Nisei Ski Club

One of Hi Fujii’s enduring legacies is the Nisei Ski Club. Over 50 years ago, Hi and his friends formed the Nisei Ski Club with the objective of promoting the sport of skiing, friendship, and fun within the community.  This club has created many lasting friendships and memories. Yes, there’s some secret sauce that has made this club special.

Not only did Hi meet his wife Phyllis through the club but I also met my husband Winston through the club. Winston likes to say that Nisei Ski Club is secretly a matchmaking club and he might be right. We counted 30 couples who have met through the club and married but we’re sure the couple count is in the hundreds. If there weren’t a Nisei Ski Club, many of us would have never met. Thanks, Hi!

I met Hi in the late 1990s when he was active in the club again. He attended many of the weeklong trips like the Steamboat Springs trip in 2005 and the Panorama trip in 2007.

NSC Presidents – Steamboat Springs (2005)

Pajama party night – Panorama Trip (2007)

Hi and Tom organized the club’s yearly salmon fishing trip for many years. Until these trips, some of us (like me) had never gone salmon fishing before. Thanks to them, I caught my first wild salmon.

Hi and Tom organized yearly fishing trips

Besides skiing and fishing, Hi helped the club with its year-round activities. For many years, NSC used to make Chinese chicken salad to sell at Nikkei Matsuri. Winston remembers meeting Hi at the Mountain View Buddhist Temple. Winston picked up the chicken and Hi picked up the lettuce. Hi had to drive all the way to Tanimura & Antle Farms in Salinas and back — easily a 160 mile round-trip! That says a lot about Hi.

Hi delivered the lettuce for making NSC’s Chinese chicken salad

Stewardship of the club has been passed on but the club holds steadfast to its original principles. Hi’s objective of creating a club to promote the love of snow sports, friendship, and fun in the community still holds true. We are lucky to share in the legacy that Hi has left and we will miss him greatly.

 Hoyt Nelson

It was a pretty hot day for San Francisco, but because of its elevation, shadiness on Mt. Davidson trails and the fact that we were done before the temperature peaked, all 7 of us agreed we were better off than in San Jose.   Homes and gardens in this district are generally beautiful, but not over the top (as in the Sea Cliff area). We were treated to lots of fuchsias, forget-me-nots and other flowers not normally found in the wild along the steep trails. Unfortunately, ivy vines have nearly killed many of the trees along the way. The 103 ft. concrete cross at the top was awesome, but the view (normally one of the best in the city) was somewhat obscured by smoke from the forest fires north of San Francisco. After finishing, we walked by many interesting restaurants along nearby W. Portal Ave. before settling on Fres ca (Peruvian tapas, etc). Not many had tried Peruvian fruit drink – chicha, but I persuaded us to get a pitcher – which all agreed was just right after a hike. It wasn’t until we got a few miles south on the way home that we realized how much hotter it was back home.

Hoyt Nelson

On July 12th, eleven club members and friends met at the base of the grand Pacheco stairs on a balmy day in San Francisco. We trooped by many grand and beautifully landscaped (except for the many brown lawns – in honor of our drought) followed by neat homes from the 1040s to 1960s. From Golden Gates Heights Park, we got good views looking west over the Sunset neighborhood and ocean, but even more 270 degree sweeping views to the north over Golden Gate Park from Grandview Park. The highlight however was the magnificent Moraga stairs with its sweeping vertical diorama of sea creatures, under land animals, under birds, under stars and the sun at the top. The hike was sprinkled with more than a dozen stairways which primed us for a delicious dim sum lunch nearby on Irving between 26/27th Avenues. A few of us also shopped for more food across the street.

Armand Gutierrez, NSC President

As we enter August, I was reminded by Mammoth Mountain to lock in on low season pass rates for the upcoming season. As they said in their email – “let the count down to winter begin!” And with all the news about a 90% chance for a strong El Niño, that’s enough to get me excited about the upcoming season. Of course, that 90% is only a prediction and the real deal will be if there is plenty of rain starting in November.

The Mountain View Obon Festival was quite exciting this year and I would like to thank the following volunteers: Alex Kami, Bill Lee, Curtis Otaguro, Wes Kawase, Brian Hess, Ken Kato, and David Uyeda. Once again NSC has stepped up to the plate and volunteered for this event.

 Coming up, we have Hoyt Nelson and David Schultz leading the St. Francis Woods Hike on August 16^th. This is a very popular hike so be sure to gander at the flyer for details.

August Pizza Social

At one of our past board meetings, we had lunch at The Garret in Campbell and feasted on a couple of great pizzas. After a lively discussion, I mentioned that this would be a great place to host a pizza social for the club. I don’t recall having an event like a pizza social so let’s give this a try. What’s the purpose of this pizza social? Well, for starters I think it would be a great way to get members to sit around the table, talk about skiing, quaff an ale or two, and enjoy the NSC camaraderie. Mark your calendar for August 27^th and let’s have an old fashioned pizza social at The Garret in Campbell at 6:30pm. Yes, it’s a Thursday evening but what better way to get a head start on the weekend. An Evite will be sent out later this month to remind you of the event, plus date/time and directions.

Park City/Canyons Ski Week 2016

The Park City/Canyons trip is moving along well and so far we have 28 signups. I am expecting about eight more people to signup, which will bring us up to 36. There’s room for 40 people so if you haven’t signed up now is the time to do so. This year we’ll be having a mid-week potluck dinner, something we haven’t had for several years. This is always a fun night visiting other condos and sampling the best of their cuisine. Don’t forget to get the Tahoe Local Pass (http://www.skiheavenly.com/plan-your-trip/season-passes/season-passes-explorer.aspx), which will be good for five days of lifts at Park City/Canyons as well as Heavenly Valley, Northstar, and Kirkwood. And if you ski a sixth day, then your lift ticket will be half-price.

Here’s a blast from the past! I found some pictures of my NSC skip trip to the Canyons, Utah in 1999. There was a lot of snow on that trip. The skiers really enjoyed fresh powder that went up to the knees.

The El Nino watch is on for Utah. It’s not clear what El Nino will bring for Utah in the winter. Regardless of whether the snow is great or not, the NSC camaraderie is always tops. Check out this picture of happy NSC’ers.

Karen,
Please thank all the volunteers who helped out at the bazaar this year. As always I appreciate their time and efforts in helping to make the Beer booth a resounding success. Sadly, I am retiring as chairman of the beer booth this year. I really appreciated all of your help over the past years in being able to get volunteers from the Nissei Ski Club. Take care and I will see you.

Thanks,
Grant Joo

A big thank you to our volunteers: Alex Kami, Bill Lee, Curtis Otaguro, Wes Kawase, Brian Hess, Ken Kato, and David Uyeda who manned the beer booth on July 18-19. Here’s a picture of David Uyeda on duty at the booth.