Lakeshorian

The Lakeshorian, 13 February 2007

2007-02-13T17:48:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
February 13, 2007
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

This week’s program…
Teresa Dellar is the Executive Director of the West Island Palliative Care Residence. She will speak to us about the importance of palliative care for terminally ill patients and their families, and of the importance of private contributions from organizations like ours to the WIPCR.

Birthdays or anniversaries…
Happy Anniversary, Bill & June today, February 13th!
Happy Birthday, Mary Saad Sunday, February 18th!

Future Programs…
February is World Understanding Month!
Feb 20: Ryan Young, teacher of Creative Arts at John Abbott College, is a member of the Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue Environment Committee. He will share with us his “Vision of a Green West Island.”
Wednesday, February 21st is our club’s 46th birthday!
Friday, February 23rd is Rotary’s 102nd birthday!
Feb 27: If all goes according to schedule, Jesper will finally get to give his Classification Talk.
March is Literacy Month!
Mar 6: It must be classification talk season. Today it will be Maureen’s turn.

Coming Events…
Feb 16: Andy’s annual fundraising Hungarian supper—a Magyar Feast—at Fritz Farm, 20477 Lakeshore Road, Baie d’Urfé. Tickets are only $25 per person. Get yours today!

Last week’s meeting…
A super-sized crowd of 20 members and 5 guests gathered in the Perno dining room of the Holiday Inn last Tuesday, to hear about Andy’s annual treks to Paraguay.
We were pleased to welcome three members of Andy’s fan club: his wife, Kathleen, and daughter, Andrea, and friend and neighbour Linda Tait, who was actually a guest of her hubby, Wayne. Present as special guests of the club were two directors of the West island Women’s Shelter, Kim Cairnduff and Danielle Guay.
We missed the fellowship of Jesper, Abie, Jules, Bob, Ted, Ghandi, Anne and George.
We also had two short-term guests, who were unable to stay, even for a free lunch. They were Ryan Quinn and his dad, Michael.
To permit Ryan to get back to school, we invited him to the podium before lunch, to receive our club’s contribution to the cost of his class’s upcoming trip to the Dominican Republic. Ryan had told us about this worthwhile project when he visited our club on January 2nd.
Our “Rotary Minute,” a new weekly feature from new member John, reminded us that “Rotary’s strength is in its members.” John went on to explain that it’s not just about the numbers; it is recognizing that the good work Rotary does is the result of teamwork by clubs and Rotarians around the world. One of the secrets of Rotary’s success comes from having members on the ground everywhere we are needed. To build on that advantage, John told us, “every Rotarian should make it his or her goal to invite one potential member to join their club.” Look what 1.2 million Rotarians are doing around the world. Imagine what 2 million of us could do!
Susan announced that she would be taking a one-year leave of absence from her John Abbott College job. He prime motivation is to find a new position, hopefully here in Montreal, but opportunities in Ottawa and Toronto would also receive her consideration. She will be leaving for her annual vacation in Barbados shortly. Her sabbatical will begin on her return.
Wayne invited Fran, the organizer of our annual golf tournament, to come forward to present our club’s donation to the West Island Women’s Shelter.
After asking Kim and Danielle to join her at the podium, Fran reminded us how important it is for West Island women who live in fear of domestic abuse have this harbour of refuge to turn to for shelter, comfort and the means to start a new life for themselves and their children. Fran then presented our cheque, along with our club’s gratitude for the personal help the WIWS provided before and during last year’s tournament.
In thanking our club for this donation, WIWS Executive Director Kim admitted that she was raised in a family where there was conjugal violence. “As a child in bed, I heard the raised voices and the blows; in the morning I saw the results. When I was 22 I took my Mom to the hospital to have a gash in her forehead stitched. She stayed with my stepfather, in spite of everything, until he died. I wish we had had a shelter to go to.” She went on to point out how different it is today, describing the services the shelter makes available for women and their children who are victims of conjugal violence. “When I consider what other services we might offer, I often ask myself what my Mom would have wished for?” She also gave us a progress report on the new home they are building. There were lots of questions from the audience.
President Art introduced Andy and invited him to tell us what it’s like to travel alone to a foreign land where the people speak a different language, yet you know you must try to make a positive difference in their quality of life before you return home.
Andy told us he was going to take us all with him on a trip to Paraguay, so we could really get a feel of what is involved in such a mission. “We’ll skip the many hours of preparation needed for this trip, like applying for grants from the district and from The Rotary Foundation to help pay for travel and living expenses and to help cover the cost of materials to build the structures I’m going to tell you about in a minutes, and petitioning Health Partners International of Canada for eight Physician’s Travel Packs (16 cases) of medicine, worth $50,000 wholesale, for the cost of handling and packing, a total of only $4,400, and pleading with the airlines to let us take all 16 boxes as personal baggage, without having to pay excess baggage charges. And not to mention getting all 16 boxes into and out of my garage and over to the airport so they can travel on the same flights as we do.” All the while he’s telling us this, we’re seeing photos on the screen, showing boxes that are each as big as a case of 24, piled up to the ceiling of Andy’s garage, and of Knud helping with the TRF and HPIC paperwork and then helping load and transport the medicines.
“Okay,” Andy continued. “We get off the plane and start walking toward Paraguayan Customs, passing a couple of armed soldiers on the way and praying that you’re not about to be accused of trying to smuggle drugs into their country. Fortunately, we are Rotarians and we’re being met by local Rotarians at the airport; they get us through customs without any hassle.
“So now we head into town, with our new Rotarian friends, who have brought along an extra van to carry the medicine to the hospital. As we walk the last part of the route we pass a small child begging in the street. You give her a toy. She is excited, never having received much more than a glance from most passers-by.
“In the children’s ward, we talk to more kids, with the help of a Rotarian interpreter, and we realize most of these kids will spend the next few weeks of life that they have left in this ward, because they have leukemia.” At this point, Andy’s voice breaks, as pictures of some of the kids he met on previous trips flash on the screen and he realizes that none of them are there any more.
Andy showed us photos that tore at our heartstrings—kids pouring through garbage cans, looking for food and undoubtedly getting a side dish of parasites that they didn’t bargain for, schoolchildren turned out in their finest duds, each waving a small Canadian flag that Andy had brought for them. We saw what passes for toilets in the schools—outdoor loos, without doors, consisting of a hole in the ground. Some we made of brick, “but that’s no good,” Andy told us, “because they’re not portable. What do you do when the hole is full?”
He told us we will be building wooden latrines, with doors and roof vents and a seat over the hole. And when that hole fills up, two adults can move the whole thing to a fresh location.
We saw Andy attending a Rotary club fundraiser for a women who had adopted 113 children! And we saw other photos that brightened the screen—youth exchange students attending the Rotary club’s 30th birthday party, and huge, beautiful falls, not unlike Niagara, across the border in Brazil, photos of orchids that resembled the flowers that adorned our main course last Tuesday.
Through the magic of photography we visited the renal care center where children and adults were receiving dialysis on machines donated by the Port St. Lucie (Florida) Rotary club.
Andy told us he had spoken by phone to the GSE team members who had stayed with him and Kathleen when they were in Montreal last fall. They plan to help him on this upcoming trip, which will see Andy fly off to Asuncion, Paraguay on April 11th.
There were lots of questions, about how many latrines he plans to build, the cost to get al this done, and the financing arrangements.
Andy was thanked by Wayne for his very moving slideshow and emotional presentation, but even more for his caring nature and untiring energy that are making a difference to the poorest of the poor in a land where poverty is a way of life.
Art and Andy reminded us that our club’s contribution to Andy’s Paraguay project 2007 is largely being covered by the proceeds from Andy’s Hungarian Supper this coming Friday. We need to all be there for Andy!

The Lakeshorian, 6 February 2007

2007-02-12T17:56:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
February 6, 2007

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

This week’s program…
Andy will tell us all about what he plans to accomplish during this year’s trip to Paraguay, coming up soon. He will again be profiting from his association with the Rotary Club of Port St. Lucie, Florida and their district, both of whom are contributing to this year’s project, as they have in the past.
He has also received tremendous support from Knud, who has handled all the paperwork to try and obtain the maximum amount of matching grant money from our district and The Rotary Foundation.

Birthdays or anniversaries…
Happy Birthday, Gladys Mazid tomorrow, February 7th!
Happy Birthday, Jules Thursday, February 8th!

Future Programs…
February is World Understanding Month!
Feb 13: Teresa Dellar is the Executive Director of the West Island Palliative Care Residence. She will speak to us about the importance of palliative care for terminally ill patients and their families.
Feb 20: Ryan Young, teacher of Creative Arts at John Abbott College, is a member of the Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue Environment Committee. He will share with us his “Vision of a Green West Island.”
Feb 27: If all goes according to schedule, Jesper will finally get to give his Classification Talk.

Coming Events…
Feb 16: Andy’s annual fundraising Hungarian supper—a Magyar Feast—at Fritz Farm, 20477 Lakeshore Road, Baie d’Urfé. Tickets are only $25 per person. Get yours today!

Last week’s meeting…
An attendance of sixteen members grew to eighteen during last Tuesday’s meeting, as will be explained later in this bulletin.
We were also pleased to welcome our guest speaker, Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholar Dr Louise Tyvaert, as well as future Ambassadorial Scholar hopeful, Christina Barrucco, who is our club’s candidate for the 2008-09 scholarship, and George Bradley, guest of Graham.
We missed the fellowship of Abie, Jules, Susan, Brahm, Bob, Fran, Ted, Ghandi, Anne and George.

First thing on the agenda was a new weekly feature called “The Rotary Minute,” by one of our newest members—in fact, at the time he gave us the première edition he wasn’t yet a member of our club—John Robertson. For his first Rotary Minute, John refreshed our collective memory about “The Object of Rotary,” which goes like this:
The Object of Rotary
is to encourage and foster the ideal of service as a basis of worthy enterprise and, in particular, to encourage and foster:
FIRST.
The development of acquaintance as an opportunity for service;
SECOND.
High ethical standards in business and professions; the recognition of the worthiness of all useful occupations; and the dignifying of each Rotarian’s occupation as an opportunity to serve society;
THIRD.
The application of the ideal of service in each Rotarian’s personal, business, and community life;
FOURTH.
The advancement of international understanding, goodwill, and peace through a world fellowship of business and professional persons united in the ideal of service.
Next up was Andy, who reminded us about his Hungarian supper on Friday, February 16th. See notice in Coming Events.
After Sergeant-at-Arms Stan collected a huge hoard of happy dollars from an obviously euphoric crowd, President Art asked Graham and Jesper to introduce our two new members, John Robertson and Sam Mortazavi, respectively, prior to their induction by Wayne, Art and their sponsors.
John Robertson, PhD, joined the Rotary Club of Warren, Ohio, in 1997, while he was an Administrator at Kent State University, involved in student affairs, institutional research funding and public relations. He also taught several courses and continues to write essays on social commentary. John served with the US Navy until, in his twenties, he was involved in an automobile accident which left him a quadriplegic. He is a Paul Harris Fellow.

An Iranian by birth, Sam Mortazavi moved to Montreal in 1983. His first job was in the advertising department of the MUCTC, but he had a lot of energy, so he also took on a heavy load of part-time study courses, and started working part-time in an Italian restaurant. By the mid-nineties he owned two Italian restaurants and worked as a volunteer with an NDG food bank. Upon graduation he worked for the Port of Montreal, then became a project manager with the Montreal branch of the international engineering firm of Landis & Gyr.
In 2002 he decided to become a real estate agent and became licensed last year as an independent real estate agent.
Sam has been actively involved in volunteerism, including Gilda’s Club, a broad-based network of cancer support groups.
Wayne read the charge to our two new members, then their he and Art and the members’ sponsors gave them their pins, badges and new member information pack that Sergeant-at-Arms Stan had prepared. Everyone offered John and Sam the right hand of Rotary.

Then while he had the floor, Wayne reminded us that the Scot-Canadian Rotary Curling Tour plans way, way ahead. We sent our team to Scotland last fall. The Scots will be coming here in 2008 and we will be going back to Scotland in the fall of 2010. In preparation for that tour, Wayne told us he would like to start a Rotary curling club here on the West Island. He asked members to think about the idea and said we would hear more about it in the coming weeks.
Next on the program, Tina Barrucco was introduced to the club by President Art, who said he and Helen had been friends and neighbours of the Barrucco family for many years. Tina thanked the club for the confidence we are showing in her by proposing her as a candidate for a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship. She is a singer of classical music, has her Bachelor’s degree in music from McGill and is currently in the Masters program at l’Université de Montréal.
PDG Bill then introduced our guest speaker. Louise Tyvaert (pronounced tee-vahr) was born and raised in Paris with her parents, two brothers and a sister. She obtained her MD from l’Université de Paris, then moved to Lille, where she earned a PhD in Neurology. With her Ambassadorial Scholarship from The Rotary Foundation, Louise is following a doctorial research fellowship program at McGill University and the Montreal Neurological Institute. When she completes her scholarship year, she plans to remain one more year, in order to complete her PhD in Neuroscience.
Louise told us she would speak about her home, her Rotary scholarship and her medical specialty, which is epilepsy.
With an excellent PowerPoint presentation she covered all of the above with grace and efficiency, managing to complete her address and answer a few questions by our usual closing time of 2 o’clock!
She reminded us that the mission of a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar is virtually embedded in the fourth Object of Rotary, to promote international understanding and goodwill, by studying in a country other than her own. In addition to gaining a year’s experience in Canada while she studies and does her research, she is developing links and friendships here, and representing the Rotary Club of Arras Vauban, Pas-de-Calais (District 1520).
She told us about that area of France: coal mining, terraced hills, farm crops such as corn, an important historical significance in northeastern Gaul, dating back to before the arrival of the Roman legions under Julius Caesar. She showed us colourful photos of festivals that featured gigantic characters, special costumed structures worn by actors as in a pageant, who move through the crowds of people. Ideally located within an hour’s plane ride from Paris, Brussels or London and a similar distance from the sea, Lille has a famous market and is well-known for its beer, football and a dish the English call Welsh rarebit, made with eggs, cheddar, toast and beer.
She showed us a photo of her medical team at her hospital in Lille, where she provides medical care and does research in the field of epilepsy. She told us she applied for and won this Rotary Foundation scholarship so she could undertake research at the world-renowned Montreal Neurological institute, to study the electrical activity of the brains of epileptics.
She spent time acquainting us with this special disease, which derives its name from the Greek word for possession. It affects 0.6% of Canadians, with over 16,000 new cases every year. It has no regard for geography or wealth.
There are several million neurons in the gray matter of the human brain, in which intercommunication occurs via electrical impulses. Seizures occur when these electrical impulses are abnormal—think of it as electricity leaking out of its conduits.
She showed us several fascinating slides, including one of a patient singing during a seizure.
The challenge is, of course, to modify or control the brain of epileptics to eliminate the seizures. This they do through anti-epileptic drugs and surgery. She said an important discovery is that the oxygen consumption of cells affected by epilepsy, which helps us pinpoint and identify them for surgical removal.
Louise was thanked by Graham for a very exciting and interesting presentation that taught us a lot about epilepsy, a fascinating but poorly understood disease.
Rotary International news…
The RI theme for 2007-2008, as announced by President-Elect Wilf Wilkinson last week, is “Rotary Shares.”

The Lakeshorian, 30 January 2007

2007-02-12T17:53:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
January 30, 2007

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

This week’s program…
Ambassadorial scholar Dr. Louise Tyvaert is sponsored by the Rotary Club of Arras Vauban, in the north of France. Arras, the capital of the département of Pas-de-Calais, is a delightful city with an interesting history that pre-dates the Roman conquest of Gaul by Julius Caesar. It is located about 40 km south of the important city of Lille, which is Louise’s home town.
She is undertaking post-doctoral research at McGill University and the Montreal Neurological Institute. Her Rotary counsellor is PDG Bill Hodges.
She will speak to us today about her impressions of Montreal and, perhaps, will also tell us about her work in the field of neuroscience.

Birthdays or anniversaries?
...none that we’re aware of.

Future Programs…
February is World Understanding Month!
Feb 6: Andy will tell us all about what he plans to accomplish during this year’s trip to Paraguay, coming up soon.
Feb 13: Teresa Dellar is the Executive Director of the West Island Palliative Care Residence. She will speak to us about the importance of palliative care for terminally ill patients and their families.
Feb 20: Ryan Young, teacher of Creative Arts at John Abbott College, is a member of the Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue Environment Committee. He will share with us his “Vision of a Green West Island.”

Coming Events…
Feb 3: McGill Rotaract 3rd Annual Gala! Place: Loews Hotel Vogue, 1425 rue de la Montagne. Time : 6 p.m. Cost: $95 per person. The proceeds from this year’s event will go to a Rotary microcredit project in Ghana.

Last week’s meeting…
Sixteen members and five guests were on hand to hear guest speaker Lucie Lacelle speak to us about a centre for AIDS orphans in north-west Africa
We were pleased to welcome Dr John Robertson, a transferring Rotarian from Warren, Ohio; Heinz Ritter, our newest honorary member; and Jamie Schafer and Brock Dumville, of the McGill Rotaract Club, as well as guest speaker Lucie’s friend, Rita Campeau.
We missed the fellowship of Jesper, Abie, Bob, Fran, PDG Bill, Ghandi, Anne, Eduardo, George and Cameron.
[Our thanks to Susan for taking notes during last week’s meeting, to Stan for the list of attendees and to Peter for the photo. Editor Bill.]
President Art was back at the podium, having recovered from his bout with the flu, and read thank-you letters from NOVA (formerly VON) for the pharmaceutical books (donated by Ted) and from the West Island Palliative Care Residence for our donation from the Golf Tournament
The visiting Rotaractors outlined the festivities to be featured at their gala on February 3rd, which will include a silent auction, a gourmet meal, music and entertainment. Last year they collected $7000 to build a school in Sierra Leone. The proceeds from this year’s gala will be used to help fund a micro-credit program in Ghana.
Susan asked for ideas for goody bags for the District 7040 Foundation Walk, which our club will host on Saturday, May 12, 2007. We expect to have 75 bags to distribute to walkers.
Starting next week, Jennifer announced, John Robertson will be presenting a “Rotary Minute.”
Andy announced that his annual fundraising Hungarian Dinner is coming up.
Knud introduced our speaker. Lucie Lacelle works at the Learning centre of Canada Border Services Agency in Rigaud, Quebec. Last year, while visiting Côte d’Ivoire she met a woman who runs an orphanage in Benin, a small country in northwest Africa, home to over 5 million people. This, said Knud, is the result of that serendipitous meeting.

With the aid of some heart-wrenching photos, Lucie described her visit to Benin from the end of October to mid-December 2006, and the children who are living and dying in the village of Savalou. She came up with the following wish list:
* Collect and deliver computers.
* Donations to sponsor a child at a school called Amour sans frontières, buy books and support school projects.
* Continue her “Pennies for Africa” project. Lucie was overwhelmed with our financial support to date.
She plans to return to Benin in November 2007 and will take some HPIC packs for the village’s only doctor and to help the grandmothers who are taking care of their own and other children. They get some foreign aid from France and French marines on shore leave volunteer at the villages.
Maureen thanked our speaker.

The Lakeshorian, 23 January 2007

2007-02-12T17:47:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
January 23, 2007

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

This week’s program…
Knud has invited Lucie Lacelle to speak to us about her “Pennies for Africa” campaign.
We will also be joined by two representatives of the McGill Rotaract Club, who will have tickets available for their upcoming Third Annual Fundraising Gala (see details below, under Coming Events).

Birthdays or anniversaries…
Happy Birthday, Brahm Thursday, January 25th!
Happy Birthday, Helen Surette Sunday, January 28th!

Future Programs…
January is Rotary Awareness Month!
Jan 30: Dr. Louise Tyvaert will talk about the research she is undertaking at the Montreal Neurological Institute, on a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship.
February is World Understanding Month!
Feb 6: Andy will tell us all about what he plans to accomplish during this year’s trip to Paraguay, coming up soon.
Feb 13: Teresa Dellar is the Executive Director of the West Island Palliative Care Residence. She will speak to us about the importance of palliative care for terminally ill patients and their families.

Coming Events…
Feb 3: McGill Rotaract 3rd Annual Gala! Place: Loews Hotel Vogue, 1425 rue de la Montagne. Time : 6 p.m. Cost: $95 per person. Proceeds to go to: The Rotary Small Loans Program in Ghana, a microcredit project supported by the D7040 WCS Committee.

