During the holiday season each year, Salvation Army volunteers Vivian Rodriguera and Dedora Yasay and her daughter, Norma Cortez – both from Lihu’e – smile, sing and ring red bells beside red kettles on Kaua’i for the poor. Their goal
During the holiday season each year, Salvation Army volunteers Vivian Rodriguera and Dedora Yasay and her daughter, Norma Cortez – both from Lihu’e – smile, sing and ring red bells beside red kettles on Kaua’i for the poor.
Their goal is to spread Christmas cheer, the word of God and to inspire Kauaians to deposit money in the kettles to allow the Salvation Army of Kaua’i to help the island’s needy, not only during the holiday season but throughout the year.
Their help and the aid of a platoon of volunteers this year is helping further the goals of the Salvation Army.
The kettle drives generate an average of $22,000 a year on Kaua’i, and organization officials predict a 24 percent increase in donations this year.
Bellringers wait with anticipation for one donation in particular – a $1,000 check from a Kaua’i woman, a gesture made each year for past five years.
This year, 15 volunteers, mostly seniors, and another 30 volunteers from the Boy and Cub Scouts Troop 148, Kiwanis club, Kapa’a and Lihu’e Rotary clubs and the Zonta Club are manning the kettles, located throughout the island.
To augment their service, more volunteers are being sought. Those who are interested are encouraged to call Dennis Nimkie at (808) 246-1120 or Maj. George Rodriguera from the Salvation Army’s branch in Lihu’e.
Rodriguera, Yasay and Cortez lead busy lives, but they set aside the month of December to stand by the red kettles, rain or sunshine, wind or windless days, greeting people who approach them. Some passersby have a smile and are willing to make a donation; others shrug their shoulders and walk by.
The bellringers receive no special instructions on ways to solicit funds; their best tool is a smile.
“We just instruct them to be courteous, say thank you for their donation,” Rodriguera said.
Yasay approaches her task like a job. She and Cortez work nine-hour days, alternating each day, five days a week. Sometimes they stand, sometimes they sit.
There are no secrets to soliciting donations, said Yasay, who manned a kettle at the Big Save store in Lihu’e last week.
“I just ring the bell, sing a song, smile at them and say ‘Merry Christmas,'” Yasay said.
Vivian Rodriguera said it is a “rare occasion when people don’t want to give.” “All over the world you find this red kettle. It is the symbol of Christmas,” she said.
Rodriguera served with the Salvation Army in the Philippines, Hawai’i and Phoenix, Ariz. for 36 years before she retired with the rank of brigadier in 1986, and now volunteers for the Salvation Army on Kaua’i.
Rodriguera said she has found people to be generous and “always open to the Salvation Army” when it came to making kettle deposits.
Shoppers initially seemed reluctant to make donations shortly after Rodriguera and Yasay set up their kettle at the entrance of the store last week. But they soon dug into their pockets after Rodriguera flashed a warm smile and played holiday songs on her accordion.
The music stopped some men in their tracks, prompting them to fumble through their pockets for loose change.
Other men appeared to want to walk past Yasay and Rodriguera, but at the urging of wives or girlfriends, stopped short of entering the store, swung on their heels, pulled dollar bills out of their wallets and put the money in the kettle.
“We just leave it to the people,” Rodriguera said.
“We don’t hold it against people who don’t give, because they might have given somewhere else at another time. And besides, you can only give so much.” Rodriguera has been associated with the kettle program as a Salvation Army officer and as a volunteer for about 50 years.
Yasay has been a bellringer for 18 years and loves the job.
Rodriguera said she rings the bell to serve God and to help the needy.
“We do not give in order to get,” she said. “We are here because there is a need. We trust the Lord to bring about what is needed.” Yasay said she continues to ring the bell and participates in other Salvation Army projects to repay God for helping her triumph over personal and financial problems in her life.
As a mother of 16 children from two marriages, she said she found it economically difficult to raise them and became estranged from some of them.
“Some of them said I didn’t pay attention to them,” Yasay said. “That I wasn’t their mother.” Through her belief in God, Yasay said she has been able to reunite with all her children and that “now they want to take care of me.” The red kettles are usually placed in high-visibility areas – Long’s Drug Store in Lihu’e and Kapa’a, Big Save stores in Hanalei, Kapa’a, Lihu’e, ‘Ele’ele, Koloa and Waimea, the Safeway store, Sueoka’s Store in Koloa, Ishihara Market in Waimea, Wal-Mart and Kmart.
What is raised from the kettle program on Kaua’i is part of the $400,000 the Salvation Army of Kaua’i is trying to raise from the operations of two thrift stores in Lihu’e and Hanapepe, membership donations, foundation grants and fund-raisers.
With the funds, the Salvation Army offers a slew of services: Emergency food, emergency shelter, utility services through the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and programs for seniors “Through the kettle program, giving starts and ends with the same person.
The people who receive the donation may make donations to the kettle one day when they can. That is the beauty of it,” said George Rodriguera. “In many ways, it comes back 10 times more, for the people of Kaua’i.” Staff writer Lester Chang can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 225) and lchang@pulitzer.net
