EVERY December, for the past three years, Ursula Hare has stopped by the newsroom with a little holiday gift or card for me. In 1995, the petite senior citizen struggled in under the weight of a giant empty wine bottle, which served as a vase for some brilliantly colored bromeliads. Exercise guru’s
scary brush with fireLast month, when Ursula didn't pop in to say ho-ho-ho, I figured she must have been busy. After all, she conducts free exercise classes in front of the Honolulu Zoo on Tuesday and Friday mornings and does lots of volunteer work, too.
She was busy all right. When Ursula came to visit the other day, she apologized profusely in her thick European accent. "I'm so sorry I wasn't in sooner," she said, "but my home burned down."
Two days before Thanksgiving, as she was preparing to watch the 6 o'clock news in her rented Aina Haina house on Oio Street, Ursula's gray toy poodle started barking. Ursula shushed Corie just seconds before an explosion shattered a large picture window in the master bedroom. Smoke alarms shrieked.
Ursula ran outside with Corie and her other toy poodle, Minnie Mouse, as flames engulfed the home. Afraid that her vehicle would be destroyed as well, she ran back into the house to get the car keys. Unknown to her, Corie followed.
Days later, as Ursula sifted through the burnt wreckage that served as her home for 16 years, she smelled a foul odor and felt something furry. It was Corie. The longtime animal-rights activist, one of the Hawaiian Humane Society's most vocal and watchful critics, still mourns the death of her pet.
Yet, she is thankful to be alive and for what she calls an outpouring of support and friendship since the blaze. She was especially touched that a group of employees at the neighborhood Foodland chipped in to buy several gift certificates for her.
As she awaits the final report from the investigation, Ursula wants to give people who believe that a house fire will never happen to them three pieces of advice - lessons she learned the hard way:
1) Don't skimp on smoke detectors. Some smoke detectors only beep when the fire is burning brightly and there is little time to escape. Ursula wishes that the detectors in her house had reacted sooner, while the fire was still smoldering, which would have given her more ample warning.
2) Look into renter's insurance. Only after she lost everything did Ursula realize she could have bought renter's insurance. She thinks that there should be some kind of law requiring such a policy for every tenant in Hawaii, and vows to lobby the state Legislature about this in 1997.
3) Copy irreplaceable mementos. Ursula's precious family photographs, newspaper clippings and important documents were destroyed and forever lost. She suggests photocopying irreplaceable memorabilia and papers and putting them elsewhere for safekeeping.
URSULA says, "You never think it will happen to you," as she holds up the blackened skeleton of a three-photo metal frame that once contained pictures of her children. It's especially painful that they are gone since her son, Douglas, died in a freak gas-leak accident in London several years ago.
Ursula isn't sure what's next for her. She might return to Europe or maybe she'll look for another place to rent or buy, but one thing is certain - she doesn't want fire to devastate anyone else's life as it did hers.