Last week’s meeting…
Winter-vacationing snowbirds are eating away at our attendance: only 14 members were on hand to hear Nancy Battet and Julie Royale speak to us about community partnerships on the West Island. However, the following visitors rounded out the “lunch crowd” at 20: Jane Lumsden, Executive Director of the Ste-Anne’s Branch of the Victorian Order of Nurses, plus three potentially new members for our club: Stéphane Delisle, transferring in from Club Rotary de Sherbrooke; Sam Mortazavi, a new candidate for Rotary membership being co-sponsored by Stan and Jesper; and Dr John Robertson, transferring in from the Rotary Club of Warren (Ohio).
We missed the fellowship of Abie, Jules, Susan, Fran, PDG Bill, Ted, Ghandi, Anne, Eduardo, George, President Art and Amiel.
[Our thanks to Bob for these wonderfully clear, concise and complete notes on last week’s meeting, to Stan for the list of attednees and to Jennifer, for her cool cell phone photo. Editor Bill.]

Acting President Graham and the VON’s Jane Lumsden

In the absence of President Art, still afflicted by the flu, Graham presided over the meeting; he and Joe Z were joined at the head table by our two guest speakers, Nancy Battet and Julie Royale. Together, they demonstrated “Léger de Main” by drawing the winning ticket for the wine. Another table was missing a ticket and received a free bottle as compensation, thanks to Sergeant Stan’s sword of justice. With the wine flowing so freely, you can understand that everybody was happy!
During the meal Graham announced that Maureen was looking for more information on the McGill Rotaract Gala, coming up on February 3rd. She, and other members with similar queries, were invited to communicate with our temporary snow bird, bulletin editor Bill. Bob interjected that he had just received on his Blackberry an email from Bill heralding that at the Gala’s dinner menu should be great, with food aplenty, so don’t get stuffed on the hors-d’oeuvres.
Joe introduced Nancy Battet, a graduate from Concordia (B. Comm. 1981), who worked after graduation at CP Railways and Hotels. Since 1992 Nancy has worked as Community Partner Liaison with the L.B.P.S.B., which was to be the subject of her presentation.
Nancy introduced Julie Royale, who also handled the computer and projector. Together they managed to keep their audience captivated about this Community Partnership with the school Board. Nancy explained the goal of the partnership as an essential tool to expose the students to the real world and prepare them for their adult professional life. They illustrated a concern shared by all students in the simple words of an anonymous student “Don’t ask me what I want to be until you tell me what’s out there”.
The partnership involves interaction with industry and the services and provides students with a first-hand look at jobs in various sectors. One of the slides listing different sectors did not include Landscaping or Transportation, which triggered passionate comments from Wayne and Coos that these are bona-fide sectors that shouldn’t be overlooked in favour of more glamorous sectors like aviation, technology, etc.
Nancy assured them that they include all occupations in the program and went on to describe the kinds of interface they have with industry for the purpose of supporting curriculum and career awareness, including but not limited to: guest speakers, career days; lab tours; opportunities for enquiry; career fairs; et cetera…and the list goes on.
Nancy and Julie showed us many specific examples of activities which give students access to expertise that they need to choose their careers for success, including:
Visit to bio-botanical labs;
Community experts sharing their expertise with students, like Engineers Without Borders from Concordia and Environnement Jeunesse;
Canadian Forces;
Student-led interviews in space technology;
Teacher Professional Development workshop at the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada;
Interactive Community Database for Grade 6 students, with the Hollie Forest Design & Global TV;
Mini career day at St-Charles Elementary featuring a presentation by a police detective;
Partnership opportunities with the Montreal Neurological Institute;
Unit of Inquiry about Equine Education;
Space and Technology day with aviation (by the late John Scoffield);
International Space Camp: two students were invited by the Cosmodome in Laval to spend a week at such a camp in Alabama;
Unit of Inquiry on Forensics with the SPVM;
Bellat Rx Inc. demonstrating owning and operating a small business and skill application;
Grade 11 discovery day from John Rennie with Police, Golf club etc.; and the list goes on.
Nancy and Julie ended their presentation and invited us to visit the web-site www.emploisetc.ca which contains an Abilities and Careers quiz.
Coos commented that their work is closely related to Rotary’s Vocational Service.
The meeting ran late due to a lot of questions, indicative of the active interest of the audience in this topic. Nancy and Julie were thanked by Stan.
We all sang ‘O Canada’ with gusto.
Other news…
Our outbound Ambassadorial Scholar, James Taylor, who came to our breakfast meeting December 27th, has been selected to participate in the 45th Session of the United nations Commission for Social Development, to be held at UN headquarters in New York February 7-16. The selection committee stated in their letter of acceptance, “The committee feels that, with your outstanding academic and extracurricular credentials, you will make a valuable contribution to the (youth) delegation.” James writes that he is excited about “the opportunity to meet with government officials, UN diplomats and civil society from around the world, to discuss issues related to social development.”
* * *
PDG Coos offers the following trivia tidbit about Canadian coins issued during World War II:
“This is probably old news to many, but I became aware of it only recently. In the middle of World War 2, in 1943, the Government of Canada issued its yearly minting of Canadian coins. The 5-cent piece had always been made of nickel. (hence its name). However, because so much metal was going into the war effort, it was not possible to use nickel that year. Instead they used a mixture of metals (I think it was brass and copper) called ‘tombac.’ As well, instead of the familiar Canadian beaver on the obverse, they used a victory torch and the ‘V-for-Victory’ sign. (V, of course, is also the Roman numeral for the face value of the coin.)
“Here's where it gets interesting. The government was doing everything to encourage people to get involved in the war effort. So, when the minted the coin, they included a message in MORSE CODE, around the edge. Although difficult to read with the naked eye, under a strong magnifying glass the message becomes quite clear.
“It reads: ‘We Win When We Work Willingly’ (each word starting with a ‘W’)
“I thought our members might find it interesting that Morse Code was used on Canadian coinage.”

The Lakeshorian, 16 January 2007

2007-02-12T17:43:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
January 16, 2007

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

This week’s program…

Joe Z has invited Nancy Battet to speak to us about “Interactive Community Partnerships.” Nancy represents the Centre for Educational Excellence of the Lester B. Pearson School Board.

Birthdays or anniversaries…
Happy Anniversary, Joëlle & Michel Leroy January 17th!
Happy “Freedom 55th?” Birthday, Brahm January 25th!
Happy Birthday, Helen Surette January 28th!

Future Programs…
January is Rotary Awareness Month!
Jan 23: Knud has invited Lucie Lacelle to speak to us about her “Pennies for Africa” campaign.
Jan 30: Dr. Louise Tyvaert will talk about the research she is undertaking at the Montreal Neurological Institute, on a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship.
February is World Understanding Month!
Feb 6: Tentatively, Elizabeth Abbott will speak about Dr. Maude Abbott, the first woman to be granted a medical degree from McGill University.

Coming Events…
Feb 3: McGill Rotaract 3rd Annual Gala! Place: Loews Hotel Vogue, 1425 rue de la Montagne. Time : 6 p.m. Cost: $95 per person. Proceeds to go to: The Rotary Small Loans Program in Ghana, a microcredit project supported by the D7040 WCS Committee.

Last week’s meeting…
An excellent turnout of nineteen members and five visitors shared our Rotary meeting last Tuesday. We were pleased to welcome our guest speaker, Nancy Hain, and visiting Rotarians David Siversky, Past President of the Hawkesbury club, and John Robertson, from Warren, Ohio, who is in the process of transferring to our club. We were also pleased to welcome Linda, guest of hubbie Wayne, and Don Crawford, guest of Jesper.
We missed the fellowship of Abie, Jules, Fran, Ted, Ghandi, Anne and George.
PDG Bill told us that our club had been invited by the Sun Lakes (Arizona) club to participate in a Rotary Friendship Exchange with about ten couples from that club. The plan would be for us to visit them for from 5 to 10 days in February or March; they would visit us for a similar length of time during May, June or July. Couples from our club would be paired with couples from theirs for the duration of each visit. Itineraries would be worked out once we have a group of interested couples at our end. Visit http://www.sunlakesrotary.com to learn more about their club and let Bill know by email on or before January 20th if you are interested in pursuing this idea further. So far Wayne & Linda and Graham & Margaret have expressed such interest. That obviously is not enough to do this exchange on our own, so if no other members from our club indicate an interest, Bill will invite other Montreal clubs to participate in this short but interesting exchange. The cost would be limited to the airfare (about $600-700 per person), plus the cost of meals and entertainment at the other end.
Joe Z introduced our guest speaker, Nancy Hain, Assistant Director General of the Lester B. Pearson School Board, with specific responsibility for its eleven secondary schools. Until the end of the 2004-05 academic year, she was principal of John Rennie High School in Pointe Claire.
Nancy began by thanking us for introducing her to the concept of “Happy Dollars,” as a painless fundraising idea that can be used over and over again at meetings throughout the year. She told us her topic, which had been billed as “Cyber- bullying,” would be broader in scope than that, and could probably be described as “Cyber Misconduct.” It deals with a wide range of problems on the Internet, from relatively minor misdemeanours, such as the use of extremely foul language, to serious criminal acts, such as death threats and the publication of hit lists.
High school kids today, without exception, are aware of and exposed relentlessly to, cyber misconduct. Some of them, of course, are the originators and perpetrators of the misconduct.
As in the old days, when immigrant kids learned the local lingo first and their parents learned it in turn from their children, so today, parents must generally rely on their kids to show them what’s going on. Unfortunately, a lot of it is so shockingly out of sync with how they taught their kids to express themselves, the kids are reluctant to let their parents see what they are reading and writing to each other on line.
She suggested parents need to discuss the situation openly with their kids, and they need to be prepared to be shocked at first. “Don’t be afraid to ask your child for his/her Internet password,” she said. “Ask them to write it on a slip of paper and seal it in an envelope; tell them you will put it in a safe place and will only open it and use it if you truly believe you must, in order to protect them from harm.
She told us she was in her office at LPBSB when the news broke of the shootings as Dawson College. “I immediately knew that an Internet trail of blogs and websites would begin to appear soon, which we would have to watch carefully to ensure that they did not get out of hand.
She went on to describe the significant differences between today’s cyber-bullying and schoolyard bullying with which most of her audience were familiar. Face-to-face examples of this abhorrent practice entail power imbalance. The bully, often with the support of a small gang of fans, controls the situation, while the bullied, usually alone and often cornered, cowers and is forced to accept the abuse, verbal, physical and emotional.
“In cyberspace,” she told us, “there is no power imbalance. But there is also nowhere for the bullied to hide, no place where the bullied can find sanctuary, as his or her home used to represent in the face-to-face form of bullying.”
There is also the loss of empathy: on the ’net the bullies can’t see the pain, blood and tears their actions cause.
“The problem is huge,” Nancy admitted, adding that she is teamed with a researcher from McGill to study this issue.
Nancy cited signs that a teenager could be in trouble, the victim of cyber-bullying—missing school, for example. She told us about a girl who had allowed “only” her boyfriend to have a private e-copy of a nude photo of her. He only shared it with his best friend, who shared it with another and so on, until it was very soon available on-line for everyone in the world to see. Result: the girl won’t go to school now, no matter what!
“The law is unclear,” Nancy declared. “We need a broader nexus, so that anything that happens on the Internet, even outside of school hours, if it affects kids at school the next day, school authorities can get the police involved.
Many so-called cyber-bullies are really nice kids, she assured us. The Internet offers a host of dark corners where a young person can go to put their most troubled thoughts into words, often giving insight into their worst intentions. She distributed a sheet of actual examples of statements posted on blogs by youngsters. Foul language was only the beginning. Violent, angry outbursts, even death threats, were part of the glimpse we got of the soul-baring jargon that typifies the uninhibited manifestoes our kids and grandkids are subjected to daily on the Internet.
There were many, many questions—always a good indication that a speaker has hit a nerve or delivered an excellent talk on a topic of acute interest to our members. Some of the questions showed that Nancy’s audience included many who are very aware and knowledgeable about what is made public via the Internet, what is written, how it is phrased and what is being revealed.
In response to one question, Nancy admitted that the police are so heavily involved in major cyber-crime they don’t have time to deal with cyber-bullying. “They will, however, write up a police report—a very useful record and tool—if you report a specific threat of harm, or worse,” she assured us.
Nancy was thanked by Wayne, who admitted, “I’m one of those parents who has a problem keeping up with computer technology, but that’s not to say that I don’t know what my son is exposed to on-line. What you have unravelled for us today confirms some of our worst suspicions. The good news is, when we work together, good things happen.”

The Lakeshorian, 9 January 2007

2007-02-12T17:35:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
January 9, 2007

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

This week’s program…
Joe Z has invited Nancy Hain to speak to us about “Cyberbullying.”

Birthdays or anniversaries…
Happy Anniversary, Mary & George Saad January 10th!
Happy Birthday, Pam Andersen January 11th!
Happy Birthday, June Hodges January 11th!

Future Programs…
January is Rotary Awareness Month!
Jan 16: Joe Z has arranged for Nancy Battlet to discuss “Community Partnerships.”
Jan 23: Knud has invited Lucie Lacelle to speak to us about her “Pennies for Africa” campaign.
Jan 30: Dr. Louise Tyvaert will talk about the research she is undertaking at the Montreal Neurological Institute, on a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship.

Last week’s meeting…

Sixteen members and five visitors were on hand for the first meeting of 2007. We were pleased to welcome our Member of Parliament, the Honourable Francis Scarpaleggia, along with Mike Quinn and Mike’s son, Ryan, all guests of Bob; our Youth Exchange student “View” Preelart, guest of the club and visiting Rotarian Carlos Vez de Bufala, from the Rotary Club of Vilanova-Garraf, located about 50 km south of Barcelona, along the east coast of Spain.

We missed the fellowship of Abie, Jules, Susan, Brahm, Fran, Ted, Ghandi, Anne, George and Amiel.

President Art noted that the next regular meeting of the Board of Directors would take place on January 10, 2007.

Wayne presented a cheque for $1,000 from the Highland Games organization, with a proviso that we in turn pass along $350 of it to the Masons’ Harmony Lodge #131, Pierrefonds.

Ryan Quinn told us he and some other members of his Grade 11 class would be visiting the Dominican republic during their spring break in March. But they won’t be going just for the sun and sand. They will be visiting the coastal village of Sosúa, 50 km northeast of Santiago, where they will help build and erect school ground equipment and participate in other activities to improve the quality of life of the youths of the village. He told us he needs to raise $500 as his contribution to the cost of the trip and asked our club if we would be willing to help finance his participation in this worth-while project that was so closely aligned to Rotary’s agenda. In fact, he told us, they will be working closely with the Rotary clubs of Sosúa and Puerto Plata in this community service project.

President Art invited visiting Rotarian Carlos to tell us a bit about his home club. Carlos said they had successfully completed a project that demonstrated the use of short-life anti-personnel mines to the Spanish army, and persuaded them to replace existing mines with new ones that only remain active for six months.

Carlos also exchanged banners with President Art and remarked on the prominent illustration of a sailboat on both, as can be seen in the photo.

Wayne took a moment to explain our banner’s graphics, especially the roses and their significance to the early history of our club.

Francis Scarpaleggia brought us good wishes for the new year and said he was delighted that his champion, Stéphane Dion, had won the Liberal leadership race. He even took a few minutes to describe the exciting twists and turns of events that ultimately brought M. Dion out on top.

Joe Z had brought along a four-pack of pilsner glasses with the Rotary wheel emblazoned on the side. Resident auctioneer Jesper was persuaded to bring his skills to the fore; at the end of the bidding frenzy that pitted her against visiting Rotarian Carlos, Maureen took them home with a winning bid of $36. Congratulations, Maureen. You too, Jesper. And thank-you, Joe!

Joe then proceeded to introduce Eduardo, although our speaker had been well-presented only a few short weeks ago, prior to his induction as our newest member, so we needed only a brief reminder of his excellent qualifications.

Eduardo told us he had been happy to accommodate Jennifer when our previously scheduled guest speaker let her down at the eleventh hour, but cautioned us that his talk might not be as polished as his first two-part presentation back in July.

Nevertheless, he took the conclusion of that earlier talk as the starting point for this new one and used his recent visit to Mozambique to provide factual and photographic fodder to further a fascinating forensic discussion of Africa’s rural economy.

After refreshing our appreciation of the “circular causation of the Africa crisis” (the unfavourable geopolitical situation and the unfortunate simultaneous occurrence of severe drought), and of the social consequences of subsistence economies in the rural world, where federal governments do not have a favourable image (the rural world remains detached from development), he went on to remind us that traditional societies became disorganized as young people fled to urban centres.

New organizations, co-ops and village associations, emerged to take their place, leading to a possible route to a solution to the African crisis.

A cycle of decentralization, the National Planning System, represented graphically as a trio of gear wheels, offers a decentralized approach to provide impetus to local development through a number of tool sets, including:

* Participatory Planning: local and traditional authority recognized by government, allowing representative bodies to promote accountability and assure that foreign aid is used to achieve local poverty reduction goals.

* Infrastructural Development.

* Capacity Building.

* Replication.

The expected outcome would hopefully yield a cornucopia of benefits, including:

* Poverty reduction.

* Primary education (a major thrust of the UN Development Programme and the UN Capital Development Fund).

* Gender equality.

* Reduced infant and maternal mortality.

* Environmental sustainability (“common natural resources”, i.e., belonging to no single entity).

Eduardo closed the “PowerPoint bullets” part of his presentation and proceeded to a photographic essay of his visit to Phandagoma., a village in the Barue district of Manica province, near the Zimbabwe border.

We were treated to a pictorial potpourri of African community life: smiling, welcoming gatherings in outdoor meetings where Eduardo received gifts (which, he told us, is most unusual and thus to be cherished all the more) and was given the enviable task of presenting an award to a young person from the community who had brought honour to his village by his success at foreign studies, then redoubled the honour by returning to his community to play a role in its future development, through an organization called the Chekwaedzera Farmers Association.

Asked how he communicated with the villagers, Eduardo replied that he had some knowledge of African languages and a bit of Portuguese and several villagers had some ability in English.

He was thanked by Jesper, who commented that he had never been to Africa, a dream that he hoped to fulfill someday. “But I have always been touched to see how one person can make a difference. Thank you for showing us that we can all make a difference if we try.”

The Lakeshorian 2 January 2007

2007-02-12T17:23:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
January 2, 2007

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

Happy New Year!
Promote World Peace in 2007.

This week’s program…
Eduardo will tell us about his recent trip to Mozambique.

Birthdays or anniversaries?
…none that we know of.

Future Programs…
January is Rotary Awareness Month!
Jan 9: Joe Z has invited Nancy Hain to speak to us about “Cyberbullying.” (Jesper’s classification talk has been bumped to the 27th of February, tentatively.)
Jan 16: Joe Z has arranged for Nancy Battlet to discuss “Community Partnerships.”
Jan 23: Knud has invited Lucie Lacelle to speak to us about her “Pennies for Africa” campaign.
Jan 30: Dr. Louise Tyvaert will talk about the research she is undertaking at the Montreal Neurological Institute, on a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship.

Last week’s meeting…
Eleven members and 14 visitors crowded into the mezzanine of the Holiday Inn’s coffee shop to enjoy each other’s company as we gathered for our annual New Year’s Breakfast.

Members and spouses included President Art, Wayne and Linda, Coos and Helmi, Susan, Stan, Bill and June, Graham and Margaret, Jennifer and Brad, Peter and Pam, Knud, and Eduardo.

We were also pleased to welcome our Youth Exchange student Titaya “View” Preelart and our outbound Ambassadorial Scholar James Taylor, both guests of the club, as well as George Bradley, guest of Graham, Phil Côté and Dallas Neville, guests of Peter.

We were delighted to have the following visiting Rotarians select our club for their make-up meeting: Edith Lheureux from Villeneuve-Loubet, France (D-1730), and Carlos Vez de Bufala from Barcelona, Spain (D-2210) and his spouse, Anna.

