Sunday is last day to send children shoeboxes of aloha

By Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer

Hawai'i residents have until Sunday to send a shoebox full of aloha to needy kids around the world, officials of Operation Christmas Child said yesterday.

Cheri Jacobs carries a load of decorated shoeboxes filled with gifts to a container being packed by Julie Akey and Bruce Cody outside the Joy of Christ Lutheran Church in Pearl City. Gregory Yamamoto • The Honolulu Advertiser

And, she said, the contributors certainly will find their own lives changed for the better as well.

"Three years ago, I was talking to my mother in Canada, where Operation Christmas Child is very big, and she was amazed that we hadn't heard about it," Hawley said.

Today, "my house looks like a shoebox warehouse, but I am doing probably the most rewarding thing a person can do in their whole life."

During that first year, 1999, Hawley and a handful of other volunteers managed to ship 80 shoeboxes by United Parcel Service to the Christmas Child distribution center in California.

"In some cases, the shipping cost more than the contents," she said.

Last year, they needed a Matson container for more than 2,000 shoeboxes, each packed with such items as toys, school supplies, T-shirts and other gifts.

This year the operation may require two containers.

But for Hawley and other volunteers, it is the feeling of having made contact with individuals that counts the most, she said.

"I am writing to a girl who got one of my first boxes, Yasmina Suljic in Bosnia.

"I had put a postcard of Hawai'i in the box with a note and my name and address, and she wrote to tell me she really was so touched that someone in America cared about the children in her country.

"I know the boxes get there, and I know they make a difference," she said.

In the weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the program continued to make a difference for Hawley, and apparently for a lot of other donors.

"I was trying to cope with 9/11, and I found one thing I could do to ease the pain was wrap shoeboxes," Hawley said.

"It didn't take a lot of concentration, but it was something I could do at a time when we were all wondering what we could do."

There was a fear that donations might decline because of the unemployment and other economic problems that came in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks.

That was not the case.

"They broke every record in the book, with 5.4 million shoeboxes of gifts, compared with 4.1 million the year before," Hawley said.

Aprill Wilson of Kailua, another coordinator, said her world view also changed after she volunteered.

"America is a very rich country, but I am guilty along with most of the other people who feel you still don't get everything you want and you still wish you had more," she said.

"And then seeing someone who doesn't have anything makes you appreciate what you have and not complain about what you don't have."

Reach Walter Wright at wwright@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8054.