Sponsorships abound in HANMI Charity Golf tourney

The business community continues to keep on giving to the 4th Annual Hotel Association of the Northern Mariana Islands Charity Golf Tournament set for this Saturday at Coral Ocean Point Resort.

Just recently Duty Free Galleria Saipan president Marian Aldan-Pierce handed over a check for $500 to HANMI chairwoman Lynn Knight for the company’s exclusive sponsorship of the 16th hole.

Knight was accompanied in the check presentation by HANMI vice chairman B.K. Park, while joining Aldan-Pierce in the handover was DFS sales and marketing manager Hideo Oyama.

Aside from DFS, other businesses that pitched in for one of the year’s biggest and richest golfing events are Japan Saipan Travel Association, Saipan Shipping and Nippon Travel, the Saipan Garment Manufacturers Association, Triple J Motors, Microl Corp., Shell Marianas, Bank of Hawaii, Sandcastle, and Ambyth Shipping, among others.

Hole-in-one prizes are definitely nothing to sneeze at as automobile dealers and airline companies would be giving away brand new cars and roundtrip tickets, respectively, not to mention cold cash in the thousands of dollars.

For instance, roundtrip tickets to Japan, Manila, Korea, Australia and the U.S. mainland will be up for grabs courtesy of Asiana Airlines, Continental Airlines, Japan Airlines, and Northwest Airlines. Spanking new 2005 Toyota Rav 4 from Microl Toyota and 2005 Mazda3 from Triple J Motors also await hole-in-one winners.

This Saturday’s golf extravaganza tees off with a shotgun start at noon but participants are requested to show up at 10:30am for registration.

The HANMI Charity Golf Tournament will have four flights—Championship Flight for players with 0 to 5 handicaps, A Flight for 6 to 10; B Flight for 11 to 16; C Flight for 17 and over.

Although the early bird entry fee of only $125 has already passed, interested golfers could still be a part of the competition by forking out $150 to pay for the green fee, awards, prizes, and the banquet. All proceeds from the event will go to HANMI’s charity fund.

The HANMI tournament committee is composed of representatives from HANMI members. It is co-chaired by Michael von Siebenthal, Hyatt Regency general manager. Also in the committee are HANMI president Lynn Knight; Jerry John, Pacific Islands Club resident manager; Yutaka Fujita, Hotel Nikko general manager; Yoshiro Kishimoto, COP Resort general manager; Paul Camacho, Dai-Ichi Hotel Saipan Beach duty manager; Juko Ishikawa, World Resort Saipan rooms director; Dave Jones, former Hyatt Regency executive chef; Thomson Palik, assistant manager of COP Resort’s Pro-Shop; Becky Castro, Triple J Wholesale general manager; Yoichi Matsumura, Pacific Development Inc. general manager; Mike Pai, Saipan Sunset Cruise general manager; Joe Asanuma, Mariana Resort and Spa personnel manager; and Faheem Ebrahim, spa and fitness director at Hyatt Regency’s Club Elan.