Our host for this year’s Gaelic New Year’s ceremony was Wayne, recently returned from a month in Scotland as part of the 2006 Canadian Rotary curling team. Wayne invited our visiting Scot, George Bradley, to feel free to embellish the lore behind “The Passing of the Quaich” before explaining how the custom began, in the days of the feuding Thanes, and why the quaich has two handles (to ensure no one had a free hand with which to brandish a dirk) and, sometimes even a glass bottom (so your erstwhile opponent would not be hidden from your field of view as you drained the Quaich. He told us the original quaichs were carved by hand out of solid oak, but that they were now usually made of sterling silver.

Wayne then filled the Quaich with uisge beatha, and, after assuring himself that the contents were indeed of the finest quality, passed the Quaich to Susan with his New Year’s wish of good health, Slainte Mhath (pronounced slahn-che-va), to which she replied Slainte Mor (slahn-che-mor) as she accepted the cup and added her own wish for Wayne’s good health.
And so the Quaich went round the room, sometimes without touching the lips of someone who was suffering from a cold or flu bug, in which case Wayne was happy to substitute a small glass to hold the “wee dram.” Even View got into the act, with a bit of coaching from Wayne.

After the club’s Gaelic traditions had been satisfied, PDG Bill introduced James Taylor, our club-sponsored candidate for the 2007-08 Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship.

James was born and raised in Baie d’Urfé, attended Royal West Academy and Lower Canada College and earned his B.A. from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia.

He is employed by the Bank Information Center, a non-profit watchdog organization in Washington, DC, that monitors the policies and practices of international financial institutions, including the World Bank.
He made application for a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship, first through District 7600 in Virginia, but then through our club when he learned that D-7600 only endorsed the application of United States citizens. Bill Hodges arranged for his last-minute switch to our district and accompanied him to his interview with the District 7040 selection committee in Cornwall. To our delight we learned that James had made a very favourable impression and won this year’s scholarship. He later received confirmation from The Rotary Foundation that he could pursue his studies at the university that was his first choice: Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda.

James said he particularly wanted to attend a meeting of our Rotary club during his Christmas visit to the family home in Baie d’Urfé, so that he could thank us personally for making this wonderful study opportunity possible.

He told us that he had always had compassion for those less fortunate than ourselves, especially the people in Africa, and was interested in studying international development programs and how they could be made more effective.

After he finished his brief thank-you speech he was introduced to Eduardo Quiroga and said he was delighted to make the acquaintance of someone so thoroughly immersed in the field of endeavour that he himself wished to pursue as a career.

He was also pleasantly surprised to learn that another member of our club, PDG Coos de Vries, was a long-time resident of several African countries and was also in a position to offer him assistance in his studies.
James’ visit was a fitting way to close out our club’s year, one that has seen us try very hard to live up to International Community Service Director Knud’s ambitions to do our part to provide educational aid to Africa’s AIDS orphans.

Africa has, indeed, offered us an opportunity for renewed focus for our World Community service activities, following on the two major WCS projects we have completed in Kenya, and complementing the work that Andy is doing in Paraguay.

The Lakeshorian 26 December 2006

2007-02-12T16:35:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN
December 27, 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE (Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
This week's program...
Happy New Year, everyone, and welcome to our annual New Year's breakfast meeting.
Today we celebrate our Gaelic roots and who better to fill in for our Scottish honorary member Joe Maxwell than Wayne Belvedere, who spent so much time in Scottish homes during his curling tour that he developed a Scot's accent!
So it's Wayne the Thane who'll be leading us in the Gaelic traditional toast to health, happiness and peace in the world-Sláinte Mhath, pronounced "Slawn-che-va!" And here's the best part...we'll be wishing each other Sláinte Mhath as we pass a two handled cup, called the quaich, which will be filled with uisge beatha, that delightful spirit of the highlands that we more commonly refer to as Scotch whisky.
So Sláinte Mhath to you, Wayne, our Thane-for-a-day!
Birthdays and anniversaries...
Happy Birthday, Meta Castagner Saturday, Dec. 30th!
Future Programs...
January is Rotary Awareness Month!
Jan 2: Stephanie Whitaker will speak to us about "Trends in the Workplace."
Jan 9: Joe Z has invited Nancy Hain to speak to us about "Cyberbullying." (Jesper's classification talk has been bumped to the 27th of February, tentatively.)
Jan 16: Joe Z has arranged for Nancy Battlet to discuss "Community Partnerships." (Lucie Lacelle will speak about "Pennies for Africa" on January 23rd instead.)
Last week's meeting...
We were back at the Holiday Inn last Tuesday and we had a good turnout but I can't seem to find the fax I usually receive from Sergeant-at-Arms Stan with the "who's who" of our Rotary meeting attendees, so we'll have to dispense with the list of members and guests for now.
One of the first orders of business, however, was to induct Eduardo Quiroga as a full-fledged Rotarian and the newest member of our club. This pleasant duty was shared with President Art by Bob and Jennifer, who introduced Eduardo, and by PDG Bill, who read the charge and, after Eduardo was duly pinned and badged, invited everyone present to offer him the right hand of Rotary.
Eduardo received his BA (cum laudae) in Social Sciences from St Mary's University in Winona, Minnesota, his MA in Sociology & Anthropology from UBC, and his PhD (mention très honorable) in Economics from Université de Paris VIII à Saint-Denis.
Dr Quiroga's work is even more global in scope, taking him to more than 60 countries on every continent with the possible exception of Antarctica. A world-renowned expert in institutional development and environmental conservation, his Rotary classification is Economic Agro Consulting.
Joe Z introduced our guest speakers, Shelley Haynes and Jean-Pierre Beauchamps, whom Joe had invited to paint us a "Portrait of West Island Youth," based on their work with the West Island Community Resource Centre.Each of these young professionals is section chief for the social development of their respective communities-Shelley for Pointe-Claire and Jean-Pierre for Beaconsfield-creating and managing programs of sports, cultural and leisure activities. They also initiate and coordinate preventive measures to counter social problems faced by their communities' youth, family, elderly and other vulnerable groups. In this field they work closely with other professionals and volunteers, including the West Island Community Resource Centre. The creation of a comprehensive PowerPoint presentation on the problems faced by the Youth of the West Island is an example of their work.
Using this PowerPoint slideshow effectively and sharing the speaking duties on an alternating basis, Jean-Pierre and Shelley painted quite a different picture of the West Island than most of its more affluent residents would normally experience personally. They began by debunking several urban legends that have contributed to the mistaken impression that the West Island was a crime-free snug harbour of homes where family values prevailed to the exclusion of all other codes of behaviour. The violent murder of an elderly cleric and his gentle spouse, perpetrated by West Island teens, changed that false impression forever, they reminded us.
With a series of data-filled slides they presented the parameters and characteristics that define the West Island's demographics and socio-economic structure, then went on to show us a rather frightening portrait of a typically vulnerable youth, substantiated by statistics gleaned from factual reports of interventions under the Youth Protection Act. We learned, for example, that "West Island teens are noted for their high number of suicide attempts."
In terms of crime, Jean-Pierre and Shelley told us that the percentage of convicted youth who are female is 32% on the West Island, compared to only 15% for the Greater Montreal region. Almost 55% of juvenile crimes for which West Island youth were convicted were in the categories of substance abuse and breach of municipal by-laws. The other 45% were Criminal Code offences, half of which related to crimes against persons.
Presented with the results of studies involving youth and their parents, we learned how easy it is for West Island teens, some as young as 13 or 14, to obtain drugs and alcohol. Parental involvement is limited and ineffectual, probably due to their lack of awareness of the degree of danger present in the local environment in which their children live and travel every day. A similar laisser-faire attitude causes parents to fail to provide early and effective guidelines for sexual behaviour. Nor do they understand, by and large, the perils present in their children's relatively unfettered access to the Internet, where they are prey to cyber-bullies and sexual predators.
Bullying, extortion and gang violence are ever-present dangers for the single youth, especially for females. Sometimes even worse than the street gangs operating in our neighbourhoods are the "wannabe" gang members who often do horrible things to try to impress those who are empowered to admit them to the gang.
When they travel on the public transit system our youth are exposed to violence, extortion and other forms of inappropriate behaviour. This is especially prevalent in bus terminals and train stations and while riding on the trains themselves, often referred to as the "Trains from Hell," used by affluent private school students.Before listing their recommendations for corrective action, Jean-Pierre and Shelley identified problems by community, shattering any remaining illusions among the audience that these problems are confined to poorer neighbourhoods, single-parent families and crowded tenements, such as Cloverdale. We learned, for example, that nature parks prevalent on the West Island, from Senneville to Île Bizard, are favourite destinations where affluent teens gather to party, unsupervised, with the financial means to liven up the party with drugs and alcohol. Needless to say, such parties frequently get out of hand and invariably lead to violence, inappropriate sexual behaviour and criminal activity.
The recommendations of Shelley and Jean-Pierre were based on simple common sense and included:
* Improve collaboration among youth-oriented professionals;
* Continue to improve dialogue and consultation with youth;
* Break down barriers between social services and the youth they are trying to help;
* Update youth information and databases frequently;
* Recognize the parents' role and involve them in developing solutions for West Island youth.
Overall, they recommended the financing and development of a community youth worker program for the entire West Island area.
Jean-Pierre and Shelley were thanked by Wayne for an eye-opening report on the disturbingly unhealthy environment in which our children grow up, and for taking the time to develop interactive communication with troubled youth, so that ways can be found to improve their level of protection.
Finally, before we closed our last regular noon meeting of 2006, Jennifer asked our servers Jeanne and Janet to come forward and receive the applause of the members of our Rotary club, who have come to appreciate the great service that these two ladies provide week in and week out.

The Lakeshorian, December 19, 2006

2006-12-26T16:24:00.000-05:00

December 19, 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE (Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
Vice President & President-elect: Graham Martin
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director, Club Service: Jennifer Neville
Director, Vocational Service: Andy Csisztu
Director, Community Service: Susan Diening
Director, International Service: Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Services: Fran Hepworth This week’s program…
Joe Z has arranged for Shelley Haynes (Pointe-Claire) and Jean-Pierre Beauchamps (Beaconsfield) to paint us a “Portrait of West Island Youth,” based on their work with the West Island Community Resource Centre.
Birthdays and anniversaries?
I know we’re a bit early, but…Happy Birthday, Meta Saturday, December 30th!
Future Programs…
December is Rotary Family Month!
Dec 26: No meeting (Boxing Day).
Dec 27: Our annual New Year’s breakfast meeting, 8:30 a.m.
January is Rotary Awareness Month!
Jan 2: Stephanie Whitaker will speak to us about “Trends in the Workplace.”
Jan 9: Jesper Andersen will give us his classification talk.
Jan 16: Lucie Lacelle will speak about “Pennies for Africa” and her work with fifty AIDS orphans in Benin.
Last week’s meeting…
Nineteen members and one potential member assembled at the Linguini Restaurant on the TransCanada’s south service road for our annual elections and our fourth (I think) Club Assembly of this Rotary year. We missed the fellowship of Abie, Brahm, Ghandi, Anne, George and Amiel.
But we were delighted to be joined by Sam Mortazavi, a new member candidate sponsored by Jesper.
As we were arriving and well before we got into the business of our annual elections, Peter had a slide show up and running to illustrate and promote the 2007 edition of our district’s Rotary Foundation Walk, for which we are the host club. It will take place on Sunday, May 12, 2007, and will feature the suburban charm of Lakeshore towns Baie d’Urfé and Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue. Peter also took this opportunity to tell us about an application he has put together to seek a District Simplified Grant to help finance some new benches that we hope to install in key locations around our Lakeshore neighbourhoods, with hopefully one or two of them to be in place by the time Rotarians from throughout the district arrive to participate in the Foundation Walk. Past President Cameron was called upon next to present the Nominating Committee’s recommended slate of club officers and directors for the Rotary year beginning July 1, 2007. He invited other nominations from the floor and, when there weren’t any, nominations were duly closed and the slate he had just presented was declared elected by acclamation. For the record, our 2007-08 Board will consist of:
President: Graham Martin
Vice President & President-elect: Stan Frost
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Directors: Andy Csisztu
: Susan Diening
: Fran Hepworth
: Jennifer Neville
: Knud Petersen
Is it just me, or does that list look familiar somehow?
President Art asked Treasurer Peter to present his financial statement, noting that the club was in pretty ordinary shape, financially speaking, with the only significant change being that the income from Lifeline installations will now be used to finance our youth programs.
Noting that the West Island Palliative Care Residence had not yet received the club’s donation from the funds raised at our Golf Tournament on September 11th, Wayne asked when that cheque would be issued. Community Service Director Susan replied that the Board had decided that all donations would be remitted or presented during the months of January and June. Art added the comment that an ad hoc committee of Susan and Fran would sit down between now and then and review all requests for financial aid that the club has received to date, and make recommendations to the Board regarding who should get what, this procedure to become part of a “due process” policy the Board has adopted to ensure our charitable donations are fair and beneficial to all concerned. Wayne made the observation that fund-raising events which named the beneficiaries in advance should be exempt from that procedure since those charities were named on the tickets and used as part of our promotion of such events. Wayne followed up his comment with a motion that the club honour its commitment to the WIPCR without further delay. The motion was seconded by Jules and, after considerable, sometimes heated, discussion the motion was carried.
A similar motion proposed by Golf Tournament co-chair Fran on behalf of the West Island Women’s Shelter, which was also a named charity for that event, was denied by President Art.
Jennifer was asked to present her Club Service report. She explained that the reason we were meeting in the Linguini Restaurant last Tuesday was to evaluate an alternative venue being considered by the Board in light of members’ complaints about the food and service offered recently by the Holiday Inn. She noted that the hotel had raised our meal price by $1.00 without prior notice and had proved difficult to deal with in subsequent negotiations by an ad hoc committee consisting of Bob, Fran and herself. In response to our attempt to arrange for prior menu approval, the hotel has offered a multi-week menu schedule that specifies only the main course and only in terse, one-word descriptions, such as “beef” or “chicken” or “fish,” which does little to satisfy our desire to have the meals conform to our members’ culinary tastes. She promised that negotiations would continue but was not hopeful that the hotel would become more accommodating.
She thanked Coos for his input on the weekly programs.
Susan presented a Community Service report that focused first on the four DDO families that we have selected to receive Christmas baskets this year. She had distributed by email a list of non-perishable food and other items and asked members to indicate what they wished to contribute. These would be collected at the Christmas Party at the Martins’ and delivered on Saturday, December 16th after turkeys and other perishable goods were picked up at the Beaconsfield Metro food market. Susan also told us that the Lakeshore Players and the West Island Chorus of the Sweet Adelines had both approached us to gage our interest in working on joint fundraisers in 2007.
Lastly, she said she had received 16-20 requests for financial assistance, which she and Fran would be evaluating in the near future.
Vice President Graham reported on membership. So far this year, the club has lost 2 members (Jeff Alcorn and Doug Pashleigh); two more are on leave of absence (Jacinthe Leroux and Jenny Wood); and two have been inducted (Jesper Andersen and Maureen Rowe), with four more moving through the membership process—Eduardo Quiroga, John Robertson (a transferee from RC Warren, Ohio), Stephane Delisle (a transferee from RC Sherbrooke), and Sam Mortazavi.
Knud reminded members that he had given his World Community Service report the previous week, covering our new and old projects in Swaziland, Paraguay, Lebanon, Benin, Peru and Kenya.
Andy reported he is making progress on a new project to purchase and distribute English and English-French dictionaries to needy Grade 3 students in the West Island. He will soon be announcing firm dates for his annual fundraising events, the Hungarian Supper and the Pig Roast.
Fran presented a brief report on our work with youth. She said that View, our exchange student from Thailand, would appreciate having an opportunity to visit the homes of some of our other club members, and suggested we invite her to come for dinner. She cautioned, however, that it will be necessary for members to have completed their police check before asking View to be their house guest.
Bob reported as Treasurer of Rotaide Foundation Inc. that Rotaide would soon be wrapping up its calendar year activities and that President Brahm would probably prepare the annual report to the government as he has in the past. Bob said the other officer was Bill as Secretary and the trustees included the three officers plus Peter and Cameron.
On Friday evening we held our Annual Christmas Party at the home of incoming president Graham and Margaret. It was an outstanding success and established Margaret as a pastry chef sans pareil and Graham as a connoisseur of fine wines and cheeses.
Our faithful photographer, Peter, was there with his finger on the shutter button whenever there was a photo-op to be consummated, to which the following candid (and otherwise) snapshots will attest.

The Lakeshorian, December 12, 2006

2006-12-26T16:17:00.000-05:00

December 12, 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961) This week’s program…
Please note that there has been a late change in our meeting place, for this week’s meeting only. We will meet at Restaurant Linguini, 18990 TransCanada Hwy. We will be meeting in the main dining room on the ground floor and the restaurant has assured me that there is full wheelchair access. To get there take the Morgan Road exit off the Trans-Canada (Autoroute 40). Follow Morgan Road south, take the first left after crossing over the highway; merge onto the south service road and follow it to the Linguini Restaurant, just before Lee Avenue. There is also no change in meeting time or program. We will conduct our annual elections of club officers and directors for the Rotary year beginning July 1, 2007. The nominating committee, headed up by immediate past president Cameron, has recommended the following slate:
For 2007-2008
President: Graham Martin
Vice President & President-elect: Stan Frost
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Directors: Andy Csisztu
: Susan Diening
: Fran Hepworth
: Jennifer Neville
: Knud Petersen
The balance of the meeting will be devoted to a Club Assembly. Front and centre on the list of topics will be whether we wish to change our meeting place. One of the new venues that Club Service Director Jennifer has suggested is Restaurant Linguini.
Birthdays and anniversaries? none that we know of.
Future Programs…
December is Rotary Family Month!
Dec 19: Shelley Haynes and J-P Beauchamps will paint us a verbal “Portrait of West Island Youth.”
Dec 26: No meeting (Boxing Day).
Dec 27: Our annual New Year’s breakfast meeting, 8:30 a.m.
Jan 2: Stephanie Whitaker will speak to us about “Trends in the Workplace.”
Coming Events…
Dec 15: Our club’s annual Christmas Party, at the home of Graham & Margaret Martin, 188 Stonehenge Dr., Beaconsfield. Take St Charles south all the way, turn right on Beaconsfield Blvd, right on Fieldsend and left on Stonehenge. It’s the 5th house on your left. The festivities begin at 7 p.m. Donations of non-perishable food for charity will be appreciated.
Last week’s meeting…
Eighteen members and five visitors were on hand last Tuesday to hear our guest speaker, Dr. Ning Wang of McGill’s agricultural and Biosystems Engineering Department, speak to us on “From Steam Engines to Robotics.” We missed the fellowship of Jasper, Abie, Brahm, PDG Bill, Ghandi, George and Amiel.
But we were delighted to be joined by the following guests and visiting Rotarians: Stewart Brown, guest of Anne; Linda Tait, guest of Wayne; our Youth Exchange student , Titaya “View” Preelart; and visiting Rotarians Haagen Kierulf, from the Rotary Club of Westmount and John Robertson, formerly from the Warren (Ohio) Rotary club, who has moved to Île-Bizard, and who we hope will soon join our club on a permanent basis.
I’m sorry I couldn’t be with you at last Tuesday’s meeting, but something came up at the last minute and I had to stay home and take care of a sick granddaughter who was sent home from daycare.
By all accounts Dr Wang gave a great presentation, one that dipped even further back in the history of farming than steam engines. Her talk could probably have been titled, “From oxen to robotics…farm tools have come a long way.”

