond a full-time working week”, she explains.
Months of work for Solar Impulse
One particularly intensive period was the arrival of the Swiss solar aircraft Solar Impulse, which landed in Hawaii and then stayed there from July 2015 to April 2016, waiting for conditions that would allow it to continue its journey.
“For the flight from Japan to Hawaii, they needed five consecutive days of clear weather,” she explains. “The landing was originally expected in mid-May, but they only arrived on July 3.”
Desai organised events that repeatedly had to be cancelled or postponed at short notice due to shifting weather conditions and technical problems with the aircraft’s batteries.
“It was a huge amount of work,” she says. “We had to keep replanning everything, which was not easy given the scale of the events.”
Another demanding episode came in 2023, when devastating wildfires destroyed the coastal town of Lahaina on the Hawaiian island of Maui. Desai spent hours advising Swiss tourists by phone, from replacing travel documents when access to their hotels was blocked to helping them find alternative accommodation.
As honorary consul, Desai is also keen to strengthen ties among the roughly 840 Swiss citizens living in Hawaii. One way she does this is through the Swiss SocietyExternal link, which has about 70 members. “Unfortunately, not everyone attends the events. It is a pity, because we organise a wide range of engaging activities.”
Originally from the town of Langenthal in canton Bern, Desai moved to Hawaii at the age of 28, where she started a family with her husband, who is also an architect.
Babysitting duties
Alongside her professional and consular work, time for family and hobbies is sometimes scarce. Her son and his wife also live in Hawaii and Desai recently became a grandmother. “Now babysitting is part of the picture,” she says.
Her daughter, by contrast, has lived in Switzerland for ten years following studies at the hotel management school in Lausanne.
Our conversation is interrupted when Desai switches on the ceiling fan – the house has become too warm. Returning to her computer, she continues talking about her hobbies.
Read more about what a Swiss honorary consul does in our explainer below:
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Switzerland expands voluntary honorary consul network
In her free time, Desai puts her expertise to use as a volunteer at an architecture museumExternal link dedicated to the work of mid-20th-century architect Vladimir Ossipoff. As her first job was in primary school teaching, leading guided tours and giving talks suits her well.
In spring 2025, she also took on a role as cultural ambassador for Switzerland, co-organising an exhibition dedicated to Swiss graphic design. Desai worked with a local architect in Honolulu and the project, titled “Art of Design: Swiss Posters 1950-2022”, was very successful.
Executive committee of the Consular Corps of Hawaii
Alongside this, Desai is active in the Consular Corps of Hawaii, which brings together representatives from 37 countries. She has served on its executive committee for six years and will take on the role of dean this year.
“The Corps is important because it allows us to tackle shared challenges as a group,” she says. Currently, one issue is stricter US entry requirements, which especially affect tourists who might provide ill-considered answers to questions when entering the country.
“So far, this has not happened to anyone from Switzerland, but I know of cases involving people from Denmark, Germany, Australia, and many from France,” she says.
These tourists are held at a federal detention centre until they are deported. “They are subjected to body searches, made to wear prison clothing, and more. It is an extremely distressing situation,” she says.
Together, the Consular Corps met with the governor and explained that these individuals were often not criminals. In many cases, Desai says, they had simply made inadvertent misstatements about remote work or volunteering on farms.
“We have just had another meeting with the airport,” she says. “They are now setting up a facility where a person in this situation can stay overnight for one or two days, or however long it takes until they must return home. Officially, they are not permitted to enter the country or stay in a hotel.”
Desai is not thinking about ending her work as honorary consul just yet. The age limit for the position is 70, and her current mandate runs for another two years. “After that, I will decide what comes next,” she says. Until then, the Swiss honorary consul in Hawaii is unlikely to run out of things to do.
Edited by Balz Rigendinger. Adapted from German by David Kelso Kaufher/dos
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