Fundraising Dinner for Japan
June 8, 2011 Update: Today Kaori finally decided and donated the money to a local NPO Japanese organization. It is called 'Momo Kaki Ikueikai'. It was recently organized by the same group that put together the NPO (Non Profit Organization) for the Hanshin earthquake disasater in the 1990's that helped take care of the children who lost their parents. They concentrate on support for education expenses. The total amount we donated (all that we received in donations) was $3,230 which was changed to 248,959 yen (after 525 yen fees).

May 29th update: Kaori has been extremely busy with our daughter's preparations for Valencia University in September and work on our properties etc. (and a national English test she took today). She apologizes that she hasn't had more time to meet various organizations and decide. She has pretty much determined to give it to the local organization mentioned before. We will announce that next week just before she flies back to America.
May 11th update: Kaori has found a good local volunteer organization that works directly orphans of families where both parents have died or at least one parent has died in the earthquake/tsunami. 100% of the money goes to the victims. She will gather some more information this week, but so far she feels very good with what she's finding and thinks this may be where she donates the money.
May 5th update: Kaori has tried again to work with individual families but there is still a lot of red tape in the way so they they aren't able to really accept the help individually to the point where they could leave the large shelters and rent a private apartment etc. Apparently personal help may be possible in the future but now it appears that we may just have to donate the money to the Japan Red Cross or another local charity working with the victims (if we aren't able to find a way to help an individual family out within the next couple of weeks we will donate it to one of these charities- and of course, provide all the details at that time).
*April 24th update: Kaori and  Shanon arrived back in Tokyo Thursday evening. They took the grand total of $3,120 in donations (Thank you everyone!). Kaori is checking on helping a family. To my understanding from our last phone conversation, she's found 1 possible difficulty in that those staying in the temporary and often make shift shelters (like school gyms sleeping on the hard floors with just a small number of bathrooms for hundreds of people) may not be allowed to leave the facilities to rent other places temporarily-- some technicality as to who can receive eventual assistance etc.). She will continue checking and find the best place for the donations (possibly having to settle on giving it to a good non-profit organization that is helping to aleviate some of the suffering and discomfort at the shelters- although we still have hopes of finding an individual family, possibly one of those that haven't even been able to get in any kind of shelter because of the defficiency of enough places for the 600,000 plus evacuees).
*April 16th update: We now have a total of $2,860 (and still more pledged which should put us over $3,000). Thanks again to everyone! Kaori will be going back to Tokyo on Tuesday, April 19th and quickly try to find the right organization or family to help.
*April 8th update: We've received $500 of pledged money bringing the total to $2,585 (and still some more likely to come). We've continued researching organizations and have even applied to search for a needy family with a site that is trying to link victims with those capable and willing to help.
*At a donator's recommendation, we are now including the address to send donations if you'd like:  Kaori Southwick, PO Box 1252, Littlefield, AZ 86432
From further research and thinking, we are now quite determined to find a homeless family or couple from the tsunami area and get them an apartment in Tokyo and help them find work etc.
*April 1, 11 p.m. update:  Wow! Only 6 days from the first email we sent out...Almost 50 people attended the dinner and $2,085 in donations! (about $400 from people who couldn't attend that Allie brought over). And we still have over $500 in pledges that should be received soon.
And I forgot to mention Ron Swenson who contacted the Spectrum to get us the newspaper article (this accounted for almost half of all the people). Thank you Ron!
Thanks so much for all of you who have donated!
Thanks to Hiroko, Yoshiko, Reiko, Atsuko, Allie, Ed, Cedrick, Rachel and Kaitlin for your help in preparation, serving and cleanup (and anyone else who might have chipped in). And a special thanks to Dave Jorgensen and Christina Osborn for the wonderful performance.
**April 1, 1:00 p.m. update** We now have over 40 people and a few more pledges. THANK YOU Everyone!
**April 1, 10:00 a.m. update**
*RSVP from 34 people and probably more,  and pledges from 10 who can't attend. 
**March 31st 9:00 p.m. update**
*We now have RSVP from 27 people and donation pledges from 6 more who can't make it.
Dave Jorgensen, a professional song writer/guitarist/singer and his professional singing partner Christina Osborn have offered to perform a couple of songs for us at the dinner (they're act/group is known as Ninadavo).

As you probably know, we are planning a Japanese fundraising dinner in 4 days on Friday, April 1, 5:30- 7:30 p.m. at the Vista Del Sol Club house at 39 N. Valley View Drive, St. George (suggested donation of $25 per person but please come even if you can't donate that much). We would like to request RSVP by email at japanus@msn.com    (Driving directions at the bottom)

So far we have received $250 promises for donations from people who won't even be able to attend the dinner. We will be donating all the food, drinks and preparation.

There will be an article in the Spectrum newspaper Thursday from an interview with my wife and daughter who experienced the earthquake in Tokyo and came over to America 5 days later. The article will also mention the fundraiser dinner, so we are hoping for a  fair number of people to attend.

We will try and update this page weekly for the next few weeks to tell you what is going on with the donations and which organization we end up donating to. We are researching local, on the ground organizations and determining which would be the most effective.

We also encourage you to make a donation to the Red Cross or other organization that you trust if you need a receipt/tax deduction from a non-profit organization or if don't know us that well. We just want to get some donations over to the Japanese victims by sending it to the most effective group/organization to utilize it well. 

We will try and update this page a few times during the next few weeks to tell you what is going on with the donations and which organization we end up donating to. Kaori is currently looking into local organizations that can move quickly, or even considering the possibility of helping one or two specific families (in which case, we could maybe have updates with pictures and comments from them) .

We hope to see you there!

Warm regards,
Edward, Kaori and Shanon 

Directions: Just drive north on Bluff Street and turn left (west) on Sunset Blvd., then take the first left at Valley View Drive and go south for about a mile to 39 N. Valley View Drive. Then turn right into the Vista Del Sol entrance and the club house is directly in front.
Call our mobiles 435-669-6615 or 435-669-6614 if you get lost.