The Lakeshorian, December 5, 2006

2006-12-11T22:21:00.000-05:00

December 5, 2006
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
Vice President & President-elect: Graham Martin
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director, Club Service: Jennifer Neville
Director, Vocational Service: Andy Csisztu
Director, Community Service: Susan Diening
Director, International Service: Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Services: Fran Hepworth This week’s program…
Dr Ning Wang, of McGill’s agricultural and Biosystems Engineering Department, will speak to us on “From Steam Engines to Robotics.” Birthdays and anniversaries…
Happy Birthday, Coos, Today, December 5th!
Future Programs…
December is Rotary Family Month!
Dec 12: We will hold our annual elections of club officers and directors for 2007-08. The rest of the meeting will be devoted to a Club Assembly.
Dec 19: Shelley Haynes and J-P Beauchamps will paint us a verbal “Portrait of West Island Youth.”
Dec 26: No meeting (Boxing Day).
Dec 27: Our annual New Year’s breakfast meeting, 8:30 a.m.
Jan 2: Stephanie Whitaker will speak to us about “Trends in the Workplace.”
Coming Events…
Dec 15: Our club’s annual Christmas Party, at the home of Graham & Margaret Martin. Details to follow.
Last week’s meeting…
Eighteen members and seven visitors gathered in the Perno dining room of the Holiday Inn Pointe Claire last Tuesday to enjoy Rotary and share in the wonders of the universe. This latter treat was provided by astronomer and science communicator Andrew Fazekas.
We missed the fellowship of Wayne, Abie, Jules, Ghandi, George, Art and Joe.
But we were delighted to be joined by the following guests and visiting Rotarians: Pam Andersen and Sam Mortazani, guests of Jesper; Stewart Brown, guest of Anne; as well as visiting Rotarian Jorge Mejia from the Rotary Club of Querétaro, Mexico, and his guest Araceli Mendoza, who recently moved from Mexico to Montreal; and John Robertson, a former member of the Warren (Ohio) Rotary club, who has moved to Île-Bizard, and who we hope will elect to join our club on a permanent basis.
With Art away, Vice President Graham was in charge.
Knud announced that, due to popular demand, he had arranged for our club to be able to offer Christmas hams again this year. We will be piggybacking on the Hawkesbury club’s order so we have to make our quantities known to Knud by next Tuesday, December 5th. The price will again be $25 each, with $7.50 coming to our club. Available delivery dates will be December 18 or 19, 2006.
While he had control of the podium, Knud took the opportunity to draw our attention to a flyer he had distributed earlier, concerning a new, free network portal to inform small and medium-size businesses what to expect when doing business in countries where corruption. A joint initiative of the Royal Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Global Advice Network, the portal (www.business-anti-corruption.com) aims its focus toward developing countries, where companies often run into difficulty trying to fight corrupt governments and public institutions. A range of helpful information includes such things as checklists for selecting agents as well as sector-specific info on the level and character of corruption in each of 15 countries covered so far, with 30-40 more countries to be added as time and budget permit.
Visiting Rotarian Jorge Mejia came to the podium to exchange banners with Acting President Graham. Señor Mejia told us his club is undertaking a series of water projects aimed at helping bring affordable potable water to a number of small villages of 25 families or less. They install steel water tanks in each village and arrange for regular deliveries of pure water by commercial suppliers. The end result is that the villages will pay about one-third what they are now paying for bottled water, because they do not have bulk storage facilities. Jorge told us he’s visiting clubs in Canada and the U.S. to raise funds to permit his club to offer this service to more villages. Their target is to raise US$100,000 through contributions from individual clubs, augmented by District Designated Funds and Rotary Foundation Matching Grants. So far, clubs in Texas and California have supplemented his own club’s contributions to bring the total to $76,000, leaving $24,000 to be raised during his present tour. He told us a generous Rotarian in the Rotary Club of Montreal has donated $500, which he hopes to have matched by our district’s DDF. Our club is the second of a total of six he will visit in Montreal this week. Knud urged Jorge to consider attending the District WCS meeting in Cornwall on Saturday, December 2nd.
Following a very successful happy dollars session organized by Sergeant-at-Arms Stan, Graham invited PDG Coos to introduce our guest speaker.
Andrew Fazekas is a freelance science communicator based in Montreal, Canada. He specializes in the natural sciences, writing and lecturing about everything from astronomy to zoology. Andrew is currently the astronomy contributor at the Montreal Gazette, introducing the wonders of the night sky to people of all ages.He also serves as Canadian correspondent at Journal of Science's Next Wave and is a Contributing Editor for Popular Science magazine.
Andrew said his topic, “Scenic Stargazing,” presenting the universe in 30 minute, was a tall order.
Using a series of fascinating photos and graphic illustrations, he gave us a tour across the night sky during the four seasons, sticking mainly to the canopy we can see here in the northern hemisphere, but occasionally taking us “down under” when something of particular interest made the trip worthwhile.
His subtitles for the seasonal themes presented by the night sky were:
Winter: “Hexagon Highways”
Spring: “Bear Tracks”
Summer: “Triangle Trails”
Autumn: “Diamond Drives”
Using a map of Canada, showing its geopolitical boundaries, he explained that a “map” of the night sky also needs to have some artificial lines added, to define the boundaries of the constellations and to help illustrate how they got their names. He then showed us a simulation of a star-studded sky, with the constellations enhanced as stick figures.
He spoke about the effect of light pollution—the dilution of the view we are capable of seeing as the light of our immediate surroundings diminishes our ability to distinguish the fainter stars and planets. As a guide, he suggested that the most complete view could be found in places where there was essentially no local light, such as at the top of Mount Everest or in the middle of the Sahara Desert. From such a vantage point over 3,000 stars are visible to the naked eye, compared with about 200 on the West Island and 24 in downtown Montreal.
He gave us some facts to establish the distance of some of the stars we see (or should look for), either individually or as part of a constellation, observing that the stars that make up a pattern that we call a constellation are not at all close to each other. Our earth is so far away from even the nearest one that the stars of a constellation always appear in their same relative position but may be tens of light years apart. A light year, he explained is the distance covered in one year by light, the visible example of electromagnetic radiation, the fastest thing in the universe, travelling through space at about 300 million metres per second. Thus a light year is about 9½ trillion kilometres. Such a distance is hard for us to fathom but consider that the space shuttle, travelling at 30,000 km/hr, would take about 36,000 years to travel one light year!
In terms of distance, the closest star (other than our sun) is Alpha Centauri, which is about 4 light years away, part of the constellation Centaurus, visible in the southern hemisphere. Most of the stars we see are at least 76 light years from earth. Thus, a photo we would take of a star tonight would be a picture of it, not today, but at least 76 years ago.
Andrew discussed the best known of the northern constellations, Ursa Major, of which the seven brightest stars are also known as the Big Dipper. It is visible in the northern hemisphere all year, revolving around Polaris, the stationary North Star. A line drawn between the two stars that define the edge of the dipper opposite the handle will lead you to Polaris.
His excellent photographs showed us stunning views of constellations and individual stars. Here are two examples:
- Cygnus, the swan which, from our vantage point, is directly overhead all summer. To find the Milky Way, and its 100 billion stars, follow the swan’s body.
- Arcturus, orange in colour, is an expanding, dying star, also known as a red giant. Its radius is equal to the distance from the sun to Jupiter.
“The holy grail of astronomers,” Andrew said, “is to find an equivalent of our own planet earth, somewhere out there. So far they have found 155 solar systems similar to ours but the search for their planets is more difficult because planets don’t emit light. They do reflect the light of their sun but at a brightness ratio of 1:1 billion! He showed us slides of artists’ concepts of earth-like planets and told us there would be a TPF telescope put into space within ten years, at a cost in excess of 100 billion dollars. TPF stands for Terrestrial Planet Finder. It will have special optical features to reduce starlight by a factor of one billion, to enable astronomers to detect the faint light reflected by planets.
Lastly, Andrew told us the farthest “thing” that the human eye can see without magnification is the Andromeda galaxy, which is 2.6 million light years away. We can see it mainly because it’s so humungous—150,000 light years across.
Andrew was thanked by Cameron for a fascinating peek into a complex and diverse field of interest that is bigger than our imagination can conceive, its chronology ranging from time before the earth was formed, off into the unknown future.

The Lakeshorian, November 28, 2006

2006-12-07T14:47:00.000-05:00

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
President: Art Surette

This week's program...
Andrew Fazekas is a freelance science communicator and astronomy contributor to The Gazette. He will speak to us about "Recognition of Star Systems."

Birthdays and anniversaries...
Belated Happy Birthday wishes to Anita Frost, whose birthday was on November 19th, not the 15th as we had reported. Sorry about that, Anita.
Happy Birthday, Winnifred Sherry, Wednesday, Nov. 29th!

Future Programs...
December is Rotary Family Month!
Dec 5: Dr Ning Wang, of McGill's Engineering Department, will speak to us on "From Steam Engines to Robotics."
Dec 12: We will hold our annual elections of club officers and directors for 2007-08. The rest of the meeting will be devoted to a Club Assembly.
Dec 19: Shelley Haynes and J-P Beauchamps will paint us a verbal "Portrait of West Island Youth."
Dec 26: No meeting (Boxing Day).
Dec 27: Our annual New Year's breakfast meeting, 8:30 a.m.
Jan 2: Stephanie Whitaker will speak to us about "Trends in the Workplace."

Coming Events...
Dec 15: Our club's annual Christmas Party, at the home of Graham & Margaret Martin. Details to follow.

Last week's meeting...
Our annual tribute to the youth of the community we serve provided a backdrop for our club to showcase career opportunities in veterinary medicine, presented by prominent West Island pet vet Dr Florence Erdmann.
Five West Island High Schools were represented by nine promising seniors, accompanied by their student counsellors. We were pleased to welcome:
From Saint Thomas High School: Tiffany Bellantoni and Kristyn Kuppek, accompanied by Dina Albertini.
From Queen of Angels Academy: Kathryn Malak and Katrina Ross, accompanied by Enza Sasso.
From Macdonald High School: Stephanie Totten, accompanied by Naomi Carsley.
From Beaconsfield High School: Brad Johns and Josh Frizzell, accompanied by Nancy Dubuc & Leslie Hutchens.
From Lindsay Place High School: Steven Alari and Melanie Plante, accompanied by Ken Taylor.We were also pleased to welcome our Youth Exchange student from Thailand, Titaya Preelart, who is studying at Beaconsfield High School.
Other visitors included Mariette Brisebois and Annie Venn, guests of Fran, Rodolfo "Gordo" Molina, from the Rotary Club of Tampico, Mexico, and John Robertson, guest of the club. John is formerly from the Rotary Club of Warren, Ohio, and has recently moved to Île Bizard. We hope he will decide to transfer to our club.
We also welcomed as our special guest Heinz Ritter, a former President of our Rotary club and who has been voted to Honorary Membership by our Board of Directors.
With seventeen members present, we missed the fellowship of Wayne, Abie, Ghandi, Anne, George, Art, Amiel and Cameron.
With President Art away, the "in-charge" was Vee-Pee and Prez-to-be Graham, who handled the crowd and meeting with his usual aplomb.
Cameron had news from Scotland about the curling tour of Wayne and the rest of the Canadian team. As of November 17th, the halfway point of the tour, the Scots were ahead 285-261, but the Canadians reported they now have their act together and are "poised to take back the lead and win the trophy."
Graham invited Knud to do the honours of welcoming Past President Heinz back to our club as an Honorary Member. Knud reminded us that Heinz served our club well when, for nine years from January 1984, he was an Active Member-with the classification of Hair Styling-including a year (1988-89) as our president. It was during that time, almost 20 years ago, that Heinz built and donated our club's beautiful pine storage cabinet, which has also served us well.
At a certain point, Knud told us, Heinz decided to close up his hair styling business in Westmount Square and pursue his hobby of sculpturing in wood and other materials on a full- time basis. Last year he donated four beautiful full size sculptures of wild birds to our Rotary club, which we raffled off, raising $7,000 for the benefit of AIDS orphans in Swaziland.
With admiration for his "heart of gold," Knud welcomed Heinz back, this time as an Honorary Member of the Montreal-Lakeshore Rotary Club.
Next, Fran invited one of our student guests, Stephanie Totten from Macdonald High School, to speak to us briefly about her recent Adventure in High Technology, in which she participated as our Rotary club's delegate. Fran apologized that she would not have time to recount all of Stephanie's awards and activities, and asked us to be content to know that she is a senior at Mac and a very active young lady in sports leadership.

Stephanie thanked Fran and our club for granting her the opportunity to participate in this exciting event, which lasted from Sunday to Thursday, October 22nd to the 26th. She told us she not only enjoyed the many tours and activities, but made many new friendships that she will cherish for years to come. Approximately thirty students were housed in the homes of Ottawa area Rotarians or friends of Rotary. All meals and a full program of activity were provided by the Rotary Club of Nepean-Kanata. It was great fun and, as a result, the time passed very quickly. "My only regret," Stephanie told us, "was that it had to come to an end."

In a final announcement, Jules told us that his grandson, renowned tenor Philippe Castagner, would be performing on Sunday, December 3rd in the Opéra de Montréal's 11th Annual Gala at Place des Arts' Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier, at 2 p.m.
With President-Elect Graham in complete control of the time schedule, Sergeant-at-Arms Stan was able to glean many fist-fuls of dollars for club charities, before it was time for new member Maureen Rowe to introduce our guest speaker.
Dr Florence Erdmann was born in London, England but educated in Montreal. The first career she chose to pursue was as an Intensive care Nurse at Royal Victoria Hospital. She later went back to university and earned her doctorate in veterinary medicine from the Université de Montréal. She practised her profession at Pierrefonds Animal Hospital, becoming one of its owners in 1999.
Dr Erdmann welcomed the students and told us she had spent the morning participating in a Career Day at PCHS, and was thus well-primed to speak about career choices and other decisions that will define our lives.
"No matter what you decide to do with your life," she told her young audience, "education and experience are never wasted; they will always be among the most valuable assets you will ever acquire. One of the most important decisions you need to make as a young person is to come to know who you are. One of the defining traits is what you like. If you like animals you will probably enjoy a career as a veterinarian, but you'll be much better at it if you also like people." She told us she has specialized in household pets, in particular dogs and cats. It is important for me to be able to inspire trust in the mind of the pet's owner, so she will heed my advice in caring for her pet and helping it heal.
She went on to talk about her decision to study veterinary medicine in French, after having been educated to that point entirely in the English school system. But at that point she was married (to a Montreal physician) and degree in veterinary medicine is only offered at UPEI, OVC (Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph), the University of Saskatchewan and U-de-M. Together they have delivered most of the approximately 5,000 vets who ply their trade in Canada.
Dr Erdmann told us that veterinarians are specializing more and more. "I have specialized in cats and dogs; other vets prefer to work with more exotic animals, still others specialize in rural animal categories, such as equine medicine. Even within each patient category further specialization occurs -cardiology, surgery, behaviour, to name just a few. And then there's a decision to make as to where you will choose to practise. For example, Vets Without Borders provide services to families in developing countries, where animals are often vital to the very survival of the human population.
"Moreover, today vets need a knowledge of business if they hope to survive. Vets are traditionally poor businesspersons. And it takes more than a love of animals to succeed. I spoke earlier about the need to like people, but you also need to be interested in the sciences if you plan to tackle any form of medicine as a career. Academic achievement is very important in order to be accepted in your choice of school."
She urged the students who wish to consider veterinary medicine as a career to learn as much as possible about the field. She suggested visiting the US and Canadian associations' websites: http://www.amva.org/ and http://www.canadianveterinarians.net/. She also strongly suggested they seek hands-on experience, "even as a volunteer at a zoo or an SPCA."
Dr Erdmann invited questions from the audience and was immediately inundated - a good sign that you're a hit as a speaker. Students and Rotarians alike wanted to know about such things as: the degree of difficulty to study in a second language. (By the second year you don't even notice it.) How do you deal with dogs that are aggressive? (Technicians help me; ask owner to muzzle; sedate if necessary.) Can you recommend a breed of dog? ("How much time do you have?") Can you discuss the pros and cons of rural versus urban veterinary practices? Is this a good career choice for a woman? ("Yes. Today 85% of all vets are women.") What sort of pet food is better: dry or canned? (Carnivores, like cats, should have the protein they can only get from canned food. A steady diet of dry food could lead to diabetes.)
On the subject of serious illnesses, such as cancer, and pet insurance, which she told us was still more prevalent in the US but was catching on in Canada, she said the evolution of veterinary medicine was keeping pace with owners' greater attachment to their pets. "We now go to greater lengths to diagnose and treat our patients," she told us, "such things as blood transfusions, CT scans and MRI (usually conducted at the university) and even organ transplants. The latter usually come from strays but remember, if you ask us to take a kidney from a stray cat, you have to adopt that cat as well."
She closed by telling the students not to worry if they are not yet sure what career path they want to follow. "I used to envy those kids who seemed to have their entire lives planned out, while I was only concerned with passing my next test." Even if you later find you have chosen the "wrong" career, you can still switch careers. ("I know a physician who decided to become a vet when he was practically at retirement age!") The important thing is to choose a field you enjoy. Nothing beats getting paid for what you would gladly do for nothing, as a hobby! Last piece of advice: take all advice with a grain of salt!
As Jennifer was making her way to the podium to thank our speaker, Jules remarked that he had always wanted to be reincarnated as an Air Canada pilot. "Now I think I would be happy as a dog living in an English home," referring to a comment Dr Erdmann had made earlier that the English do not believe in castrating their pets.
Jennifer thanked Maureen for suggesting Dr Erdmann as a speaker for our Student Appreciation Day. She also thanked the good doctor for her thoughtful suggestions and welcome counsel about career planning in general and the veterinary professions in particular.

To The Members of the Montreal-Lakeshore Club
From Coos de Vries
Re Attendance at Club Meetings
Several members may remember that while I was in Holland for six months last year, I attended the meetings of the Rotary Club of Haarlem regularly. The club secretary now sends me their bulletin every week.
Recently they held an 'enquête' among the 79 members about attendance habits, and I thought I might share the results with you. I think you will find them interesting, some perhaps even amusing.
Of the members who participated in the survey, the following percentages gave as their reasons why they could not maintain the required 60% attendance:
* 40% absent because of urgent obligations elsewhere.
* 15% on holiday.
* 10% don't go because the subject of the meeting does not interest them.
* 11% had social concerns or felt alienated.
The following remarks were also mentioned:
* Lunch on Wednesdays does not suit me. Another day would offer more possibilities.
* My attendance is deplorable: I should do something about this.
* If Rotary expects prospective candidates to be above-average in their socially activity, then Rotary should not be fussy about low attendance.
* Individual members should be more often approached about attendance.
* We cannot escape eventually becoming an evening club. We will eventually have to give way to the wishes of the younger members in preference over the older members.
* I don't need to go because the excellent reports of the previous meeting (in the weekly bulletin) keep me 'au fait' in an excellent manner.
* If we maintain the day of the week and meeting time, I won't go any longer.
* It is senseless to continue Rotary all summer. We should have a summer recess.
* A condition of membership is that you must go to the meeting. A low attendance forces one to eventually leave the club.
Conclusion: diversity and creativity in rationalizing reasons for non-attendance.
Coos de Vries

2006-11-23T22:21:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
November 14, 2006
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)

This week's program...
Kathy Whitelaw will speak to our club about Fundscrip, a fundraising system for non-profit organizations and school groups. Members purchase prepaid cards which can be used instead of cash, credit cards or debit cards to purchase goods or services at participating retailers. A discount percentage is later returned, split between the member and his/her non-profit organization or school group.

Upcoming Birthdays and anniversaries...
Happy Birthday Rod Quesnel Today, November 14th!
Happy Anniversary, Jules & Meta Wednesday, Nov 15th!
Happy Anniversary, Bob & Magda, Wednesday, Nov 15th!
Happy Birthday, Anita Frost Wednesday, Nov 15th!
Happy Birthday, Lois Scarpaleggia, Wednesday, Nov 15th!

Future Programs...
November is Rotary Foundation Month
Nov 21: Fran is arranging a program for the youth of our community.
Nov 28: Andrew Fazekas is a freelance science communicator and astronomy contributor to The Gazette. He will speak to us about "Recognition of Star Systems."
Dec 5: Dr Ning Wang, of McGill's Engineering Department, will speak to us on "From Steam Engines to Robotics."

Last week's meeting...
Seventeen members and seven visitors were on hand to help us honour our veterans and remember those who gave the supreme sacrifice overseas, and to celebrate the induction of a promising new Rotarian, Jesper Andersen.
We missed the fellowship of Wayne, Abie, Brahm, Bob, Ghandi, Anne, George and Cameron.But we were delighted to welcome Honorary Member Joe Maxwell, and his three friends who are distinguished veterans of WWII:

From the left:
* Jack Hendrie, Air Commodore (Ret'd). Served with the RCAF in WWII and the Korean War.
* Gordon Thompson, Pilot Officer, RCAF, WWII.
* Jake Watson, Flight Lieutenant, RCAF Bomber Command, WWII, Prisoner-of-War for two years.We were also pleased to be joined by Maureen Rowe, whom we will formally welcome on November 14th as our next new member.

