Local “Mo Family Prom Time Bettah” Business on Maui Win-win: freshness Our new risk and If you are in High School, for the buyer and reward column ask yourself: what are business for the focuses on our your plans for the Junior farmer! It’s Maui Filipino or Senior Prom? Have sustainable! commerce sector. fun but be safe! Page 1 Page 1 Page 5 February 2019 · Vol 3 No2 FILIPINO AMERICAN VOICE • UPLIFTING OUR COMMUNITY FREE inside Buy Local and Support Our Farmers Alfredo G. Evangelista | A SSISTANT EDITOR This veteran and banker leads a lifetime of merits. love food! chicken paria or chicken p6 Everyone who follows marunggay and if we have a I me on Facebook or Insta- lot of time, she will cook gram knows I love to post some dinengdeng. photos of food. I don’t get to I’m sure everyone knows cook a lot except for an occa- many of the fresh vegetables sional backyard bbq which we buy are locally farmed by has to include grilled tarong, Filipino farmers–some with sili, and okra that I buy from acres and acres of land or my neighborhood Filipino some, like my brother-in-law market. Oh yes, don’t forget Jose Lampitoc, with smaller Christ the King’s Annual the lasona to dip in the patis lots in Wailuku Country Es- Oby’s Farm LLC owned by Robert Mata in Waikapü across from Bazaar: Truly a community- or shrimp fry bagoong. Some- tates (the former Wailuku Kahili Golf Course. centered event! times my wife will cook some see BUY LOCAL next page PHOTO: ALFREDO EVANGELISTA p9 Risk & Reward Elly’s Formal Wear Sto Niño celebrated “large” & Bridals: The Passing on Läna‘i… p14 of a Torch An amazing story of how a daughter’s pursuit of her passion brings her full circle back to her own hometown. Alfredo G. Evangelista | A SSISTANT EDITOR from Maui Community Col- work at Jeans West and quit lege in 1973 with a degree in in 1994 to take the risk of Accounting (she wanted to be opening her own business at a CPA) but also studied Fash- the age of forty-one. Elly and daughter Terri sort through their inventory of white ion Design. She worked at “I was working at home af- wedding gowns and dresses. Woolworth’s Fabrics and No- ter I quit Jeans West and after PHOTO: ALFREDO EVANGELISTA tions Department but quit my divorce. I was making when she went on a trip to prom dresses. It came to a EDITOR’S NOTE: This month, home and was ready to con- the Philippines as Miss Barrio point where I couldn’t handle. we begin a new column titled tinue the business that her Fiesta. I needed a shop–not just a “Risk & Reward” focusing on mother, Elly Angel Ewbank, She married Paul Ewbank room–I needed help,” ex- businesses. had started twenty-four years in 1977, moved to the Big Is- plained Elly. n this age of social media, ago: Elly’s Formal Wear & land, went to work for City The business became head- the announcement came Bridals. Bank on O‘ahu, and returned quartered in Kïhei–first at 41 I via an emotional Face- Elly, who comes from a to Maui in 1982. After having E. Lïpoa Street for a couple of book post. On November 14, large family (nine siblings) two children, she started to do years and after two other lo- 2018, a teary Terri Ewbank and who reigned as the 1974 alterations at home. After a cations, moved in 2009 to its announced she had come Miss Barrio Fiesta, graduated divorce in 1989, Elly started see ELLY’S p.3 Traje Farmers Market is now at Lower Main St. where Minit Stop used to be. PHOTO: ALFREDO EVANGELISTA Fernando Traje proudly displays the egg plants grown at his farm. PHOTO: ALFREDO EVANGELISTA lettuce, round onions, squash, straw- Buy Local… berries, sweet corn, sweet peppers, sweet potatoes, taro, tomatoes, and from p. 1 Arthur Latayada ‘s markets includes the annual Barrio Fiesta. zucchini. PHOTO: ALFREDO EVANGELISTA Sugar macadamia nut farm land). If you shop at JMA, Maui Greens, The produce grown by Filipino Pacific Fish Market, Paradise, Pukalani farmers is an amazing A to Z list that Superette, Rowena’s, Tamura’s, VIP, includes arugula, bananas, bell pep- or Wailuku Seafood, the vegetables pers, bittermelon, bok choi, cabbage, you buy were probably grown by a lo- land produce because the mainland cumbers, tomatoes, round onions and Chinese cabbage, coconuts, cucum- cal Filipino farmer. If you shop at produce spends one month in the other produce. Arthur Latayada, who bers, dragon fruit, egg plant, green Costco, you don’t know where the chiller before distribution,” said Fer- participated in the 1979 program re- onions, marunggay, long beans, okra, vegetables came from. nando Traje, owner of Traje Farm in turned