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| Ninety-year-old Hatsuyo Sakata oversees the traditional Japanese mochi-making, an annual family event for more than 100 years. Photo by Julia Neal |
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| Gloria Camba, president of the cooperative, with partner Bong Aquino. Photo by Julia Neal |
On small plots ranging from five to seven and even larger acreage, local residents built the Ka`u Coffee industry as sugar phased out. During the last 16 years, Ka`u Coffee has become one of the state’s most successful post-plantation economic development stories, with individual family businesses becoming the backbone of a growing entrepreneurship in the local community.
This year in which Inouye passed away, noted Camba, is the year of the Ka`u Coffee growers seeing the most success, with the market outstripping supply. It is also the year in which growers are scrambling to lease more acreage and are seeking more land security with longer-term leases so they can plan for expansion of their businesses.
The market for Ka`u Coffee is worldwide, with a number of the farmers having accounts with gourmet and gift stores, coffee shops and roasting houses. Starbucks is selling Ka`u Coffee with prices topping $50 a pound. Ka`u Coffee Mill sends Ka`u Coffee in containers to one of Europe’s largest roasting houses in Germany that distributes throughout the continent.
The market for Ka`u Coffee is worldwide, with a number of the farmers having accounts with gourmet and gift stores, coffee shops and roasting houses. Starbucks is selling Ka`u Coffee with prices topping $50 a pound. Ka`u Coffee Mill sends Ka`u Coffee in containers to one of Europe’s largest roasting houses in Germany that distributes throughout the continent.
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| Air Force One's backup plane waits in the Hilo rain while Pres. Obama attends Iouye services and Christmas on O`ahu. Photo by Ko Ueno |
Ka`u Coffee continues to place in the top ten for coffees worldwide in the annual Specialty Coffee Association of America’s competition, held this year in Portland and next April in Boston.
Rusty’s 100 Percent Ka`u Coffee has a strong marketing program in Japan and is placed on shelves in international airport stores, all the while still being sold at the farmers market in Na`alehu by the grower Lorie Obra.
JN Coffee has ABC Store accounts and the gourmet food store at Queens Shops in Waikoloa.
The Bull Kailiawa brand is featured along with other Ka`u Coffees at Alan Wong’s restaurants. Most of the more than 30 Ka`u Coffee Growers Cooperative members have their niche markets that have led them to success.
Rusty’s 100 Percent Ka`u Coffee has a strong marketing program in Japan and is placed on shelves in international airport stores, all the while still being sold at the farmers market in Na`alehu by the grower Lorie Obra.
JN Coffee has ABC Store accounts and the gourmet food store at Queens Shops in Waikoloa.
The Bull Kailiawa brand is featured along with other Ka`u Coffees at Alan Wong’s restaurants. Most of the more than 30 Ka`u Coffee Growers Cooperative members have their niche markets that have led them to success.
All of this success would not have been possible without the start that Inouye gave to the hardworking coffee growers, Camba said.
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| Pres. Barrack and Michelle Obama with Irene Inouye at Punchbowl this morning. Photo from Hawai`i News Now |
SEN. DANIEL INOUYE was honored yesterday with his body arriving from Washington, D.C. to lie in state at the Hawai`i Capitol. Gov. Neil Abercrombie said that “Daniel Inouye comes to us not in his role as U.S. Senator but as a Keiki O Ka `Aina, a child of these islands to remain with those who loved him, remembered with Aloha.… Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Rest easy now, you are home with us in paradise,” said the governor.
Remains of Inouye will be brought this Thursday to the Afook-Chinen Civic Auditorium in Hilo with noon viewing of the koa box containing his ashes and a service at 1 p.m. Hilo is also the location of the backup plane at the airport for Pres. Barack and Michelle Obama, who attended a service for Inouye this morning at Punchbowl National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific on O`ahu.
The ceremony ended with bagpipes playing Danny Boy, a military jet flyover and presentation of American flags to Inouye’s wife, Irene, and his son, Ken, with one also provided for Inouye's granddaughter.
The ceremony ended with bagpipes playing Danny Boy, a military jet flyover and presentation of American flags to Inouye’s wife, Irene, and his son, Ken, with one also provided for Inouye's granddaughter.
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| Grandson helps the men oversee steaming of the rice for making mochi. Photos by Julia Neal |
MOCHI MAKING TOOK OVER THE GROUNDS of the Hatsuyo Sakata house on Maile Street in Pahala today, with the annual event drawing many members of the Japanese, Japanese-Hawaiian and Japanese-Filipino community.