And last, but by no means least, we enjoyed the fellowship of the following visiting Rotarians and their guests: Rodolfo "Gordo" Molina, Secretary of the Rotary Club of Tampico, Mexico; and Bernie Allard, from the Rotary Club of Cataraqui Kingston (Ontario) and his lovely wife, Shiela.
Our members and visitors were pleasantly surprised and grateful to have wine served to everyone, courtesy of our new member, Jesper Andersen.
After thanking Jesper for his thoughtful generosity, President Art announced a special meeting of the Rotaract Club of Montreal-McGill University on Thursday, November 9th. If any of our members was able to attend this meeting on admittedly short notice, please provide your bulletin editor with details for publication in our next issue of The Lakeshorian.
Art also announced that the Rotary Club of St-Laurent-Mt-Royal will host a special meeting on Monday, November 27th, at St. James Pub, 8307 Côte-de-Liesse. The club is trying to expand its membership and has invited PDG Greg Campbell, District Membership Committee Chair, as a special guest for the evening. They would appreciate a show of camaraderie and support from their many friends in the Lakeshore club for this important occasion.
Jules distributed copies of a brochure on Rencontre des Arts which would take place from Friday, November 10th through Sunday, the 12th, at Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu. One of the featured artists: Heinz Ritter, a former member, Past President and soon-to-be Honorary member of our club.Peter told us that he had contributed to our meal by supplying the Holiday Inn Pointe-Claire with enough cubed venison and caribou meat to permit the chef to serve up the delicious stew we were enjoying.
Director of Community Service Susan announced that we would be preparing four Christmas baskets again this year, to be given to families in need as recommended to us by the Fonds de dépannage de l'Ouest de l'Île.
Next on the agenda was the induction of Jesper Andersen into our club. His sponsor, Knud, gave us some background information about our new member. Born and raised in Denmark, Jesper earned his BA in business from the Neils Brock Academy in Copenhagen, one of the world's foremost centers for learning the ins and outs of international trade.
In 1977, three years after graduating from the NBA, Jesper emigrated to Canada, where he worked for Plumrose Canada Inc., a subsidiary of international giant East Asiatic Company. Eleven years later, after rising to the post of General Manager of Plumrose, Jesper was transferred to the parent company's Consumer Products Division in Hong Kong, where he also rose to the top rung as General Manager. In 1995 he joined Beiersdorf AG of Hamburg, Germany, for whom he opened a regional office in Singapore and, as Director for Business Development with responsibility for the Asia/Pacific Region, he steered the strategic business development for NIVEA skin care products until, in 2003, he was invited to move back to Canada, this time to head up Beiersdorf Canada Inc. In October 2005, Jesper gave up all that security to open up his own business, right here at 6600 TransCanada Highway, the office building that shares this address with our Holiday Inn.
Jesper's classification is Consulting, International Trade.
PDG Bill read the charge by which our club traditionally welcomes new members and charges them with the responsibility to represent and share Rotary with their friends and colleagues. He and the rest of the club and visiting Rotarians then welcomed Jesper to Rotary.

Jesper thanked us all for the privilege to serve mankind and the opportunity to give back to a global community that has been kind to him in his business and travels. He also won a place in our annals with one of the most successful leg-pulling shaggy dog stories we have heard in a long time.
Next up was our Honorary Member, Joe Maxwell, to introduce our guests of honour, all veterans and, like Joe, members of the Canadian Legion, Churchill Branch 91, in Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue.After presenting each visitor and citing his credentials, Joe told us a bit about his own exploits with the Royal Navy in the Burma Campaign.
"The Asian conflict was largely unknown," said Joe. On a memorial stone in Assam, northern India, a plaque to those who served in Burma reads, 'When you go home tell them of us and say, For your tomorrow we gave our today.' "
Joe went on to lead us all in a few moments of reflection on war, the horror and the honour, the obligations of service and the paramount importance of the fundamental human values we cherish, values that we take for granted but that might not be even available for us to enjoy today were it not for those brave souls who gave so much without counting the cost, during the harrowing moments, days, months and years that consumed their lives from 1939 to 1945.
It should also be noted that, in response to the call from our Sergeant-at-Arms Stan, many of our members donated $20 bills to the Canadian Legion's Poppy Fund.
Lastly, following up on the sentiments expressed by Joe and evoked by the presence of our distinguished guests, Peter asked us to distribute a video by Canadian artist Terry Kelly. Called "A Pittance of Time," it emphasizes the tiny amount of time it takes to reflect on the immensity of the sacrifice given by Canada's armed forces during times of war. If you did not receive the file and wish to retrieve it now, go to:
http://www.army.forces.gc.ca/chief_land_staff/remembrance/English/video.asp
Knud has asked us to let our readers know he received the following email from TRF alumna Alexandra Vinograd, who with our help brought HPIC medications to Peru
"They are (finally) out (of Peruvian customs)! I'm not quite sure how it was done-my coworker managed to finagle something. The boxes were opened in customs, so we have to go through them with the original packing lists.
"More soon when I know more...just wanted to give you the good news!"
[Editor's note: Y'r 'umble servant will be away all of this week, so we wish you all a good Rotary meeting, and we'll see you on the 21st. Meanwhile, remember that November is Rotary Foundation Month. Give generously-and before Christmas, if you want to be sure of getting your tax receipt dated in this taxation year.]

2006-11-23T22:15:00.000-05:00

The Lakesorian
November 7, 2006
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)

This week's program...
President Art will head up a program on Rotary information, a sort of mini club assembly. And we will induct Jesper Andersen, as well as Eduardo Quiroga, if he is back from Guyana.Also, we understand that Honorary Member Joe Maxwell will help us to honour those who served our country in all wars past and present...lest we forget.

Upcoming Birthdays and anniversaries...
Happy Anniversary to Stan & Anita Thursday, Nov. 9th!
Happy Birthday to Bob Sunday, November 12th!

Future Programs...
November is Rotary Foundation Month
Nov 14: Kathy Whitelaw will speak to our club about Fundscrip, a fundraising system for non-profit organizations and school groups. Members purchase prepaid cards which can be used instead of cash, credit cards or debit cards to purchase goods or services at participating retailers. A discount percentage is later returned, split between the member and his/her non-profit organization or school group.
Nov 21: Fran is arranging a program for the youth of our community.
Nov 28: Andrew Fazekas is a freelance science communicator and astronomy contributor to The Gazette. He will speak to us about "Recognition of Star Systems."

Last week's meeting...
Seventeen members and six visitors were on hand to hear Aaron Derfel speak to us about a hot topic, in light of the recent deaths from C-difficile in St-Hyacinthe: "Medical Errors and Accidents."
We were pleased to welcome Jesper Andersen, guest of the club, Dean Parchomchuk, guest of Jennifer, Adam Gallay, guest of Brahm, and Lioudmila Chatilova, guest of the club, as well as visiting Rotarians Lena Talih from the Rotary Club of Chouff, Lebanon, and Steve Moors form the Rotary Club of St. Catharines-Lakeshore, Ontario.
We missed the fellowship of Abie, Ted, Michel, Ghandi, Anne, George and Amiel.President Art read a thank-you note from Joan Fowell of Meals-on-Wheels. He also extended the gratitude of the club to Graham for organizing a successful Oyster Party the preceding Friday.Graham passed those thanks along to the members of his organizing committee, especially to Peter, who was "there from A to Z," and Andy who donated bowls and bowls of the best oyster chowder anyone had ever tasted.
Jules presented the club with four jars of his special Oyster Sauce and suggested that perhaps we could persuade Jesper to auction them off, which he did, collecting a total of $42 for the club's coffers. Thank you Jules AND Jesper!
Susan thanked those who helped make the Group Study Exchange team's visit to Montreal a great success. Special thanks were offered to Andy & Kathleen, who hosted two of the team members (Andy also was a driver during the team's busy itinerary); and to Jennifer who took the team dancing Thursday evening; and Art, who volunteered to be a substitute driver on Sunday, following an automobile accident Saturday evening. No one was injured but the car was totaled.
Cameron invited Steve Moors and Wayne to join him at the podium. "Every four years we send a curling team to Scotland," Cameron told us. "Steve was a member of the 1998 team, I was part of the 2002 team and Wayne is now preparing to leave to represent our club and Canada on this year's team." They all were part of a Canadian bonspiel held in Guelph, Ontario, the preceding weekend, with the various teams that have represented Canada competing with each other. The 2002 team won this year's tournament. But Wayne also brought home some honours, Cameron told us. He won the scotch tasting contest, correctly identifying four out of four blind samples of scotch whisky. Congratulations, Wayne, and have a great trip to the auld sod!
Knud rose to the podium to present a eulogy for Ray Courey, who passed away at his home in Magog on Friday, October 27. Ray had been Knud's Rotary sponsor in 1971, and was very active in Junior Achievement, an organization intent on teaching high school students about the world of private enterprise by helping them organize themselves into small companies as an extracurricular activity. Ray helped bring Junior Achievement to Quebec and presided over its evolution here. Until his death, Ray was a member of the Board of Directors of Danesco Inc.
Knud also spoke about polio eradication in India and a project in Benin, Africa, for which he has asked us to put our pennies and spare change into a jar labeled "Pennies for Africa."
Susan introduced our guest speaker. Aaron Derfel is the senior medical reporter at the Montreal Gazette, specializing in investigative and literary journalism. He has been a reporter for the gazette since 1989 and has been full-time on the health beat for the past eight years. He was born and raised in Montreal, and graduated from Concordia University with a double major in English lit and journalism. He lives in NDG.
Mr Derfel told us his topic would be "Medical Errors and Accidents" but that he first wanted to make clear that doctors are saving lives and prolonging life, so his purpose is not to paint a picture of our health care system in a shambles.
"Nevertheless," he observed, "a lack of resources is causing unnecessary deaths. In St-Hyacinthe recently, nine people died from complications due to clostridium difficile, commonly known as C. difficile, or just plain C. diff." None of them were infected with C. difficile when they entered the hospital, though some had other infections and were given antibiotics as part of their treatment. Others were relatively healthy and were in hospital for a hip replacement, for example. This may be termed a medical accident but it's a serious issue for the patient's family.
C. diff is a bacterium that causes severe diarrhea and colitis. To quote from the Public Health Agency of Canada's website: "The use of antibiotics increases the chances of developing C. difficile diarrhea. Treatment with antibiotics alters the normal levels of good bacteria found in the intestines and colon. When there are fewer of these good bacteria, C. difficile can thrive and produce toxins that can cause an infection. The combination of the presence of C. difficile in hospitals and health care settings and the number of people receiving antibiotics in these settings can lead to frequent outbreaks."
The C. diff bacterium has evolved in this 21st century. Prior to 2004, med students were taught to look upon C. difficile as something of a nuisance; it was one of most common infections present in most hospitals and long-term care facilities. It can remain active on an inanimate surface, such as a washroom faucet handle. So it can be transmitted by dirty hands. But by the same token it can be effectively controlled by following assiduous hygienic practices, including the frequent washing of one's hands.
Aaron told us that 8,000 people die in Canada every year from medical errors and accidents. In the U.S. more people die from medical errors and accidents than from highway accidents and AIDS combined!
"You, as the health care consumer, should feel empowered to criticize hospitals proactively," Aaron declared. "When you go to the hospital, be aware of the level of cleanliness. Report and complain about apparent shortcomings in sanitation or cleaning inadequacies. We must remain vigilant to avoid a systemic failure to confront and defeat infection."
Aaron spoke about the sterilization of surgical instruments and the shortcuts that can lead to serious problems. He noted that sterilization must be thorough. It takes hours-not seconds or minutes-at high temperature in an autoclave to kill germs. Flash sterilization-a short time in an autoclave-is sometimes used to sterilize an instrument that falls on the floor of the O.R. Unfortunately, he told us, it is seldom adequate to remove infectious agents from surgical instruments. What is the answer? More surgical instruments, so that flash sterilization is unnecessary. An instrument that falls on the floor must be removed from the process and replaced with a sterile substitute. He described some hair-raising conditions he had observed as an undercover sterilization attendant at the Montreal General Hospital. He also told us he had won a journalism award for an investigative report on the re-use of one-use disposable instruments.In response to a comment about the role of unions, Aaron observed that hospitals operate with three separate yet intertwined systems: the doctors who are self-employed, the hospital administrators who are responsible for budget control, and the unionized employees, who often have a separate agenda. This is a recipe for conflicting priorities, and the problem prevails whether the health care system is public, private or two-tier.
" 'What can I do?' you may ask," said Aaron. He told us there is much we can do. Become more knowledgeable about infection, how to prevent it and how to follow your doctor's advice. For example, with antibiotics it is important to use the full dosage prescribed, and for the full term. Otherwise we contribute to the development of mutant strains of germs that become resistant to our usual antibiotic treatments. Be aware that antibiotics only kill bacteria; they are not useful for viruses. "But," he emphasized, "the patient's most important role is be more proactive. Tell the hospital, and the doctors and nurses that attend to your treatment, that you will not permit the use of inadequately sterilized surgical instruments."
Aaron was thanked by Stan for a thorough and thoroughly interesting exposé of some of the inadequacies of our health care system, brought about by short cuts that put dollars ahead of patients' lives.
Before we went home, Lena passed around a couple of large boxes of chocolate covered biscuits she had brought from her Lebanese homeland. Thank you, Lena!

The Lakeshorian, 31Oct06

2006-11-23T22:09:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
October 31, 2006
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961) This week's program...
Aaron Derfel, The Gazette's senior medical reporter, will speak to us on a health care topic of current interest: stem cell research.
Birthdays and anniversaries?...none that we know of.
Future Programs...
November is Rotary Foundation Month
Nov 7: President Art will conduct the second of six bimonthly programs on "Rotary Matters."
Nov 14: T.B.D.
Nov 21: Fran is arranging a program on veterinary medicine.
Last week's meeting...
Eighteen members and six visitors were on hand to hear Joan Fowell speak to us about the Meals-on-Wheels program serving the West Island.
We were pleased to welcome Helen Surette, guest of President Art, as well as visiting Rotarians PDG/DGE Edmond Lanthier, from the Hull club, and his wife, Suzie; Laurie Seagrim, from the Rotary Club of Borrego Springs, California, Russell Merrifield, from the Rotary Club of Kingston, Jamaica and Rodolfo "Gordo" Molina, from the Rotary Club of Tampico. Mexico.
We missed the fellowship of Abie, Brahm, Michel, Ghandi, Anne and George.
Fran reminded us that our Interact club would be holding their Bike Collection Campaign on Saturday, October 28th, and asked members to check their garages to see if we have any old bikes we'd like to donate to this good cause. Working with Cycle North-South, the Interactors collect and repair old bikes for use by indigent families in Central and South America.
Visiting Rotarian Laurie Seagrim told us she is a native of Baie d'Urfé now living in southern California. Her Rotary club is located in Borrego Springs, about 80 miles east of San Diego, meets on Thursdays for breakfast and has about 35 members. She and President Art exchanged club banners.Gordo Molina also brought a banner from his club in the beautiful city of Tampico, Mexico. He had received one of our banners during an earlier make-up and had promised to bring one of his club's the next time he was able to visit us.
Our last visiting Rotarian, Russell Merrifield, brought greetings from his club in downtown Kingston, Jamaica, where he serves with the Canadian High Commission. He said his club's membership had slipped to a low of about 35, but with a recruiting campaign under way, they hoped to build it back up to about 45-50. They also sponsor two Interact clubs. And are working on a community service project to revitalize the poor downtown waterfront area known as Rae Town.Susan brought us up to date on the itinerary of the Group Study Exchange team from Paraguay and Argentina, which would arrive Wednesday October 25th and spend the rest of the week in Montreal, including three Rotary club meetings and our club's Oyster Party, before catching a plane back home on Monday, the 30th.
Knud and Art gave us an update on our two containers of school supplies for the AIDS orphans in Swaziland. Knud told us the first container had finally arrived October 21st and had been opened, to the amazement of the members of the Malkerns Valley Rotary Club. He read two e-mails he had received:
Reginald Barrow wrote: "We were somewhat overwhelmed by the volume of material and some of the items, such as many sets of dinnerware and what appears to be hundreds of tee shirts. What generosity!"
Jeanne Ayton wrote: "Wow - what a lot of things, we are all amazed at what you achieved! Well done to the members of Montreal-Lakeshore, our grateful thanks to you and your donors and all who have made this incredible gift possible."
Art assured us that better pre-clearance procedures had been followed for the second container, which should soon catch up to its sister in Swaziland.
Joe Z. told a tasteless joke, for which the club's Board should surely wish this bulletin editor to apologize to the ladies present and any others who may have been offended.
Wayne welcomed visiting Rotarian Laurie back to her Baie d'Urfé roots and expressed the wish that she will visit often and will make up at our club whenever she is in town.
He also introduced our guest speaker. Joan Fowell was born in Pointe Claire and is a graduate of Sir George Williams, (now Concordia) University. She worked for Bell Telephone, then for an insurance firm in London, England for a while, before returning to Canada. She married and moved to Hamilton, Ontario, where she resumed her employment with Bell, and this time stayed for 22 years! Following her retirement in 1995 she offered her services to the West Island Volunteer Bureau, where she is now the Coordinator.
Joan said she especially wanted to tell us about the Meals-on-Wheels program operated by the WIVB. She asked us, "What did one cat say to the other cat when they saw two mice sail by on roller-skates?" "Wow! Meals on wheels!"
She gave us a few statistics regarding their volunteer force: It takes 3 cooks, plus 13 home kitchens, shoppers, drivers and dishwashers to prepare and deliver two meals a week (Tuesday and Thursday) to 35 to 40 clients on the West Island, adding up to about 300 hot meals a month.Referrals come from the CLSC and by word of mouth. She told us their clients would typically be quite old, late 80s or 90s, usually living alone and often suffering from macular degeneration, and thus unable to see well enough to feed themselves properly. Malnutrition is rampant. "We give large enough portions so our clients can split them in two, assuring them of at least four proper meals a week. We charge $3 a meal, less-or even zero-in hardship cases." Occasional extras include a loot bag on Halloween and a traditional Christmas dinner, including turkey or roast beef, with all the trimmings, and a Christmas present, will be delivered on Thursday, December 21st.
In response to questions, Joan agreed that one of the perceived benefits of the Meals-on-Wheels delivery person, from the client's point of view, was the opportunity for a social interchange. This, she admitted, made it difficult for the volunteer to make all her calls on time and with meals that remained hot. "Consequently," Joan told us, "we have to limit the social side of a call to about five minutes. However, all our volunteers are trained to be on the lookout for-and to report-signs of more serious problems than simple loneliness.
She also commented on the value of the CLSC system, in particular because its people are so generous and caring. She told us a story about a blind client who had to take a lot of pills and was having trouble to ensure that she took the right pill at the proper time. The CLSC came every day to set out her pills in a way that assured that she would not make any mistakes or errors of omission..
Joan was thanks by Peter, who told her he had started Meals-on-Wheels in Bedford, Quebec. "So I know how much work you do, and how much it is appreciated," he added.
President Art gave Joan a cheque for $200 with our apologies that our budget constraints prevented our donation from being bigger. But then he had an idea: During his recent visit, our Foundation scholar from France, Rodolphe Koehly, gave us a bottle of wine from his family's vineyard, a fine Reisling. Art auctioned it off, with the proceeds to go to Meals-on-Wheels. Wayne was the winning bidder, at $60, to which he added $20 and challenged others to contribute as well. The end result was an additional $210 donated to Joan for M-O-W!
Well, we're out of time, and almost out of space, so we will close with a thank you to Chairperson Graham and all who helped make the Oyster Party a success, and a promise to publish next week a financial report and any pictures we can talk Peter into sharing with our readers.

2006-11-23T21:54:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian
October 17, 2006
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
This week's program...
Dr Marilyn Scott is Associate Professor at the McGill Institute of Parasitology and Associate Director of Graduate Affairs, McGill School of Environment which she, with five other professors, created in 1998.Her research on host-parasite population dynamics has taken her to many regions of the world. She will speak to us today on the impact of Vitamin A supplementation on the health of pre-school children in Panama.Birthdays and anniversaries:Happy Birthday, Stan. today, October 17th!
Future Programs...
October is Vocational Service Month
Oct 24: We are scheduled to have our annual program celebrating the youth of the communities we serve, but with Youth Service Director Jacinthe on leave of absence until January, we're not sure what's happening next Tuesday.
Oct 31: Aaron Derfel, The Gazette's senior medical reporter, will speak to us on a health care topic of current interest.
Nov 7: President Art will conduct the second of six bimonthly reports of the state of the club.

