Vanessa Whang has been on the job long enough — three weeks, to be exact — to know which passers-by will drop a little something in her kettle, which won’t and which would love to but just can’t.

"Sometimes they’ll look a little embarrassed and say, ‘I’ll catch you another day,’" Whang says. "It’s OK. Times are tough for everybody. Sometimes people will drop in a few pennies. But pennies are money, and I tell them that every little bit helps."

Whang understands. Disabled since suffering a massive heart attack 20 years ago, the 53-year-old Makiki resident took on this temporary job as a bell ringer for the Salvation Army to help make frayed ends meet.

"It’s OK," she says in typically concise but affable assessment. "I enjoy meeting people, especially little kids. They always want to know what’s in the kettle."

Whang was born in Honolulu, one of six children raised by a single mother who kept the family afloat working for the Dole Pineapple cannery. After graduating from Farrington High School, Whang spent several years as a caregiver to her ailing mother. When her mother died in 1983, Whang enlisted in the Navy and was trained as an avionics electrician.

Back in Hawaii after her four-year stint, Whang got a job as a cashier at Longs Drugs in Moiliili and settled in to a new life with her boyfriend and newborn daughter.

But just months after her daughter was born, Whang woke up with chest pains. Her boyfriend took her to the emergency room, and it was there that her heart stopped.

"I flat-lined," she says. "It took them 15 to 20 minutes to revive me. They were going to stop trying, but the doctor told them that I had a young baby at home so they kept going."

Whang was in a coma for a month. When she finally awoke, she was faced with an arduous recovery and lifelong disability.

For the past two decades, Whang has focused on raising her daughter, Nicole, and taking each day as it comes.

"I don’t plan too far ahead because you really don’t know what will happen tomorrow," she says.

And yet, tomorrow, if the sun rises and she’s still there to greet it, Whang will once again bring her homemade lunch and her cooler and her bell to Safeway supermarket to raise money for those in need.

"It’s a good cause," she says. "That makes it worth it."

Disabled artists Isaac and Tammy Lau, featured here last month, need your help. Their family home in Niu Valley was burglarized recently, and Tammy’s laptop and Isaac’s ukulele were taken, along with money and jewelry. If you have any information regarding this crime, please call the Honolulu Police Department or email me.

Reach Michael Tsai at mtsai@staradvertiser.com.