VIRIDITAS: SOUL GREENING
Interviewed by Sister Malia Dominica Wong, OP
Hawaii Catholic Herald
I can still remember the morning when the community was notified that we all needed to go to Lihue for a very important phone call. We did not have phone service at the time in Kekaha. Once in Lihue, we were able to return our mother superior’s call. She spoke to us one by one asking us whether we wanted to go home to Wisconsin. She said that it was okay to leave, that we did not need to stay. But the sisters and I thought, “What happens to the lay people? They can’t go home, so why should we?”
I had just arrived at St. Theresa School in 1992 before the new semester was to begin. Who would have expected that in September Hurricane Iniki would hit and leave us and others homeless? Everyone was going to a gym in Waimea, and we were expecting to go there too. However, a parishioner told us that we would instead be going to Holy Cross Church in Kalaheo where there was a vacant convent. We lived there for months commuting back and forth to clean up the school. As things settled, we looked for a place to rent back in Kekaha. But there were no accommodations available for the six of us. Eventually, one sister had to go home.
During the events that led up to Iniki, we were forewarned. At that time, the school was preparing for its carnival and so I had all of the printed tickets held in boxes. As the rains poured and slipped through the louvers in one classroom, I had the boxes moved to another classroom and yet another in order to keep them dry. About 2 p.m., I remember looking outside and seeing how the eye of the hurricane had turned. The sky was calm and it was quite beautiful. However, chaos hit in the evening and it was bitter.
The next morning you could see that Father’s car was wrecked; our car and van were also wrecked. Father said that there were a lot of live wires out there and we had to be careful. The church and the school sustained major damage. That began our living day by day with the people around us. We had lost everything except what was on our backs. We were all stuck together.
We did have a little grill however, and as people’s freezers defrosted, or whatever could be salvaged, we cooked and ate together. Sister Nora’s relatives also had a generator that could keep the food cold a little longer. As the Navy base and others helped us, Red Cross brought us food as ours ran out. I couldn’t wait to get a cup of hot coffee. Thinking of the carnival tickets, it is now amusing. I just kept doing my best, trusting all the rest to God.
Sister Valerie Lemansky is a Franciscan Sister of Christian Charity. In 1992 she was assigned to St. Theresa School in Kekaha, Kauai, as principal. She returned to the Mainland in 1998 and is happy to be back at St. Theresa Convent in Kekaha helping at the school. Sister Valerie is 59 years professed.