Coming Events...
Oct 27: Our Annual Oyster Party, at the Baie d'Urfé Fire Hall, 300 Surrey Drive. Make ticket sales for this important event a priority this week! Prizes also needed for the raffle.

Last week's meeting...Members kept straggling in last week, but we ended up with a relatively normal attendance of sixteen members and one guest, to hear Canadian author and Montreal Gazette columnist Howard Richler speak to us about "Variety, the Spice of English."
We were pleased to welcome Len Rubin, guest of Knud. We missed the fellowship of Wayne, Abie, Susan, Bob, Michel, Anne, George and Cameron.
Among the announcements...
Graham reminded us that our annual Oyster Party is just around the corner: October 27th will be here before we know it. He urged members to sell their tickets, noting that members will be charged only for those tickets actually used to gain admittance to the party. He also called for members to bring in quality prizes, to help make the evening's raffle a success.
Jeff announced that he and his wife are expecting, a brother or sister for Emma. After the applause died down, he gave us the bad news: he has decided to take an indefinite leave of absence from the club, to catch up on a hectic work schedule that has beset him ever since the golf tournament.
President Art added some more news of a similarly bad ilk. Jacinthe Leroux and Jenny Wood have informed the club that they will be taking leaves of absence until January, 2007.
Sergeant-at-Arms Stan cleaned up with his call for happy dollars, raking in over $120 from happy and sad dollars and the ante for the wine draw.
Jennifer introduced our guest speaker. Howard Richler was born in Montreal in 1948 and graduated with distrinction from Concordia University in 1969 with a major in political science. For three decades thereafter he toiled in the steel industry, first at Richler Steel Corporation until 1992, and then from 1993-1998 at Leroux Steel.
In 1992 he started writing his weekly Speaking of Language column in the Gazette, looking at linguistic nuggets, word origins, and other asides about the idiosyncrasies of the English language.
Mr Richler has also written three books: The Dead Sea Scroll Palindromes, Take My Words, and A Bawdy Language.
He began his presentation with the observation that English has become the global language. In the 1950's, he explained, the uncertainties of the Cold War obscured the evidence of that trend, but statistics now confirm that English is the lingua franca of this planet.
Howard gave us many examples of how other, non-English, cultures are adding colourful alternatives to our British and North American English words and expressions. He told us that the many regional colloquialisms and idioms have given rise to several 'divisions' of the English language as spoken in other parts of the world. "As a result," he observed, "the Oxford English Dictionary now has 23 volumes!"He also noted that the USA, which is the largest country of English speakers in the world, represents only 20 per cent of the world's English-speaking population."In 25 years," he predicted, "more than half the people who speak English will speak it as a second language. Already more than half of the winners of the Brooker Prize-for best novel in the British Commonwealth and South Africa-are from non-English-speaking countries." He went on to give examples. "In Quebec we know what it means to be bilingual," Howard observed, "but it now seems we must be bilingual in our own English language." Asked if he anticipated that English will become even more dominant in the world, he replied that the jury is still out on that one, noting that Spanish and Chinese are major competitors for the world title.Howard went on to speak about the melding of major languages, resulting in Franglais, Spanglish, et cetera.He found it ironic that many lingual purists bemoan the contamination of English by other languages, while he took the view that the direct importation of expressions from other languages, such as double-entendre, RSVP, nom de plume, actually enriched the value and the beauty of English.But he also noted that connotational constraints in the usage of certain English words are introducing limits to their scope of application, to the point where we experience difficulty to find a word that is both aptly descriptive and politically correct. For example, no single word seems to be emerging to describe a person with whom one is cohabitating. We can't use partner, because that now has gay overtones. The word 'gay' itself lost its original reference to carefree happiness long ago.He made reference to the observations of H L Mencken, back in the 20's, that regional idioms can lead to embarrassment when taken at face value in a different English culture from that in which they were coined. Howard cited by example, "Keep your pecker up," which is certain to be misunderstood in North America, where we would say "Keep your chin up" to mean the same thing.One of the reasons English is becoming more widespread, he suggested, is because it is a very flexible language. English speakers are quick to accept change. We often embrace brand names so thoroughly that we use them in a generic sense, much to the consternation of their corporate owners, who fear the loss of trademark rights. "Kleenex" to mean "tissue" and "Google" as a verb meaning to undertake an Internet search of a name or expression.Over the centuries the language of colonizing forces-not only English-have resulted in the unification of languages and regional dialects that previously had been impossible because of intertribal jealousies.
Howard was thanked by Graham for presenting several interesting tidbits that define the vagaries and charm of our mother tongue. "I'm not surprised that English is winning the usage race," Graham concluded.
IF YOU MISSED THIS YEAR'S DISTRICT CONFERENCE IN MONT-TREMBLANT, YOU MISSED A LOT OF FUN!Attending from our club were President Art, Peter, Pam and Jennifer, Susan, Fran, Ted and Patricia, Bill and June, as well as ambassadorial scholars Rodolphe Koehly and Louise Tyvaert.Our club won the District trophy for the highest per capita annual giving to The Rotary Foundation, and the Prize for Best Club Bulletin of 2005-06, and PDG Bill was awarded the Citation for Meritorious Service to The Rotary Foundation.

2006-10-10T14:33:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN
3 October 2006
http://www.ROTARY-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
Headline: NUMBERS DOWN DUE TO ITALIANS!
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
This week’s program…
Mr. Doug Lightfoot will be presenting a program on NOBODY’S FUEL
Coming events and programs…
District Conference in Mont Tremblant, October 13-15, 2006, we should be well represented for this all important conference. You can register on line from the District web site.
Oyster Party, October 27, 2006. This year we share the responsibilities with the Baie D’Urfé Volunteer Rescue Squad and the party will take place at 300 Surrey in Baie D’Urfé. Tickets are available from Peter. They are selling for $50.00 each. As a Club member you are expected to support this major fund raiser in any way you feel possible. The profits will in part go to feed several West Island unfortunates. Remember not everyone is as lucky as we are!
Last week’s meeting…
The members decided that the meeting should be small, we had in attendance; Coos, Bob H., Jennifer N., Peter N., Knud, Cameron, Art, and Joe Zemanovich.
Rotarian Bob said grace and Rotarian Joe toasted the Afghan talks.
As a pleasant surprise we had a visitor, Jesper Anderson, a potential new member. He runs an auction business on the West Island and threatens to take over for Wayne when needed at our fund raising events.
Knud presented an update on the Swaziland project. The first container has as yet to be cleared and the second is on its way.
A quick review of the upcoming Oyster Party and a few more tickets distributed the meeting continued.
PDG Coos DeVries arrived a little late with Rodolphe Koehly, an Ambassadorial Scholar from France. Rodolphe is studying at McGill as an engineer, he has an interesting project using paper to make inexpensive contacts for electronical sensors.
Rodolphe told us about his studies and then he started to tell us about his family in France. They are wine makers, producing approximately 50,000 bottles of wine annually. The clients come from all over Europe to purchase their wine so they do not have enough to export. He did however bring a fine bottle as a sample for us to admire. This bottle seemed to disappear and then re appear during the meeting, however, in the end it was saved for the next meeting when we expect to have a greater turn out.
The question period followed and Rodolphe was quick to explain the potential uses of his studies as related to the music field.
Jennifer was asked to thank the speaker and then the singing of Oh Canada followed. It seems that the members on tour in Italy do not sing to strongly as the national anthem was sang probably the best we have heard in several weeks. It must have something to do with the way Joe started us off.
NOTES:
As a note of interest, it has been one year since Jeff Alcorn joined our Club and he has already made a difference!
Wayne Belvedere and Knud Petersen joined Rotary in September 1970, 36 years ago.
This bulletin comes to you courtesy of:
o Bill Hodges, Template designer and chief editor;
o Peter Neville, reporter
o Bob Habib, Photographer

The Lakeshorian, September 19, 2006

2006-10-10T14:16:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN
September 19, 2006
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE(Chartered February 27, 1961)President: Art SuretteVice President & President-elect: Graham MartinSecretary: Bob HabibTreasurer: Peter NevilleDirector, Club Service: Jennifer NevilleDirector, Vocational Service: Andy CsisztuDirector, Community Service: Susan Diening Director, International Service: Knud PetersenDirector, Youth Service: Jacinthe Leroux
This week's program…John Griffin is the film critic at the Montreal Gazette. He also writes about music, and popular culture. Before joining the Gazette in 1980, the native Montrealer attended school here and - between 1964 and 1967 - in England, during the full flower of British pop culture.
Birthdays and anniversaries:Happy Birthday, Joe Z. Friday, September 22nd!
Future Programs…September is New Generations MonthSep 26: Amiel will present his Classification Talk.Oct 3: H. Douglas Lightfoot is a retired mechanical engineer with an avid interest in energy. He is a member of the McGill Centre for Global Environmental and Climate Change. His topic will be "Nobody's Fuel: How can we use more energy and reduce carbon emissions when the current fuel supply is 85% fossil fuels?"Oct. 10: Author and Gazette Columnist Howard Richler will speak about "The Spice of English"
Coming Events…Oct 27: Our Annual Oyster Party, at the Baie d'Urfé Fire Hall, 300 Surrey Drive.
Last week's meeting…Fifteen members and one guest enjoyed our Rotary Club Assembly last Tuesday. Our guest was Maureen Rowe, our most patient prospective member to date. (Hopefully, our Board of Directors put the finishing touches on her sponsor's application to have Maureen considered for membership in our club. She has been wonderfully participative and a faithful attendee. Let's stop dragging our feet, folks! I get the feeling that someone is dropping the ball, here. If you need someone to publish the notice, I am available for 3 or 4 more days, before I take off for Italy. I just need a copy of the approved New member Application Form.
We missed the fellowship of Wayne, Abie, Jules, PDG Coos, Jacinthe, Michel, Ghandi, Anne, Peter, and Joe.
President Art had nothing but praise for the organizers of our Golf Tournament, especially for Jeff, Fran and Wayne.
Bob delivered on his promise to Knud by presenting his personal cheque to Rotaide for $1,000, to cover one-half of the estimated deficit on the Swaziland project.
Knud thanked Bob for his generosity, which Knud was quick to match with a cheque of his own in the same amount, for the same purpose. He also told us that the first container was still awaiting customs clearance in Swaziland. Apparently the letter from the Canadian Ambassador had been misplaced but the ambassador was kind enough to provide a replacement. Knud said he would do everything possible to pre-clear the second container through Swaziland customs. He also mentioned that we had received sufficient shelving for the walls of all five schools, to provide for the accessible storage of the many books we have provided.
Graham suggested the club send thank-you notes to Mike (Peter's employee) and to Greg Belvedere and the other members of Wayne's crew who helped load the container.
President Art started off the Club Assembly with a recap of the club's fundraisers. Stan added kudos to Jennifer and Coos for the good speakers we have been blessed with this year.
Fran told us that we have selected a student to participate in the Cornwall clubs' Adventure in the Environment.
Art said that reminded him that more members need to get police checks so that we can get more involved in youth activities. Fran mentioned that the cost was $60 each. Graham suggested she contact his wife, Margaret, who has been consistently successful in getting the police checks done for free for volunteers of the Scouts and Guides movements.
Susan spoke about our club's policy with regard to the beneficiaries of our largesse following our fundraisers. She told us that ten years ago we had decided we would be able to make a bigger impact on our community's charity needs of we spread our money around more, favouring smaller organizations rather than (at that time) the Lakeshore General Hospital's Building Fund. She lamented the fact that other large organizations, like the Palliative Care Residence, which has its own very successful foundation and fundraising program, were getting the bulk of our hard-earned cash.
Brahm agreed that the larger organizations do not need our relatively meagre contributions, but Stan pointed out that if we piggyback on the recognition factor of the large organizations in order to get more recognition for our fundraisers, we need to honour the resulting commitment, whether explicit or implied.
Bill reminded us of the importance of making two budgets at the beginning of each Rotary year—one for operating revenue and expenses and the other for fundraising revenue and targeted charitable organizations.
Graham suggested that we ask all potential beneficiaries of our funds, including the smaller organizations, to make a case for their particular needs.
Bob pointed out that we conduct our two biggest fundraisers-—the golf tournament and the oyster party—during the first half of the Rotary year. He suggested we budget our contributions to be distributed after January 1st. He also suggested that the Club Service Director should present the cases for all charitable organizations to the board, along with her recommendations for the distribution of funds. This could be done as part of the budget process and also during the year, as funds are raised and requests for funds are received.
[P.S.A.] Into cats? Love kittens? Want to adopt a cat or a kitten? Call Grace at 514-683-3607. Or come to an adoption clinic September 23rd or 30th at Finnegan's Market, Hudson.

The Lakeshorian, September 12, 2006

2006-09-18T22:55:00.000-05:00

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
Vice President & President-elect: Graham Martin
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director, Club Service: Jennifer Neville
Director, Vocational Service: Andy Csisztu
Director, Community Service: Susan Diening
Director, International Service: Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service: Jacinthe Leroux
This week's program...
The program for today calls it, "Rotary Matters," but I'm not sure if that's the same as a Club Assembly or not. Maybe it's a mini club assembly. In any case President Art will give us an update on the state of the club, two months into his term. Perhaps some of his board members will assist him in this endeavour. We'll have to wait and see.
Birthdays and anniversaries? none that we know of.
Future Programs...
September is New Generations Month
Sep 19: Tentatively, Gazette film critic John Griffin will speak to us on movies.
Sep 26: Amiel will present his Classification Talk.
Oct. 03: Author and Gazette Columnist Howard Richler will speak about "The Spice of English" or "How the Language We Use Uses Us."
Coming Events...
Oct 27: Our Annual Oyster Party, at the Baie d'Urfé Fire Hall, 300 Surrey Drive.
Last week's meeting...
Sixteen members and six guests enjoyed our Rotary club meeting last week. In addition to our guest speaker, Ms Yue Chi, we were pleased to welcome Helmi and Ms Tish Jones, guests of PDG Coos, David Visagie, guest of Ms Chi, and Adam Gallay, guest of his dad, Brahm. We were delighted to have our prospective member, Maureen Rowe, back and looking fit and well after a brief medical absence. We were also happy to provide a make-up opportunity for visiting Rotarian Malcolm Young of the Montreal-Westward club.
We missed the fellowship of Jeff, Abie, Susan, Bob, Michel, Ghandi, Anne, George, Cameron, Amiel and Jenny.
President Art had to leave but before he did, he invited our new bride, Jennifer, who had married Brad Belvedere on Saturday, September 2nd, to come forward to receive a card of congratulations from the club, a moment your cub reporter was almost quick enough to capture on film, or rather, digital media...you know, those newfangled camera memory thingees.
Vice-Prez Graham took over the proceedings seamlessly.
Joe entertained us with a shaggy dog story, which we don't usually print because they're so long, but this one was kinda cute, so... Joe said he had heard about two special department stores for singles looking for a mate. The first, which offered Husbands for sale, had a rule posted in the elevator, informing prospective brides that they can go up and check out the goods one floor at a time, but that, having left a floor to continue upwards, they could not go back. At each floor the Husbands' attributes were briefly described on a screen above the door and the ladies could stop or continue.
A shopper entered the elevator, read the rules and proceeded to the first floor, where the screen read "Men with jobs." On Floor 2, it read, "have jobs and love kids." On Floor 3: "have jobs, love kids and handsome." On Floor 4: "have jobs, love kids, handsome, love to help with housework" and on Floor 5: "have jobs, love kids, handsome, love to help with housework and strong romantic skills." On the 6th and last floor, the screen read, "You are Visitor No, 13, 461, 972. There are no men left on this floor. Thank you for shopping with us."
Joe said that across the street there was a similar store where prospective husbands could shop for a bride. The elevator rules were the same but the screen announcements at each floor were, of course, adapted to the type of merchandise this store offered. A man entered the elevator, read the rules and proceeded to Floor #1, where the screen read, "Women who love sex." He chose to go up to the next floor, where the screen read, "Wealthy women who love sex." He got off at that floor. If he had stayed on the elevator, he would have learned that Floors 3 through 6 have never been visited.
Knud told us that the second container for the Swaziland project had not arrived yet but was expected on Friday, Sep 8th and that loading would begin that evening and continue on Saturday, September 9th.
Jacinthe introduced our guest speaker. She told us Yue Chi was president and CEO of AAST Inc, a specialty travel consultant and tour organizer located in Toronto. Ms Chi was born and raised in China and earned her Masters degree in history from Beijing University before moving to Canada in 1989. Her topic would be "China, Past and Present."
Yue began by asking "Who in the room has been to China?" Coos said that he had visited China in June 1989, following the RI Convention in Seoul, Korea. He added that he was present at Tiananmen Square when the student protests were quelled by the PRC government troops.Knud said he had been to China twice, the first time in 1985.
Yue gave us the most time-effective history lesson we've ever experienced, beginning with China's emergence from the Confucius era over 2000 years ago, through a series of feudal dynasties that differed greatly in their areas of emphasis, some on peace and prosperity, others on power and expansion. From a conviction that China was the centre of the world, with little interest in the barbarians beyond its borders, through en enlightened view of trade opportunities, beginning with the Silk Road trade routes established by Marco Polo and his contemporaries, to the introduction of the principles of democracy at the beginning of the 20th century and, interestingly enough, the emergence of the Chinese Communist Party by 1920, leading to civil war that lasted for 30 years, even during World War II, and to the proclamation of the People's Republic of China by Mao Tse Tung on October 1, 1949.
Yue told us her parents grew up amidst the turmoil of the 1930's and saw communism grow and develop during their teenage years. "Communism was well established by the time I was born in 1962," she told us.
She told us about life under a communist regime, dreams of a Utopian society where everyone was equal espoused by Karl Marx conflicting with the realities of human nature. Everything belonged to the state; nothing belonged to the individual. Even money was replaced with coupons. But while it is in our nature to want to be rewarded for our efforts, even in proportion to our talent and willingness to work hard, communism destroyed initiative by ignoring that precept of human nature. Ultimately, in the early 60's two consecutive years of failed crops led to millions of deaths from starvation. Intellectuals began to revolt against communism, so Mao Tse Tung outlawed higher education, and sent professors and university students to remote villages in the far north. She told us she actually enjoyed life in rural Manchuria, not far from the Russian border, although her parents suffered much hardship and many others went crazy, some even committing suicide. In the middle of the 1966-to-1986 Cultural Revolution, Mao Tse Tung dies and his widow became Public Enemy Number One. Major changes occurred in rapid succession, including the reopening of the universities. She told us she entered university in 1980 and graduated in '84. "At first," she admitted, "we thought Western Society was our evil enemy, but we were gradually converted as we became aware of US-made movies and how much more interesting they were than the revolutionary movies we had been limited to. American movies introduced us to American morals and American politics. In 1986-87 she was studying at Chicago University, graduating in 1989, just before the Tiananmen Square incident. That happened on June 4, 1989. On June 11th I flew to Winnipeg, where the weather was not all that different from northern China where I had grown up. I was told that Winnipeg was a 'medium sized' city, not like Chicago, which was a 'very large' city. And I thought of Chunching, in China, which is larger in population than all of Canada!
"I got a job at the University of Manitoba, then through a friend I got a $21,000/year job as an 'editorial assistant' at the CBC, where I found out later that I was hired to satisfy a quota for visible minorities. At first I didn't know anything or anybody in the business, so I screamed at Peter Mansbridge to 'pick up your phone!' Later I became a national speaker for the Canadian Club.
"But after a year and a half I became frustrated; I got too little airtime to cover big stories. I kept thinking what about my country? What about China? We are more than Tiananmen Square. So I decided to teach Canadians about China, one traveler at a time! In 1992 I started my travel company, AAST, which stood for Asian Adventure and Study Tours."
I though to myself, "Now they will learn how broad the scope of everything is in China. They can't imagine the huge difference between shopping in cosmopolitan Shanghai and life on a remote Chinese farm, just like it was 500 years ago!
"So I started taking Canadian tourists on a 131/2-hour flight from Toronto to Beijing and showing them the China I grew up in. And I've been doing that for 15 years plus.
"Now I want to grow the business again, increase its scope, add more Asian destinations, add other destinations-I had to do that when SARS and Asian bird flu decimated the 'Travel-to-China' business, especially when I realized that as a Torontonian Chinese in the travel business, I was the most unpopular person in the world!
"So I started teaching people about Morocco, the sahara desert, et cetera. Later I spread to Peru and other places in South and Central America. But always I kept the company name unchanged. AAST also stood for African Adventure and Study Tours, then Americas Adventure and Study Tours. I was confident the business would survive, even if only as 'Adult Adventure and Sex Tours!'
"Travel broadens our perspectives like nothing else on earth. I have recently come up with a new wrinkle-the Silk Road, the trade route from Beijing to the middle east and Europe opened up by Marco Polo, the first human to bring east and west together.
"Except that we won't do the trip the way Marco Polo traveled. Who's got three years to spare in which to do this trip? We'll go by all-wheel drive SUVs and do it in style in 60 days! The cost? $18,000, all included." Try it. You'll love it!"
Yue Chi was thanked by Brahm for her passion, her clarity and her energetic presentation style.Ms Chi had said she would auction off a work of art among those who would give her their coordinates for her semi-annual newsletter mailing list. The winner of a lovely watercolour painting by a Chinese amateur artiste was none other than Joe Zemanovich.
For our current bulletin and much more, visit our web site: http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org

