February 12th – Eyeglasses cleaning

On a beautiful but breezy Sunday, February 12 at 8:00 am, 12 Hawaii Kai Lions, 14 Kaiser High School Leos (including advisor Gordon Chun and brother Brandon), and 3 guests sacrificed their Super Bowl morning for the Eyeglass Recycling project. Thank you to Lion Frances for allowing us to use her garage due to anticipated high gusts and rain. Guests included Winston Watarai, D50 Leo Advisor.

Some Leos sorted and selected only reusable eyeglasses, while everyone else washed and wiped the 2,067 eyeglasses and packed them in shipping boxes. Lions who helped with the project were Silvia Ardila, Kendrick Chang, Cynthia Chun, Sandy Gomes, Alvin Hayashibara, Stan Ito, Walter Kuriowa, Frances Lum, Marja Leivo, Appan Subramanian, CIS Lyn Yee, and Ellsworth Fujii.

Two potential HK Lions, Krysta Gallagher and Diane Taira, also helped with the cleaning. Non-prescription sunglasses were placed in separate boxes and will be given to Lion Chris Chow, Waikiki 2000 LC who coordinates the collection of sunglasses that are given to foreign fishermen who are at sea for months and can’t afford to buy sunglasses.

This year, due to downgraded Covid restrictions, we were again able to enjoy pizza and socializing after the cleaning was completed. Thank you to the Lions who collected and stored eyeglasses from the various businesses and optometrists throughout the year.

Thank you to Cynthia who made her delicious oatmeal/raisin and peanut butter cookies for the volunteers! Nine boxes of recycled eyeglasses were dropped at DHX on Monday. We were done by 10:30 so everyone was able to watch the Super Bowl. Congratulations, Kansas City Chiefs!!!