Lions Club Pancake Breakfast. Courtesy photo
On Saturday, September 19, the annual Seattle First Hill Lions Club Pancake Breakfast will be held at Blaine United Methodist Church to benefit Seattle senior residences, including the Kawabe House, Kin On, Legacy House, and Nikkei Manor.
Karen Ko, the club chapter president since 2016, is leading the fundraising efforts.
“It’s a breakfast that involves all of the members, their families, friends, supporters, and most importantly, I think, is just a wonderful place for the community to gather,” she said. “You hear over and over and over again when you’re at the pancake breakfast, people saying, ‘Oh, I haven’t seen you for a whole year; it was at the last pancake breakfast that we talked,’ and it just has become a real, traditional place for friends and family to catch up and reconnect.”
Since 1984, the Lions Club has organized an all-you-can-eat breakfast of pancakes, eggs, Portuguese sausage, rice, tsukemono (Japanese pickled cabbage), and more for a $20 ticket.
The Seattle First Hill Lions Club chapter is part of the international service organization of 1.4 million members in more than 200 countries and is based in the Chinatown-International District. According to Ko, it began post-World War II after Japanese American businessmen decided they wanted to join this service organization but were denied because of racism. They created their own chapter in 1954 and became the first Japanese American Lions Club in the country.
After breakfast, the Lions Club plans to volunteer with one of the club’s best-known causes: serving people with vision and hearing disabilities. They put collection boxes for glasses around the Chinatown International District, First Hill and Capitol Hill, including one in Tai Tung, where they meet regularly. The collected glasses are then transported to a recycling center in Olympia.
“So in mid-October, we’ll be going down to clean and help recycle the glasses because they’ve got a lot and always need help. And so it’s a completely volunteer-run project and so they’re always looking to Lions Clubs to help come and do that work,” said Ko, “One of the really fabulous things about Lions is that, when you donate to lions, you know that the money that you’re donating is going to go directly to the need, because there’s no administrative or overhead cost that are taken out of that.”
The club chapter also sponsors scholarships for nearby Seattle high school seniors, funded by the bake sale during the annual pancake fundraiser. Ko says 600 attendees and 70 volunteers are expected at this year’s fundraiser, which is lower than pre-pandemic numbers. However, she is hopeful about the future of club membership, which is welcoming more younger Gen-X members in a historically senior-member club.
The Club members meet for lunch on the first Tuesday of the month at noon and at 6:00 pm on the third Thursday of the month at Tai Tung. Meetings are for members and their guests, but the club also welcomes new C-ID community members.
Tickets for the Pancake Breakfast can be bought directly from members, including International Examiner board member Bruce Miyahara, or at the event doors beginning at 8 a.m. on September 19.
Hong Ta (she/her) is a news writer from South Seattle and grew up going to the CID, specifically in Little Saigon. She graduated from the University of Puget Sound with degrees in Political Science and Spanish. You can read more of her work at thienhongta.com.