The Lakeshorian, Sep 5, 2006

2006-09-10T21:10:00.000-05:00

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
This week's program...
Program Committee Chair Coos, who was brought out of retirement to help out a fellow Rotarian who found that preparing for her wedding was taking up a lot of her time, has been doing a very good job this summer. Too bad the attendance has been less than sterling, but with Labour day now behind us, no one (with the possible exception of Jennifer) will have any excuse for being absent.As a fine example of Coos's skill in finding exceptional speakers, we have as our guest speaker today Ms Yue Chi, a specialist in cultural, educational and special-interest travel. Ms Chi was born in Beijing and brought up in the remote city of Harbin, near the Russian border. She majored in history at Nankai University in Tianjin, then went on to earn her master's degree and a teaching post with Beijing University, where she established a seminar for foreigners in Chinese history and culture.
In Canada since 1989, Yue Chi has made a career of designing and operating enriched travel programs to China and other Asian destinations. Her goal is to build bridges of understanding between the West and the Orient.
More recently, she has begun a life-fulfilling dream of every lover of world history, to travel the route Marco Polo took over 500 years ago. But this time she and her fellow travelers will be using all-wheel-drive vehicles and the journey, which will proceed in the opposite direction, i.e., from Beijing to Istanbul, will take only 60 days instead of the three years plus that it took Marco Polo.
This may be a lengthy presentation with, perhaps, many questions. I hope we can give Ms Chi an early starting time.
Birthdays and anniversaries...
Happy Birthday, Magda Habib Sunday, September 10th!
Future Programs...
September is New Generations Month
Sep 12: President Art, when he began this year, told us he would report on the status of the club every two months, at the first meeting of the following month. This will be his first bi-monthly report.
Sep 19: Tentatively, John Griffin will speak to us on movies.
Sep 26: Amiel will present his Classification Talk.
Coming Events...
Sep 11: Our Annual Golf Tournament, Valleyfield Golf Club.
Last week's meeting...
Fourteen members and six guests enjoyed our Rotary club meeting last week. In addition to our guest speaker, Fr Mike Shaw, we were pleased to welcome Pam Neville and John & Rochelle Dangerfield, guests of AG Peter, Len Liben, guest of Knud, and visiting Rotarian Haagen Kierulf of the Westmount club.
We missed the fellowship of Abie, Jules, Brahm, Bob, Michel, Graham, Ghandi, Anne, Jennifer, Eduardo, Maureen, George, Cameron, Amiel and Jenny.
President Art proved that even sad stories with a funereal slant can make us laugh. When a restaurant moved a friend of the owner sent flowers. But he called the florist the next day to complain that the card had mistakenly read, "Rest in Peace." The florist asked him to consider the other aggrieved party, whose casket spray bore the inscription, "Congratulations! We hope you enjoy your new location."
Wayne called on Fran to join him at the front of the room, to receive a special award. It seems Fran had managed to total a golf cart at the Lions Club tournament, when she passed under a tree whose low, but sturdy, limb tore off the cart's roof. Fran wasn't hurt, at least not until she got the bill! The award? Golf "driving" lessons!
Knud told us we are finally ready to load the second container of goods destined for the AIDS orphans in Swaziland. This one will be only 20 feet in length. The loading party will take place at Landcare on Wednesday, September 6th. (That's tomorrow! Details re timing to follow today, we imagine.)
Joe Z introduced our guest speaker, Father Mike Shaw. Born in England, he moved to Canada in 1965. Ordained in '69, Father Mike is Associate Pastor at St Thomas a Becket parish in Pierrefonds. He provides spiritual animation at Gardenview and Parkdale elementary schools in St-Laurent as well as at FACE, the multi-cultural school housed in the old High School of Montreal building on University Street, that emphasizes visual and performing arts in its curriculum.
Father Mike led off with priestly wit, telling a story of a cockney lad who could not decide which of his two girlfriends he should marry, Maria or Joan. His pastor invited him to go to the altar rail and pray for guidance from above. Soon the lad was thanking the priest profusely for his wise counsel. "The answer was right there on the wall," said the boy in his distinctive cockney accent. "I looked up and there it was ...'ave Maria...can't get any plainer than that!"
Father Mike said he was proud, as we all should be, of the multicultural nature of our great city. He expressed his thanks to our Rotary club for helping to finance a program of educational tours of Montreal offered to Grade 5 and 6 pupils, to teach them some of the cultural, geographic and historical features of Montreal. Students have to work hard to qualify for these 2-day tours, he told us, which are highly prized. Sites visited include the Old Port, Notre Dame Cathedral, Place-Ville-Marie, Mary, Queen of the World Basilica, Place du Canada, the Olympic Stadium and the Biodome.
As an instant test of our knowledge of the city, he posed the following question: "At the top of the Jacques Cartier Bridge there are four distinctive features. What are they?" Only Haagen Kierulf knew the answer: At each of the two peaks on each side, there is a miniature Eiffel Tower. Check it out.
Father Mike told us that the program has recently been expanded to include tours for autistic children, some of whom are unable to travel and thus get a 'virtual' version of the tour, via the Internet.. He said the results are broad-reaching. Not only do the kids achieve better scores on their tests but many subsequently take their parents on public buses tracing the routes of the tour and relate the facts they learned from the tour.
He closed by reading from a letter to our Rotary Club from the principal of Parkdale Elementary School, thanking us for our financial assistance in 2005. Father Mike mentioned that they usually do their fundraising in the January-February time frame, since the tours take place only in late May.
Wayne asked for clarification of the cost to take one class on this tour, and how many such tours are budgeted for 2007. Father Mike replied that each class tour costs about $1,000 and that they hope to be able to afford to conduct 4 or a maximum of 5 tours next spring.Wayne offered to pay for one class tour, as a tribute to his wife, Linda, who was a "mental prisoner of the West Island ghetto" as a child. He also expressed the hope (expectation?) that the club's Board of Directors would authorize club funds sufficient to match his personal contribution. President Art said that would be up to the Board but he promised to present that challenge to the Board at its next meeting.
Father Mike was thanked by Stan, who also took that opportunity to call for happy dollars, gently admonishing President Art for forgetting to stop at that corner during his own tour of the program for the meeting.
Stan said he first met Father Mike through their mutual friend and member of our Rotary club, the late Bert Coughlin. "Thanks to Bert and my other Catholic friends, my Protestant kids went to Camp Kinkora in St-Adolphe d'Howard, and had such a good time they told me they would rather go back to Camp Kinkora than go to Disney World!"
A Super Wedding!
Not even tropical depression Ernesto dared appear on Saturday, September 2nd, to dampen the spirits of the wedding party and 250 of their closest friends, as Brad Belvedere and Jennifer Neville became husband and wife in a delightfully traditional yet user-friendly ceremony in the quaint little Wesleyan United Church of Clarenceville, Quebec.
Two years in the making but worth every minute, I'm sure. Since the bride and her dad and the father of the groom are all members of our Rotary club, it is not too surprising that our club was well represented at the wedding and the day-and-a-half-long reception that followed at the Neville family farm just 5 kilometres down the road, on the shores of beautiful lake Champlain.
There are several snapshots on our club's website: http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org. Go to Members News.

The Lakeshorian, Aug 29, 2006

2006-09-10T21:06:00.000-05:00

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
This week's program...
Joe Z is in charge of today's program. Here is what Joe has to say about that:"Father Mike Shaw will be speaking to us about the project we helped out with several months ago."J.A. Zemanovich
Your guess is as good as mine.
Birthdays and anniversaries? none that we know of.
Future Programs...
September is New Generations Month
Sep 05: Our guest speaker will be Mrs. Yue Chi, President & CEO, Concept East Adventures and Study Tours. Mrs Chi's topic has not yet been disclosed.
Sep 12: President Art, when he began this year, told us he would report on the status of the club every two months, at the first meeting of the following month. This will be his first bi-monthly report.
Sep 19: Speaker: John Griffin. Topic: Movies.
Coming Events...
Sep 11: Our Annual Golf Tournament, Valleyfield Golf Club.
Last week's meeting...
Twelve members and member-to-be Eduardo Quiroga were on hand to hear guest speaker Tom Patterson speak to us about tramp shipping of bulk cargoes.
We were pleased to enjoy the company of Art, PDG Coos, Knud, Joe Z, Fran, Jeff, Wayne, Peter, Brahm, Stan, Andy and PDG Bill.
President Art thanked the many members and spouses who helped with the barbecue at the West Island Palliative Care Residence the preceding Friday. He also told us that the WIPCR will be selling Entertainment Books this fall. In fact, they will be undertaking that fundraising project on the coattails of our club; their books have already arrived at our club, care of Stan at Pesco Inc.Wayne gave us our weekly promo about the golf tournament, reminding us that we still need foursomes, ads for the booklet, prizes and corporate gifts and donations.
Knud had some bad news to impart about the medicines we acquired in February from HPIC and sent down to Peru with Alexandra Vinograd. Alexandra has reported that those medicines were confiscated by Peruvian Customs because her organization failed to complete the necessary customs pre-clearance procedures in Lima. She even appealed to the wife of the president of Peru, but to no avail. Knud said he still hoped for a miracle. Perhaps the right palms have yet to be greased.Art read a letter from Émilie Lapointe, one of the students from Engineers Without Borders for whom we helped finance a summer aid project in Mali.
Stan acknowledged that we had a very full program ahead of us, so he invited members to "do the necessary" by tossing their spare change and folding money into the fine jars.PDG Coos introduced our guest speaker. Tom Patterson is with FedNav Ltd, and has also been involved with CanArctic Shipping and Innotech in Montreal. After graduating from nautical school, Tom worked for Peninsular & Orient Steamship Co, and became a "Master" in 1988. He joined FedNav in the UK and later transferred to Canada.
Tom told us FedNav was incorporated in 1944 and remains privately held (by the Pathé family). With 250 employees, headquartered in Montreal, FedNav Ltd is now Canada's largest shipping company for overseas shipments. Specializing in bulk carriers, of which they have 92, FedNav ships 25 million tons/year. He told us that FedNav is very profitable but keeps a low profile. It operates in specialized, niche markets and most of its ships are young, with an average age of only 8 years. Using a PowerPoint presentation, he gave us a lot of information about FedNav's operations, including:
* 60 "Handysize" (smaller) ships operating in the Great Lakes and the Saint Lawrence.
* An interesting fact is that the gross weight limit is greater for seagoing vessels outbound from Montreal than it is for traffic in the Great Lakes and the seaway, so they top up the cargo at the Port of Montreal before the vessel departs for foreign ports.
* 22 Handymax (larger than Handysize, destined for world-wide routes) and 8 Panamax (225 m long, 80,000 tons, designed to pass through the Panama Canal).
* 2 new large vessels carriers, the "Arctic" and the "Umiak" for carrying bulk shipments to and from Canadian ports in the Beaufort Sea and the Arctic Ocean, e.g., Red Dog, Raglan, Nalunaq, Voisey's Bay and Bent Horn, which is the closest port to the North Pole, 50 mi. from "magnetic north."
* This year there is more ice than usual in the western Arctic, less ice in the eastern Arctic.He told us they are not yet able to use the polar route for reasons of licensing and insurance, but great timesavings will result. For example, it takes 28 days for a shipment of ore concentrate to get to Russia from Red Dog via the Suez Canal, but only 15 days via the polar route.
Tom spoke about the two newest ships, built by Universal Shipbuilding Corp in Japan. The Arctic and the Umiak are each 188 metres long and stronger than Canada's famous icebreaker, the "Louis Saint-Laurent" It can cut through ice that is 80 feet deep!
He spoke about the challenges of Arctic shipping:
* -30 to -40C environment;
* Freezing ballast water;
* Ice adhering to the hull;
* Very few charts to show the status of the ice, which is constantly on the move;
* Scanty weather info.
Among the lessons learned and the requirements to be met:
* Patience;
* Experience-crew, shore personnel and vessel design;
* Fine beam radarsat;
* Ice specialists;
* Customer's inventory control;
* Close liaison with the customers.
Strategic objectives for the future include growth, diversification, the development of new and existing niche markets, and value-added logistic support services.
Tom was thanked by PDG Bill who complimented him on his mastery of and communication of a fascinating subject, and said he was sure that many in the audience would be ready to buy shares in FedNav if it ever goes public.

The Lakeshorian, Aug 22, 2006

2006-09-10T20:59:00.000-05:00

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
This week's program...
PDG Coos, our new program coordinator, has drawn our attention to a very special program this week.
You see, 2007-2008 will be an International Polar Year (IPY), and Canada is already aggressively defending our sovereign claims to the islands along our north coast, including the navigable waters that surround them.
Moreover, as we lament the harmful effects of global warming, we must also acknowledge one commercial benefit: the opening of that holy grail of 15th century explorers, "the Northwest Passage," the polar sea route connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
Our speaker, Mr T Patterson of Federal Navigation (Fednav Ltd), will speak about Arctic shipping and the use of custom-built vessels to transport bulk cargoes safely through the new polar lanes.
Happy Anniversary, Knud & Ruth Monday, August 28th!
Happy Birthday, Joëlle Leroy Monday, August 28th!
Future Programs...
August is Membership and Extension Month: Share Rotary
Aug 29: Reserved for Joe Z.
September is New Generations Month
Sep 05: President Art, when he began this year, told us he would report on the status of the club every two months, at the first meeting of the following month. This will be his first bi-monthly report.
Sep 12: Reserved for Joe Z. Another one? What gives, Joe?
Coming Events...
Sep 11: Our Annual Golf Tournament, Valleyfield Golf Club.
Last week's meeting...
We don't have a list of who was present last week, but it did not look like a great turnout, although our numbers were supplemented by the presence of two prospective members, Maureen Rowe and Eduardo Quirago, as well as make-ups by Malcolm Young of the Montreal-Westward club and Steve Moors of the St. Catharines Sunrise club.
President Art had Good News and Bad News for us. First the bad news: Fran has had to resign from the Board of Directors, due to district-level commitments. The Good News is that she has found a replacement to take over the youth portfolio: Jacinthe Leroux.
Art also told us that The Rotary Foundation has been rated among the "Best Bets" for donors to contribute to, one of only 1075 such winners out of a whopping 71 million charitable organizations investigated.
Fran gave us an update on the golf tournament and repeated the usual refrains about foursomes and prizes. Andy asked who the cheques should be made out to, RCML or Rotaide. Fran said definitely to the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore, NOT Rotaide.
After raking in his usual haul of happy dollars, Stan introduced our guest speaker, Jules Castagner. Stan said he had known Jules for over 30 years, adding "even I have a hard time remembering when Jules was working-not because he seldom worked, but because it was so long ago!" He then invited the audience to welcome with a big hand of applause, our Canadian Idol, Jules Castagner!
Jules' talk lived up to its billing-filled with funny stories and witty remarks. Using his son's new VW Jetta station wagon as an example, he described how hard it is for an old-timer like himself to get used to these newfangled descendants of the good old horseless carriage-all buttons and gadgets. "I went to get gas but couldn't figure out how to get the gas tank's cover open!"He told us he started his career with an insurance broker in 1946, selling "general insurance" which means "everything but life." In 1961 he started his own company, and joined the Rotary club. "I tried to sell the business about 20 years later but the new buyer went bankrupt, so I bought it back from the trustees, built it up again and finally in 1985 accepted another offer-this time for cash!"
Jules told us he started making furniture as a hobby (i.e., "for fun and profit") in 1987, and found himself working harder than ever.
He ended his talk with a sad personal reminiscence about Maurice's last request, before he heft for Ireland, to make two cabinets for his two grandchildren. Needless to say, both were delivered, labours of love.
Asked how he met Meta, he obliged, telling us she was visiting a friend in Mont Tremblant, and started working there. He was working there, too, at the time. When they ran into each other, it was love at first sight...and the rest is history.
Jules was thanked byJoe, who reminisced so long about the Good Old Days" that Bill asked who was thanking the thanker!
Jules was reminded that our club brought "Junior Achievement" to Quebec, where it's now called "Jeunes Entreprises."

The Lakeshorian, Aug 15, 2006

2006-09-10T20:54:00.000-05:00

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
This week's program...
Jules has been retired for longer than many of us have known him. Hence the topic of his talk to us today, "What was my profession, you ask." Sit back and enjoy Jules's natural wit and wonderful sense of humour.
Happy Anniversary, Art & Helen Saturday, August 19th!
Happy Birthday, George Saad Saturday, August 19th!
Future Programs...
August is Membership and Extension Month: Share Rotary
Aug 22: 2007-2008 will be an International Polar Year (IPY). Our speaker, Mr T Patterson of Federal Navigation (Fednav Ltd), will speak about Arctic shipping and the use of custom-built vessels to transport bulk cargoes safely through the new polar lanes.
Aug 29: Reserved for Joe Z.
September is New Generations Month
Sep 05: President Art, when he began this year, told us he would report on the status of the club every two months, at the first meeting of the following month. This will be his first bi-monthly report.
Coming Events...
Aug 18: West Island Palliative Care Residence Barbecue.
Sep 11: Our Annual Golf Tournament, Valleyfield Golf Club.

Last week's meeting...
A measly thirteen members and, happily, one guest turned out to hear Susan's presentation on how we can support RI's goal to improve literacy worldwide. Our guest was Suzanne Etwell, guest of Abie.Because it's a shorter list, we will tell you who was there last Tuesday, rather who was missing.

We enjoyed the fellowship of Jeff, Abie, Andy, PDG Coos, Susan, Stan, Brahm, Jennifer, Peter, Knud, Cameron, Art and Joe.
Alert readers will note that yer 'umble servant and bulletin editor was among the missing last week, having been trapped in his home by a road-paving crew who quit for lunch half-way through the job of repaving Sherwood Road in Beaconsfield. With the driveway emptying onto a roadway coated with a sticky film of oil on one side and a partly rolled layer of asphalt on the other, Bill decided to forego the pleasure of your company and substitute a peanut butter and banana sandwich for the Holiday Inn's Blue Plate special.
As a result we didn't get to hear the announcements, but we can guess that they included:
* expressing the gratitude of the club to Andy and Kathleen for a fabulous feast of roast pig with all the trimmings;
* acknowledgement of the members who turned out to help with the gate control during the Montreal Highland Games;
* a reminder about the barbeque at the West Island Palliative Care Residence, Friday, August 18th, 4 pm for 5;
* an update on the golf tournament September 11th
Cameron was scheduled to introduce our guest speaker, and we have no reason to suppose he didn't. Susan was kind enough to provide her speaking notes (even brought them to the house in person!), which makes our job so much easier.
Susan began by giving us an insight into a special literacy project that was to be the topic of her presentation. RI President-Elect Wilf Wilkinson has personally arranged for an Ottawa-based company to undertake a pilot project in just two Rotary districts in North America and one or two in Australia.
The company, called AutoSkill International Inc., has developed a computer-based system that enables anyone to learn reading skills or mathematics, at their own pace. AutoSkill's products, Academy of Reading and Academy of Math, have become the Number One readers' choice awards of e-School News magazine.
Now the creators of this award-winning software for in-school use have developed an on-line, interactive version that any student can access with a high-speed Internet connection from home, school or library. To test-market this new product AutoSkill has set up a pilot project whereby the $105 fee can be split equally among three parties: a sponsor's Rotary club and that club's Rotary district each pony up $35 and AutoSkill International underwrites the other $35. Our club undertook to cover the $350 cost to permit Susan to sponsor 10 students this year. Susan said she is already working with the first three students. Her multiple roles as a sponsor and a facilitator include motivating the students, monitoring their progress on line and presenting certificates of achievement when a student has mastered a program module.
She gave us some illustrations of how the software works, then went on to explain who can benefit, from struggling students to new Canadians who need to learn English as a second language, to adults who never learned to read as a child.Susan asked for volunteers to become facilitators, who will receive training via "webinars," telephone-assisted on-line seminars. Brahm and Suzanne signed up.