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| Next generation learns mochi-grinding process. |
The Japanese tradition begins with rice steamed in stacks of wooden boxes over an open flame and ground through a homemade machine to make a paste that is rolled out and formed into treats filled with azuki beans. Sakata, who is 90 years of age, said her grandparents started the family tradition in Ninole more than a century ago when they lived in sugar plantation housing below the mountain of Makanao. Family and friends would walk or come by horse and donkey, which were the major forms of transportation for working, visiting the villages, shopping and getting to school in Hilea. She remembered the cane rushing in the overhead wooden flumes that would carry it by water from the mountains to the sugar mills.
Sakata’s father’s family, the Koharas, continued the annual mochi-pounding tradition. Today she carried on and watched her great granddaughter begin to learn the art of mochi-making, as little Dhaylee Ceberos helped her extend the tradition to the next generation.
OFFICIALS IN HAWAI`I ARE MAKING PLANS to spend $100,000 for marine debris clean-up, according to an Associated Press story in today’s Hawai`i Tribune-Herald. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is providing $50,000, with a matching grant from the state Department of Land and Natural Resources. NOAA provided grants of $50,000 to each of five Western states expected to be affected by debris from the 2011 Japan tsunami.
Beach clean-up groups can apply for funds in February, and the goal is to spend the funds by the end of next summer, according to Laura McIntyre, of the state Department of Health. See hawaiitribune-herald.com.
OFFICIALS IN HAWAI`I ARE MAKING PLANS to spend $100,000 for marine debris clean-up, according to an Associated Press story in today’s Hawai`i Tribune-Herald. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is providing $50,000, with a matching grant from the state Department of Land and Natural Resources. NOAA provided grants of $50,000 to each of five Western states expected to be affected by debris from the 2011 Japan tsunami.
Beach clean-up groups can apply for funds in February, and the goal is to spend the funds by the end of next summer, according to Laura McIntyre, of the state Department of Health. See hawaiitribune-herald.com.
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| Volunteers from Ka`u can sign up to record behavior of whales during the 2013 Ocean Count. Photo by Barbara LaCorte/NOAA |
HAWAIIAN ISLANDS HUMPBACK WHALE National Marine Sanctuary is seeking volunteers in Ka`u for its 2013 Sanctuary Ocean Count. The project offers the community a chance to monitor humpback whales and provide important population and distribution information. Site leaders and general volunteers are needed for events on Jan. 26, Feb. 23 and March 30. For more information and to register, visit hawaiihumpbackwhale.noaa.gov.
DISCOVERY HARBOUR COMMUNITY CENTER hosts Ka`u School of the Arts’ holiday concert today at 7 p.m. Ka`u `Ohana Band, Ka`u Community Chorus and Hannah’s Makana `Ohana Hula Halau.
TOMORROW’S CANDLELIGHT CHRISTMAS EVE SERVICE at Na`ohulelua Historical Garden on Kama`oa Road begins at 6:30 p.m. on the grounds of the historic Catholic Church. Everyone is welcome at this non-denominational Christian celebration. Bring a chair and flashlight to walk the path to the ceremony. Space is limited. RSVP to 345-9374.
NA`ALEHU METHODIST CHURCH also offers Candlelight Christmas Eve Service at 7:30 p.m., with lessons and carols that retell the Christmas story in word and song. For more, call Julie White at 503-756-8035.
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| Ken Gaub |
CHRISTMAS DAY BUFFET IS AVAILABLE at Kilauea Military Camp’s Crater Rim Café in Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m. Menu items include braised beef in red wine and forest mushrooms, seared ono lu`au-style, mushroom and leek pot pie, three cheese scalloped potatoes, cream of butternut squash soup, salad bar, desserts and beverages for $24.95 and $12 for children 6 to 11. Open to authorized patrons and sponsored guests. Park entrance fees apply.
KEN GAUB BRINGS HIS MINISTRY to Na`alehu Assembly of God next Sunday, Dec. 30 at 6:30 p.m. His website states that “Ken Gaub Ministries is about helping you find the life of peace and joy that God wants you to have. He motivates people to be more than average in a very unusual, humorous style.”
Gaub speaks before diverse crowds in places such as colleges, high schools, universities, conventions, prisons, music festivals, state and county fairs, some of the world’s largest churches and even the Pentagon.
For more information, call 929-7278 and visit gaubministries.org.
SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS AT WWW.PAHALAPLANTATIONCOTTAGES.COMAND WWW.KAUCOFFEEMILL.COM. KA`U COFFEE MILL IS OPEN SEVEN DAYS A WEEK.
ALSO SEE KAUCALENDAR.COM AND FACEBOOK.COM/KAUCALENDAR.
FIND MORE OF OUR DECEMBER 2012 EVENT PHOTOS ON OUR FLICKR ACCOUNT.
FIND MORE OF OUR DECEMBER 2012 EVENT PHOTOS ON OUR FLICKR ACCOUNT.