By HUNTER BISHOP
By HUNTER BISHOP
Tribune-Herald Staff Writer
As she sat in the back of her Furneaux Lane flower shop to talk about closing for a second time, Ann Ebesugawa Kaya wore a small patch on a worn checkered smock that had only two words — “Hearts” and “Flowers” — a fitting tribute to the local institution know as Ebesugawa Sisters.
For nearly 80 years in Hilo, the six Ebesugawa sisters delivered a lot of kindness along with the fresh fruits, vegetables and flowers their customers ordered for funerals, celebrations, illnesses, holidays and countless other occasions that called for fruit baskets, cut flowers and floral arrangements.
Their father started the retail produce business in 1932 just around the corner on Keawe Street, naming it Ebesu’s, thinking it easier for customers to remember that than the full Japanese surname. All the sisters started working for their father from the very beginning, and five were still involved in the business in 1990 when their adult children said it was too much work and urged them to retire.
That was the first time they closed the store. “At that time, we were the only FTD florist in Hilo,” Kaya said. “(FTD) panicked. We were willing to teach because Hilo has to have good flowers.”
But the truth was that the sisters missed each other, their work, their friends and their customers too much, and none was quite sure what to do in retirement anyway, Kaya said. So they partnered up and went back into business. Within four months, four of them — Ann, Nappy, Sets and Kay — opened Ebesugawa Sisters on Furneaux Lane, just around the corner from where their father started Ebesu’s 60 years earlier.
“We never imagined it would go so well,” Kaya said. But at 91, she is the last one working now. Sister Kay worked by Ann’s side until she died in July at age 94. Sisters Nappy, Sachi and Ruby survive but no longer work at the shop. Sister Sets is also deceased.
Kaya’s son would see her taking the store’s paperwork home and falling asleep over it after a long day, then waking up at 2 a.m. to complete the work before going back to the shop. He told her it was time, and now, there really is too much work to do, Kaya admits.
So Saturday, Sept. 29, is marked on her calendar as the last day for the Ebesugawa Sisters flower shop.
As the mix of sweet floral scents carries out to the sidewalk through the open plantation-era storefront and inside, vase after vase of fresh anthuriums create a sea of bright red throughout the shop, the diminutive Kaya now aspires only to “straighten up my life, (and) take care of my plants at home.”
Their old-school father never let the girls attend college, she said ruefully. “We all had to work at Ebesu College. He couldn’t do that today.” But she doesn’t complain. “God has been really good to us,” she said. “Life has been so wonderful.
“I’m going to miss the people, the friendly faces, the kindnesses they returned … too bad my sister died,” she said wistfully.
There was no secret to the Ebesugawas’ success. It was clearly about the flowers, but much more about the heart.
“The best thing,” Kaya said, “is to give everybody kindness. That’s what they remember. You have to be kind to people.
“And give extras,” she added with a wink. “It’s not to make money, it’s to help people.”