Posted on: Friday, October 1, 2004
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By Lee Cataluna
Advertiser Columnist
Mail carrier Adele Yoshikawa is so well-known on her Pearl City/Manana route that she gets invited to her customers' parties, is friends with all the neighborhood dogs and is often presented with snacks saved up from someone's lunch.
In the next few months, the entire country will have the chance to get to know Adele Yoshikawa. She has been chosen as one of nine faces to represent the U.S. Postal Service in a new ad campaign that will include television commercials, guest appearances at big events, maybe even a billboard in Times Square.
Yoshikawa and the eight other mail carriers were selected out of 800 nominees from around the country to be "National Postal Ambassadors" in an audition process reminiscent of "American Idol." There were local screen tests and interviews and photos, then a final audition in Chicago.
"I give models credit," Yoshikawa says. "We had people making sure the creases in our uniform were perfect, making sure our hair was perfect. One photo shoot went for 12 hours."
"When the package comes, I tell them, 'Hey! Johnny sent you something!' They come to the door and they hug me and I feel so good. I didn't send the package, but I brought the package."
Little children look out the window waiting for her.
Dogs wait for her, too, sometimes with their snouts poking out of the mail drops.
"I love dogs. I know all their names. I hug them," she says.
And the residents of an old-folks home in the Pearl City part of her route wait most intently and greet her with "You late today!" or "Early today!" even though her arrival varies only by a matter of minutes.
It's this closeness to all the folks on her route that brought Yoshikawa national attention.
Yoshikawa gets tears in her eyes when she talks about how the crew at the Pearl City station have rallied around her. Fellow mail carriers have to take up her load when she's traveling. She was worried how that might play out. But her co-workers wrote her a card of support and tucked in a little spending money for her to buy extra omiyage to take on her travels.
"I wrote them a thank-you card," Yoshikawa says. "We mail carriers, we're big on cards."
Lee Cataluna's column runs Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Reach her at 535-8172 or lcataluna@honoluluadvertiser.com.
On the job, it's shorts, a blouse stained by the ink that rubs off some publications, a ponytail and her ever-ready smile. Yoshikawa walks a route through military housing in Manana. The houses are old-fashioned, with
mail slots right in the front door, so she gets to see her customers' faces all the time. Yoshikawa knows all the military wives with husbands on deployment and knows when they're waiting eagerly for a delivery.
Adele Yoshikawa
