{"id":210652,"date":"2015-09-18T06:00:52","date_gmt":"2015-09-17T20:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=210652"},"modified":"2015-09-18T06:00:52","modified_gmt":"2015-09-17T20:00:52","slug":"kinpachi-at-35-arigato","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/kinpachi-at-35-arigato\/","title":{"rendered":"Kinpachi at 35: Arigato!"},"content":{"rendered":"

– Giving back to the community for their continued support<\/p>\n

– \u2018Mini street market\u2019 fundraiser to benefit Soudelor survivors<\/strong><\/p>\n

In its 35 years of existence on island, Kinpachi Restaurant believes in two things that has made it last this long: luck and people.<\/p>\n

Kinpachi\u2019s Misako Kamata said they were lucky that her father, the late Yoshio Kamata, started the business early on Sept. 15, 1980, and that tourists as well as locals just love Japanese food.<\/p>\n

But she also believes that getting along with and understanding people, whether guests or employees, are important to one\u2019s business.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven if you have food, without the people you won\u2019t have a business,\u201d Kamata said.<\/p>\n

Having lived on Saipan much longer than in Japan, this island is now home for Kamata, and its people have become her family. Which is why the instinct to help soon after Typhoon Soudelor hit Saipan came naturally for her.<\/p>\n

\u201cI learned a lot from the people living here. If I lived in Japan, I don\u2019t think I will be doing these things, how you helped each other, the people here. That\u2019s what I learned,\u201d Kamata said.<\/p>\n

Although their restaurant also had a hard time operating after Typhoon Soudelor hit, Kamata, with the help of her employees, was still able to reach out and help the community.<\/p>\n

Kinpachi has been providing meals to volunteers responding to relief efforts as well as to residents who need it most. About a thousand meals have already been served and they continue to serve meals to those with special needs at the Office on Aging.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was hard but I felt that people were suffering more. I knew I can do it anyway so we just helped,\u201d Kamata said.<\/p>\n

\u201cKinpachi was one of the few restaurants that opened from the day after Soudelor, the first restaurant that started donating hot lunches to the people in need, and still doing it,\u201d CORE\u2019s Mami Ikeda said. \u201cTheir compassion to help the community is jaw-dropping and unbeatable. And all the kindest, most generous considerations, love and support they gave C.O.R.E. while we distribute their bento boxes, I just can’t thank them enough. Yet, Kinpachi never stop giving, even on their anniversary.\u201d<\/p>\n

Arigato!<\/strong><\/p>\n

Their outreach to the community doesn\u2019t stop there. Instead of holding a grand celebration for their 35th anniversary, Kinpachi will be holding a fundraiser to benefit Soudelor survivors.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe thought of many ways to celebrate but because of this typhoon, we didn\u2019t feel like celebrating,\u201d Kamata said. \u201cWe\u2019d like to share what we can and what we have.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Saturday, Kinpachi will be having a mini street market-style fundraiser called \u201cArigato!\u201d at the Marianas Business Plaza parking lot from 11am to 2pm.<\/p>\n

Special hot lunch, yakitori grills, taiyaki grills, as well as mochi will be served and all proceeds will go to the Community Outreach Recovery Efforts, which is doing direct relief efforts as well as medical outreaches on Saipan. There will also be free giveaways from 360 Restaurant and many more.<\/p>\n

\u201cMisako-san said they just wanted to thank the community that has been supporting them for 35 years and they don\u2019t want to make any money,\u201d CORE member Kazuyo Estrada said. \u201cSo Misako-san decided to give it to the CORE to purchase whatever stuff we need for the relief efforts.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAll the comprehensive recovery that we\u2019re doing, we\u2019re going to utilize that fund to continue those efforts,\u201d CORE member Glen Hunter said.<\/p>\n

Aside from great food, there will also be performances from the Saipan Awaodori Team as well as other groups.<\/p>\n

Kamata and the rest of the Kinpachi team as well as members of CORE are inviting the public to celebrate with the island\u2019s longest-running Japanese restaurant while helping the community recover from Soudelor.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe hope that the community will support us. This is not for Kinpachi but for the members of our community who needs help,\u201d Kinpachi assistant manager Sonia Siwa said. (With Jayson Camacho)<\/strong><\/p>\n

SOUDELOR FUNDRAISER<\/strong><\/p>\n

For its 35th anniversary, Kinpachi will be holding a fundraiser on Saturday to benefit Soudelor survivors. It will be held at the Marianas Business Plaza parking lot from 11am to 2pm. Called \u201cArigato!\u201d it will be a mini street market-style fundraiser that will feature special hot lunch, yakitori grills, taiyaki grills, as well as mocha. All proceeds will go to the Community Outreach Recovery Efforts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

– Giving back to the community for their continued support – \u2018Mini street market\u2019 fundraiser…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[6897,1712,67,6333],"class_list":["post-210652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-core","tag-marianas-business-plaza","tag-people","tag-typhoon-soudelor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=210652"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210652\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=210652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=210652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=210652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}