{"id":193443,"date":"2024-03-15T08:00:07","date_gmt":"2024-03-15T18:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=193443"},"modified":"2024-03-14T21:30:50","modified_gmt":"2024-03-15T07:30:50","slug":"alan-fujimoto-dentist-culinary-student","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2024\/03\/15\/alan-fujimoto-dentist-culinary-student\/","title":{"rendered":"From dentist to al dente\u2014student goes from treating mouths to feeding them"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> 2<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span><div class=\"responsive-video-wrap-post\"><figure class=\"wp-block-embed wp-block-embed-youtube is-type-video is-provider-youtube epyt-figure\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\"><div class=\"epyt-video-wrapper\"><iframe  id=\"_ytid_21494\"  width=\"620\" height=\"349\"  data-origwidth=\"620\" data-origheight=\"349\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/7odOBxa9O70?enablejsapi=1&origin=https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu&rel=0&autoplay=0&cc_load_policy=0&cc_lang_pref=&iv_load_policy=1&loop=0&fs=1&playsinline=0&autohide=2&theme=dark&color=red&controls=1&disablekb=0&\" class=\"__youtube_prefs__  no-lazyload\" title=\"From dentist to al dente\u2014student goes from treating mouths to feeding them\"  allow=\"fullscreen; accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen data-no-lazy=\"1\" data-skipgform_ajax_framebjll=\"\"><\/iframe><\/div><\/div><\/figure><\/div>\n<p>A painful, disabling condition caused <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Hawai&#699;i<\/span> Island dentist Alan Fujimoto to retire several years ago, after decades of practice.<\/p>\n<div style=\"float:right;clear:right;margin:0 0 0 15px;\"><figure id=\"attachment_193878\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-193878\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-a-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"Fujimoto in culinary class\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-193878\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-a-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-a-130x73.jpg 130w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-a.jpg 676w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-193878\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Alan Fujimoto<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"float:right;clear:right;margin:0 0 0 15px;\"><figure id=\"attachment_193880\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-193880\" style=\"width: 214px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-dentist-214x300.jpg\" alt=\"Fujimoto in scrubs with dental equipment\" width=\"214\" height=\"300\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-193880\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-dentist-214x300.jpg 214w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-dentist-93x130.jpg 93w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-dentist.jpg 250w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 214px) 100vw, 214px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-193880\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Fujimoto in his previous career<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n<p>Dentistry\u2019s loss was <a href=\"https:\/\/hawaii.hawaii.edu\/welina-mai-welcome\"><span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Hawai&#699;i<\/span> Community College<\/a>\u2019s gain. Now a second-year culinary arts student, Fujimoto, 68, was recently rolling out tagliatelle pasta with the intensity and focus of an artist, for a bountiful Italian meal to be served in the on-campus restaurant <a href=\"https:\/\/hawaii.hawaii.edu\/bamboo-hale\">Bamboo Hale<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Fujimoto loved cooking since he was a child. He had inquired about the college\u2019s culinary program while he was still practicing dentistry, but was told it was a full-time commitment. So, when he was sidelined and his physical therapist told him he needed movement and exercise, the timing was right to jump from the proverbial frying pan into the fire&#8212;where 11-hour days are not unheard of.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I&#8217;m looking for a vocational skill and to tell the truth, it&#8217;s pretty rigorous. It is time consuming,&rdquo; Fujimoto said. &ldquo;If you don&#8217;t put in the time, you are not gonna get anything out of it.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Yet, his <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Hawai&#699;i<\/span> <abbr title=\"Community College\">CC<\/abbr> experiences stand in stark contrast to the sometimes harsh eight years of formal higher education he needed to become a dentist, when he remembers getting yelled at\u2014a lot.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I went to school for a very long time and I went through a lot of different professors, different educational systems,&rdquo; said Fujimoto. &ldquo;<span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Hawai&#699;i<\/span> <abbr>CC<\/abbr> is the only one&#8212;I can say this really, very sincerely&#8212;they&#8217;re the most supportive faculty that I&#8217;ve ever met in my life.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<h2>&lsquo;Awesome&rsquo; student brings experience to class<\/h2>\n<figure id=\"attachment_193881\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-193881\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-class-300x300.jpg\" alt=\"Two culinary students plating a pasta dish\" width=\"300\" height=\"300\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-193881\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-class-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-class-130x130.jpg 130w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-class.jpg 676w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-193881\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Fujimoto (right) in class<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Chef Instructor Philton Velasco called Fujimoto a &ldquo;special guy&rdquo; who is willing to share his knowledge, life experiences and more with his classmates, most of whom are decades younger. Fujimoto brought his pasta maker to use for the Italian cooking sessions and his chocolate fountain to celebrate a classmate who was getting married.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;He&#8217;s awesome,&rdquo; said Velasco. &ldquo;He&#8217;s got a great understanding of food.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Chancellor Susan Kazama said she knows of just one or two other people who have transitioned to something totally different after full professional careers.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;He&#8217;s an excellent dentist and then he moved into something else, where he can unleash his creativity,&rdquo; Kazama said. &ldquo;You can start from a professional career and then reinvent yourself into what you truly want and that&#8217;s what I see him doing because I can see the love that he has for how he creates and cooks.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>This is not Fujimoto\u2019s last reinvention. He has his sights set on becoming a master sommelier, but that will have to wait until after graduation from <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Hawai&#699;i<\/span> <abbr>CC<\/abbr> in May.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_193879\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-193879\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-dining-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"Two people seated at a table holding glasses of champagne\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-193879\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-dining-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-dining-130x73.jpg 130w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hawaii-culinary-fujimoto-dining.jpg 676w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-193879\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Alan and Phyllis<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>&ldquo;One thing I truly do want to do more than furthering my education and pursuing my other hobbies after finishing the culinary program would be to be a better husband and supporter for my wife Phyllis to whom I&#8217;ve been married for over 40 years,&rdquo; Fujimoto said. &ldquo;These last two years at <abbr>HCC<\/abbr> were very demanding and time consuming and I couldn\u2019t have done it without her continued support and understanding. I\u2019m really looking forward to staying at home more, cooking for her and catering to her flavor profiles more than anything else.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8212;By Kelli Abe Trifonovitch<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Hawai&#699;i<\/span> Island lost a dentist, it gained an &lsquo;awesome&rsquo; culinary student.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,12],"tags":[184,61,71],"class_list":["post-193443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-people","category-video","tag-culinary","tag-hawaii-community-college","tag-uh-community-colleges","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193443"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":193884,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193443\/revisions\/193884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}