to Maui in February 1981 on a papaya, peppers, pumpkins, romaine “Local produce is better than main- Kula. Traje is originally from Aklan on fiancée visa and married his wife the island of Panay. He was a student Sigrid. In 1983, Latayada opened his at the Aklan Agricultural College, ma- farm, a ½ acre lot in Kula where he joring in Agriculture, when he came to began growing green onions and red Maui in 1988 as part of the Philippine onions. It would take Traje almost Agricultural Training Program through thirteen years before he opened his the University of Hawai‘i. Traje’s co- farm. He began working in the hotel hort included nineteen students. They industry in 1992 and started Traje trained on Maui for two years and re- Farm in Waikapü in 2005, where he turned to the Philippines. A few years would farm bananas, long beans, and later, Traje was able to return to Maui sweet potatoes. after marrying his wife Evangeline. “I wanted to make my own busi- Others in the Philippine Agricultur- ness,” said Traje. “I started farming on al Training Program also returned to a part-time basis while I continued Maui after the program. Noel Escobe- working at Kealani Fairmont.” In do is farming in Kula, selling strawber- 2010, Traje moved his farm to the Ku- ries, tomatoes, onions and other pro- la Agricultural Park, where he leases duce. Pepito Valdez is also farming in sixty acres, growing round onions, Kula, selling egg plant, zucchini, cu- see BUY LOCAL p.4 Silvestre and Naty Tumbaga of Tumbaga Enterprises LLC dba Syl’s Produce stand proudly over their verdant soil. PHOTO COURTESY SILVESTRE TUMBAGA 2 | Fil-Am Voice | February 2019 | Vol 3 • No 2 Elly’s… from p. 1 Elly’s doesn’t only provide dresses—a full range of dapper mens’ apparel are avail- able as well. PHOTO: ALFREDO EVANGELISTA present location at the Sugar Beach Resort on North Kïhei Road. To Elly, the greatest challenge has always been the economy. “I think through perseverance and knowing how to juggle your money, we are still Elly Ewbank, owner of Elly’s Formal & Bridal fronts a full array of colors and styles in her store. standing. I love the shop, the cus- PHOTO: ALFREDO EVANGELISTA tomers, the people. It’s so amazing to own your own business. When you dream wedding gown. They’re happy twenty-five to thirty hours, depending volume of their sales. wake up in the morning, I am happy about the service, price, and the over- on how intricate the dress. After eight Employees are crucial to any busi- to go to work,” she says. all interaction with us. We want every years, Elly stopped hand sewing the ness. “My employees are like family,” The reward in owning one’s busi- bride to be happy,” says Elly. dresses. “It was easier to sell ready Elly explains. One employee has been ness is happy customers. “We see the In the early years, Elly would sew made dresses and alter them,” Elly ex- with her for fifteen years, another em- bride so happy when she finds the every wedding dress, taking about plained. It also led to increasing the see ELLY’S p.12 AWARD-WINNING STROKE & CARDIAC CARE ON MAUI Vacation be er. We offer the perfect fit for your Maui Memorial Medical Center was recently awarded the highest and most honors in next stay. the state by American Heart Association and featured in U.S. News & World Report “Best Hospitals 2019” for Gold Plus Quality Achievement and Honor Roll awards for stroke and Oahu Maui Kauai heart failure care. Hawaii Island South Tahoe Maui Memorial Medical Center is the only acute care hospital on the Valley Isle. Our 1400 Orlando Costa Rica physicians, providers and staff are committed to providing high-quality, patient-centered, affordable care and exceptional service to all of Maui’s residents and visitors. aqua-aston.com | 855.945.4092 BEST HOSPITALS 2019 HOTELS FOR ALL www.mauihealthsystem.org Vol 3 • No 2 | February 2019 | Fil-Am Voice | 3 From the Editor’s Desk Tante Urban EDITOR & PRESIDENT • FIL-AM VOICE Farmers: Our Partners Buy fresh–buy local. I owe a lot to Telly, the love of my life and partner in busi- ness. She really un- derstands me and To maintain freshness, the Tumbagas keep their cucumbers hydrated. always has my PHOTO COURTESY SILVESTRE TUMBAGA back. PHOTO: ALFREDO EVANGELISTA teen years. “For me, farming is a Buy Local… gamble. Sometimes you win, some- times you lose,” says Latayada. “I from p. 2 s we near the end of Febru- cal farmers that grow vegetables was brought up as a farmer when I ary, I'm hoping all of you that find their way to our homes zucchini, egg plant, long beans, ba- was small.