Four weeks after a flood of muddy water shut down Kahala Mall for four days, the mall is back in business, but life for merchants isn't entirely the same.

The walls and tile floors have been scrubbed and decontaminated. Temporary carpeting has been installed.

Many of the estimated 90 businesses that make up the mall have yet to tally the total cost of losing four days of business, cleaning up the soggy mess and ripping up carpets.

The costs are still adding up, said Ron Yoda, the mall's general manager. A new, custom carpet with a possible new Kahala Mall logo has yet to be ordered, but will undoubtedly cost "several hundred thousand dollars."

"The meter's still running," Yoda said.

Unlike many mall tenants, Kahala Mall itself has flood insurance that Yoda hopes will cover cleanup and repairs to anything the mall owns or is responsible for, such as common areas.

But Borders Express won't re-open. And renovation work continues on three of Consolidated Theatres' eight theaters, the box office and concession area.

No re-opening has been scheduled yet for the movie theater. Businesses can hardly wait for it to resume operations and attract more customers.

"Everybody can come back to the mall," said Gina Morioka, one of the owners of Carousel Candyland. "It's nice and clean. But it's really quiet because there's no movie theater. And you can't make up for losing four days" of sales.

On March 31, a freak flood of muddy water burst into the mall through the Hunakai Street entrance around lunch time, knocked holes through two movie theater walls, flooding three of them, then swirled through every wing of the mall, damaging an estimated 60 out of 90 businesses.

Much of the loss was focused on the flooded downstairs storage area, where Lo Kaimuloa, the owner of Riches Kahala, estimates she lost more than $40,000 worth of merchandise.

In the four days of cleanup that followed, customers, businesses, their families and friends came together in a way unlike ever before.

Customers brought in food and flowers. Companies like Pizza Hut and Cookie Corner passed out free food to exhausted workers.

"Everybody was in the water helping everyone," Kaimuloa said. "Everybody came together in this mall. My voicemail was full with people calling to help. One girl I knew from 19 years ago said, 'I'll help you.' Another said, 'Lo, I'm bringing you dinner.' I had people from the outer islands offering to fly in and help. It was incredible."

Gilda Minassian, the owner of Calista By Cotton Cargo, estimates that the lost revenue from the Spring Break weekend cost her 20 percent to 25 percent of her sales for April. But the outpouring of customer generosity eased the pain.

"I was really surprised at how much the community got involved," Minassian said. "Every day, people stopped by to say they were thinking of me. It was really nice."

Yoda said "the staff put in long hours, days on end. Some came off of vacation to help. Tenants helped each other the best they could. Instead of fleeing for their lives, customers stayed around and actually came back to help. This mall has become a kind of community center. The cooperation didn't surprise me. It pleased me and exceeded my expectations."

The good will was briefly interrupted by a mall-wide memo from Yoda on April 14 telling businesses that they had to replace the walls of their soggy storage areas immediately — or bear the expense of having the mall do the work. A week later, Yoda sent another memo, telling businesses that the mall would cover the costs.

"When we got that letter saying we were responsible for the storage areas, we were really, really surprised," said Morioka, who, like others, did not have flood insurance to cover losses. "It's not like it was our fault. I thought the mall would help us out. Then we got the notice that the mall would help everybody out and, honestly, we're really, really grateful."

Yoda said the work had to begin immediately to prevent mold from appearing and to keep the area secure while the work was under way.

"The tenants are responsible for the interior of their storage areas," Yoda said, "but the mall will take care of the walls."

In the aftermath, mall officials also promoted one-time "trunk shows" that boosted sales for several businesses like Calista By Cotton Cargo, which held a special clothing sale by local designer Anne Namba on April 9.

"That trunk show saved our weekend," Minassian said. "It ended up doubling a usual Sunday sale. The mall is doing its best to promote the mall."

But the flood ended up costing Minassian "well over" $60,000 in lost merchandise, lost sales and the cost of replacing a $15,000 special-order carpet.

"It's going to be a rough month," Minassian said. "Nobody would think that in a mall you would need flood insurance — and I didn't have flood insurance. But we're trying to get back to normal."

As Kahala Mall pushes ahead, Yoda has been looking back over the mall's four decades of operation for any similar kind of disaster.

"Nothing like this has ever happened," Yoda said. "I keep hearing it's a once-in-a-lifetime event, and I certainly hope so."