The Lakeshorian for August 8, 2006

2006-08-14T21:41:00.000-05:00

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
Vice President & President-elect: Graham Martin
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director: Andy Csisztu
Director: Susan Diening
Director: Fran Hepworth
Director: Jennifer Neville
Director: Knud Petersen
This week's program...
Susan will speak about the district's new "AutoSkill" pilot project designed to develop literacy skills.

Happy Birthday, Patricia Khal Sunday, August 13th!

Future Programs...
August is Membership and Extension Month: Share Rotary
Aug 15: "What was my profession?" is a question Jules has been waiting for you to ask. Come and enjoy Jules's natural wit as he answers it for us.
Aug 22: 2007-2008 will be an International Polar Year (IPY). Our speaker, Mr T Patterson of Federal Navigation (Fednav Ltd), will speak about Arctic shipping and the use of custom-built vessels to transport bulk cargoes safely through the new polar lanes.
Aug 29: Reserved for Joe Z.

Coming Events...
Aug 18: West Island Palliative Care Residence Barbecue.
Sep 11: Our Annual Golf Tournament, Valleyfield Golf Club.

Last week's meeting...
Sixteen members and one guest were on hand to hear Dr Eduardo Quiroga present the conclusion of his talk on "Africa."
We missed the fellowship of Jeff, Abie, Bob, PDG Bill, Jacinthe, Michel, Graham, Ghandi, Doug, George, Art and Jenny.
Wayne reminded us about the barbeque at the West Island Palliative Care Residence. It will be Friday, August 18th. If you're helping with the cooking, be there at 4 pm; otherwise be there at 5 to 5:30. It will wrap up about 8 pm.
Fran gave us an update on the golf tournament September 11th. She told us we still need:
* 36 foursomes;
* loot bag prizes(quantity 144 of each)
* raffle prizes
* ads for the booklet
Jennifer introduced our guest speaker. Eduardo Quiroga who had graciously agreed to return to give us the conclusion of his talk on Africa.
Dr Quiroga gave us a brief summary of the first part of his presentation, which included an historical overview as well as a discussion of certain issues: inadequate food production and fundamental economic contradictions which left Africa vulnerable to a variety of diseases and other unhealthy conditions, both medical and political in nature.
Dr Quiroga told us he planned to continue to discuss the conflicting priorities of the rural and the urban geopolitical groups, the dismantling of traditional communities to permit the emergence of new societal structures, and how the cream of Africa's brightest prospects was being skimmed off, leaving an even poorer population, especially in the rural areas.
He recounted some disturbing statistics to illustrate the magnitude of the population appropriation due to the slave trade, which saw 20 million men and women in the prime of their lives purloined off to the Americas. The effects of the period of colonization by powerful European states and private organizations were more subtle but just as harmful, changing African values and leaving the population ever more vulnerable to the plundering of the spirit of the people as well as the natural resources of the land. As colonial governments were overthrown by revolutionary cabals, only the adherents of the revolution were permitted to benefit, and it became apparent that Western values had not taken root, even though the best African customs had largely been undermined. The resulting social restructuring created unwanted and unnecessary hardship among the rural populations, who became alienated and underdeveloped, demotivated victims of stagnation, while the new central governments strove to build a more easily controlled urban society as a national priority.
The poorer elements of Africa's rural population succumbed to the temptations offered by the new urban warlords, leaving "prosperous" farmers, often foreign born or first generation Africans, ripe for plundering and depredation by marauding bands condoned by the new central governments.The flight from the rural areas was aided and abetted by a school system that favoured the more efficient education of an urban clientele. Worse yet, the most dynamic of the "new Africans" escaped to the temptations of living abroad.
Lessons learned:
It seems that we have failed to heed the lessons learned during the period of colonization, when Africans were trying to convey to European visitors and colonists alike what was really needed. Today we try to mend fences with books that flaunt our values and taunt the Africans with stories and pictures about Europe and America instead of teaching them basic values that would work in their limited and more fundamental environment. He cited the example of the "school uniform" culture that fails because it is too expensive and designed for a northern climate, not a tropical or desert climate. The UN has likewise failed to appreciate that we must teach the African to market the products we teach them how to manufacture.
Dr Quiroga concluded that the natural conflicts that existed in African society, such as the gulf between rural and urban societies, between the political process and the people it purports to serve and between African youth and the outside world which does not try hard enough to understand how different Africans are from us, how their values differ so fundamentally from our own. We want to sell them cell phones, even if we must convince our own governments to give them the money to buy them, because that will bring us a more immediate payback for our efforts.
With such superb treatment of a popular topic, it was very predictable that the question period would be hot last Tuesday.
Coos voiced the opinion that the West has failed Africa time and time again. "It was a tragedy that the Europeans left so quickly, for it was impossible for the locals to take over." He suggested that Africa desperately needs expert help with the problems of governance, but experts with the integrity to eliminate corruption.
Stan pointed out that African youth who leave the country to get an education seldom return to use it for the good of Africa. Eduardo agreed that the brain drain was one of Africa's most pressing problems, one that western governments are trying to solve with in-country training incentives.Brahm asked how Rotary is helping. Eduardo pointed out that, by Rotary's own evaluation yardstick only 50% of its humanitarian projects are successful.
There were many other questions and comments, proving once again that the Montreal-Lakeshore club delivers the kind of audience that guest speakers love.
Eduardo was thanked by Stan, who observed that it was a special treat for us to hear a presentation on the issues and problems of Africa, prepared and delivered by a Doctor of Economics. Jennifer added that she can't wait to hear Eduardo's classification talk, after he becomes a Rotarian.
This past weekend was a full one for our Rotary Club...Here are a few snapshots of the Pigfest and the Highland Games' Rotary Gate Control Squad, all courtesy of Stan:

The Lakeshorian, August 1, 2006

2006-08-07T22:00:00.000-05:00

Visit our website at http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette

This week's program...
"Africa - Part 2," will permit our guest speaker, world-renowned human development expert Dr Eduardo Quiroga, to conclude the presentation he started last Tuesday. It will also, hopefully, allow time for questions about this subject that Montreal-Lakeshorians find so fascinating.
Our thanks to Susan, who graciously agreed to postpone her talk on the AutoSkill literacy program until August 8th.

Happy Birthday, Knud Friday, August 4th!

Future Programs...
August is Membership and Extension Month: Share Rotary
Aug 8: Susan Diening will speak about the district's new "AutoSkill" pilot project designed to develop literacy skills.
Aug 15: "What was my profession?" is a question Jules has been waiting for you to ask. Come and enjoy Jules's natural wit as he answers it for us.
Aug 22: 2007-2008 will be an International Polar Year (IPY). Our speaker, Mr T Patterson of Federal Navigation (Fednav Ltd), will speak about Arctic shipping and the use of custom-built vessels to transport bulk cargoes safely through the new polar lanes.

Coming Events...
Aug 5: Pig Roast & Pot Luck Supper, 44 Oxford, Baie d'Urfé.
Aug 6: The Montreal Highland Games
Aug 18: West Island Palliative Care Residence Barbecue.
Sep 11: Our Annual Golf Tournament, Valleyfield Golf Club.

Last week's meeting...
Sixteen members and two guests (who are both, we hope, future members) were on hand to hear Dr Eduardo Quiroga present the first part of his talk on "Africa." We were pleased to welcome Rotarian Sultan Jesse, at present a member of the Cornwall club but who will be transferring to our club as soon as his sponsor, Fran, makes the necessary arrangements with club secretary Bob and/or the Board. We were also delighted that Maureen Rowe paid us a repeat visit. I believe Stan will be her sponsor and will get the information written up and presented to Bob or directly to President Art, so the Board can act on the proposal for Maureen's membership. We missed the fellowship of Abie, Jules, Susan, Michel, Graham, Ghandi, Anne, Doug, George, Amiel, Jenny and Joe.
President Art announced the resignation of Rod Quesnel, for personal reasons.
PDG Coos told s he had joined Jennifer on the Programs Committee and urged all members to get involved in recruiting interesting speakers for future meetings. "Don't just suggest a name," he suggested. "Go all the way and make the arrangements. The committee will confirm the availability of a suitable date; you take it from there."
Cameron told us the Rotary Club of Golders Green (Greater London, England) has planted a tree in the name of our club in Pestalozzi Forest, to mark the occasion of a talk that Ambassadorial Scholar M-G Nightingale had given to their club this past spring.
Jeff gave us an update on the golf tournament, observing that September 11th will be here before we know it.
Sergeant Stan had a field day with happy dollars last week. They just kept pouring in; we are one very happy club!
Fran told us she and Peter had each paid $60 to get their police checks done and urged every member who wishes to be involved with youth (Interact, Youth Exchange, etc.) to do the same.
Bob introduced our guest speaker. Eduardo Quiroga is a man to whom the word 'global' has broad personal meaning. He received his BA (cum laudae) in Social Sciences from St Mary's University in Winona, Minnesota, an MA in Sociology & Anthropology from UBC, and a PhD (mention très honorable) in Economics from Université de Paris VIII à Saint-Denis.
Dr Qiroga's work is even more global in scope, taking him to more than 60 countries on every continent with the possible exception of Antarctica. He is a world-renowned expert in institutional development and environmental conservation. His topic was also far from small in scope - Africa: Overall View of Issues and Problems.
He began with an historical overview, pointing out that the turning point in Africa's development coincided with the fall of the Bornai and Songhu empires at the end of the 16th century. This led to widespread insecurity that encompassed the entire continent. European powers found a continent of separate fiefdoms, ripe for the picking. He spoke of the discontinuity between colonization and the emergence of modern nation-states.
'It is important to note that the main difference between Africa and the rest of the world is the value placed upon the smaller structures-the family and the village community," Dr Quiroga observed. "Those values have endured throughout history and remain intact to this very day." He cautioned us, however, not to jump to the conclusion that Africa does not have large cities, but we must remember that certain issues drove Africans from the land they loved, forcing many to forsake their small communities to find work in the large urban centres.
Issue Number 1, he told us, is inadequate food production. Between 1960 and 1985 the total population doubled. Worse yet, the urban population rose by a factor of five! African farmers, using primitive farming tools and methods, continued to produce millet and sorghum, while the new urbanites had learned to crave wheat and rice, imported from Europe, Asia and North America. They were cheap, because of subsidies, but that only widened the rift between the small African farmer and the urban dweller. A similarly uneven pace of livestock development led to conflicts between herdsmen and crop farmers.
He discussed national resource management and conservation issues, including the progressive desertification of rural areas, for which he gave Senegal as an example.
"The second issue," said Dr Quiroga, "concerns basic contradictions in national economies." He spoke of the growth of the public sector, as a result of taxation and foreign aid, and the emergence of a parastatal sector, which attracted high school and university graduates, while the largest segment of the population remained in the poor rural areas.
The lessons learned:
* These economic contradictions were a poor foundation for sustained economic growth, leading to a loose network of disjointed local economies.
* Foreign aid ended up mainly in public sector pockets.
* Thus, external aid did not meet the needs of the main, rural population.
* In the end, Africa became a playing field for cold war enemies, the USA and the USSR, for example.
Issue Number 3 is the conflicted political process. Colonization ended in independence, but the resulting nation states have never been well understood by the rural populace, which continues to identify with rural villages and cities.
Some communities are vibrant and forward-thinking, while others remain backward and withdrawn. From personal experience, he related the difficult choices a foreign aid visitor must make, deciding whether to work with powerful local chiefs or "war lords" or ill-equipped government employees at the local level, whom he caricaturized as akin to a park ranger on a bicycle.
At this point, we ran out of time but Dr Quiroga's audience was obviously deeply committed to seeing this 'short course' on Africa through to its conclusion. After only a few minutes of consultation, President Art found a consensus urging our guest speaker to return on August 1st to conclude his lecture.
Dr Quiroga was just as committed to his subject as we were, and heartily agreed to return.

[Editor's note: The Lakeshorian has subsequently learned that Bob and Art became convinced that Dr Quiroga would make an excellent addition to our club. Better yet, they were able to persuade him to let Secretary Bob submit his candidacy to the Board at the first opportunity.]

The Lakeshorian July 25, 2006

2006-07-30T16:17:00.000-05:00

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette

This week's program...
The topic is "Africa" and our guest speaker is Dr Eduardo Quiroga, a world-renowned expert in
institutional development and environmental conservation to ensure sustainable human development.

Happy Birthday, Fran Monday, July 31st!

Future Programs...
Aug 1: Susan Diening will speak about the district's new "AutoSkill" pilot project designed to
develop literacy skills.
Aug 8: Temporarily reserved for Joe Zemanovich.
Aug 15: "What was my profession?" is a question Jules has been waiting for you to ask. Come and enjoy Jules's natural wit as he answers it for us.

Coming Events...
Aug 5: Pig Roast & Pot Luck Supper, 44 Oxford, Baie d'Urfé.
Aug 6: The Montreal Highland Games.
Aug 18: West Island Palliative Care Residence Barbecue.
Sep 11: Our Annual Golf Tournament, Valleyfield Golf Club.

Last week's meeting...

A relatively good turnout of 18 members and three guests were on hand for the official visit of
our District Governor, Linda Bradley. We were pleased to welcome Maureen Rowe, who is DG Linda's sister and a prospective new member for our club. We were also delighted that two Rotarians decided to make up at our club last Tuesday: Ms. Hoda Zaki Ghaly, from Egypt and Sultan Jesse, a member of the Cornwall club who has just recently moved to the west Island and would like to transfer his Rotary membership seamlessly to our club, a move I am sure we can facilitate with the help of Club Secretary Bob and Sultan's sponsor, Fran. We missed the fellowship of Jeff, Abie, Jules, Michel, Graham, Ghandi, Anne, Doug, George and Jenny.

President Art reminded us of the Montreal Highland Games on Sunday, August 6th at the park just south of Pierrefonds Comprehensive High School. Our club will again be responsible for gate
control. Please get in touch with Wayne to negotiate a mutually suitable shift assignment.

Art also reminded us that our club has made another important commitment, to participate in the West Island Palliative Care Residence Barbecue at noon on Friday, August 18th at the WIPCR, 265 André Brunet Boulevard, Kirkland.

Andy announced that he and Kathleen would be hosting their annual pig roast at their home, 44
Oxford, Baie d'Urfé. Members are reminded that this is no longer a fund-raising event; members, their family & friends are welcome providing they bring their own chairs and a dish to share (salad or dessert).

Fran brought us up to date on the Golf Tournament. Tickets are now available for those who prefer to have them, although they are not strictly necessary if a foursome is fully identified and paid for, especially if they are part of a corporate package. Fran told us prizes are coming in but we still need more if we are to retain and build upon our reputation as the best golf bang for the
buck. She also told us we will sign up 160 golfers to ensure that we end up with a full complement of 144 players on the course when the gun goes off Sept. 11th.

Jennifer announced that PDG Coos would be taking over the weekly programs subcommittee, effective immediately, although she confirmed that she would complete the follow-up with our speaker for July 25th.

Visiting Rotarian Hoda told us about her desire to undertake a Matching Grant project jointly with our club. President Art assured her it would be discussed by the Board at the first opportunity.

PDG Bill introduced our District Governor: Linda Bradley was born in Montreal, where she became a Registered Nurse, graduating from the St. Mary's Hospital School of Nursing. She worked as a nurse at RVH in Montreal and, after moving to British Columbia in 1974, at the Children's in Vancouver.

In 1984 she retired from nursing and joined her husband James in Dart Aerospace Inc., designers and manufacturers of helicopter parts. As VP Marketing she traveled the globe extensively.Linda joined the Rotary Club of Sidney by the Sea, B.C., in 1996, but moved to the Rotary Club of Sidney, where James was already a member, six months later. While there she initiated a hi-tech trade show called EduTech, to introduce high school students to local hi-tech industries and vice versa. That vocational service trade show is still an annual event in Sidney.

In 1998 she and James moved to Hawkesbury and transferred to the Rotary club there. Linda served as club treasurer and president before becoming our governor-nominee in 2004-05.She and James have been married for 38 years and have three children and two grandchildren. They recently moved to Ottawa.

DG Linda acknowledged that she chose our club as one of the first on her visit list, because she felt comfortable among her friends at Montreal-Lakeshore, where she had made up many times.She began with a story to illustrate how to overcome the challenges of diversity. A mother with three kids decided to rent a movie and asked each of them what kind they'd like her to bring home. "A horror flick," said her eldest, a boy. The middle child, a girl, requested a love story. "Oh, a cartoon, please" begged the toddler. Everyone's tastes were satisfied by the mother's choice, "Beauty and the Beast.

"She told us she had a single objective for our district this year, to strengthen our clubs. "This simple goal has a number of diverse components, however," she pointed out:

1. Have fun. "It is important to enjoy Rotary. Clubs that are fun to belong to are the ones that
thrive. There are lots of ways for Rotarians to have fun together: Involve everyone in some facet of club life; encourage members who miss a meeting to discover the fun of making up; get involved with youth-they help keep us young, too. In fact, she told us, bring a youth to the District Conference in Mont-Tremblant this year. The theme will be, 'Making a Small World Smaller,' and it will be a celebration of the joy of youth, complete with Santa Claus. So bring a wrapped gift, bilingual, if possible. While at the conference, each club will have a 5-minute opportunity to boast about their favourite project."

2. Communicate. "The other 64 clubs in our district are your siblings. Share the fun of Rotary
with them. Montreal-Lakeshore is a strong club. Invite a weaker club to join in some of your
special events, such as a Paul Harris Fellow Awards Night."

3. Improve your knowledge of Rotary. "Ensure that all your new members attend the Rotary
Leadership Institute courses. Knowledgeable Rotarians become active Rotarians. And, for your
seasoned members who might need a Rotary refresher, PDG Nancy Gilbert of the Westmount club will hold a 'live' chat room/Rotary game every month-a 'fun' way to learn about Rotary."

4. Increase membership. "If we don't grow, Rotary will die. Some day your grandson will be a
grandfather himself. You don't want him to have to explain to his grandson while walking through a 'Rotary' park that Rotary 'used to be the best service club in the world but it doesn't exist anymore.'"

5. Promote Rotary through active public relations. "Issue press releases, with graphics or photographs. Put Rotary decals on your car windows and a 'Goodbye polio' sticker on your bumper. Wear your Rotary lapel pin and PHF pin all the time. Be proud to be a Rotarian!"

6. Use the power of The Rotary Foundation. "Your club's contributions to a Rotary project can be multiplied 3 and a half times through District Designated Funds and Matching Grants. Make it happen!" She told us she had travelled in Africa and had seen first hand the difference in the
quality of life between villages Rotary has touched, compared to those Rotary hasn't found yet."

Sponsor non-Rotarians to benefit from Our Foundation," Linda urged us, "as a GSE team member, an Ambassadorial Scholar or a Rotary Peace Scholar. This club has succeeded many times in the past; keep up the good work. Plus, we desperately need Rotary host counsellors for scholars who come here from other countries to study at McGill, Concordia, U of M or UQAM. Offer your services today!"

Linda told us that Paul Harris made three very significant observations about Rotary during his
lifetime:

1. Rotary clubs have proven themselves through both research labs and testing grounds of new ideas throughout the world.

2. Rotary is not an organization for retrospection. It is rather one whose worth and purpose lie
in the future activity rather than past performance.

3. We live in a changing g world and Rotary must be prepared to change as well.

She told us she subscribed to an unusual philosophy of life: "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." She urged us all to be unreasonable: "Stimulate your club to change for the better. Don't accept the status quo."

Linda listed the four initiatives of RI President Bill Boyd:

1. Water. Until your thirst is slaked, nothing else matters.
2. Health & Hunger. Without food there is no health; without health there is no hope.
3. Literacy. Only through literacy can communities learn to manage their own resources, control their destiny.
4. Think ahead, not one or five years-think decades ahead. That means cultivating the youth of
today to ensure the future of Rotary tomorrow.

With those four initiatives in mind, Rotarians must Lead the Way to a better life for everyone in
the world.

She closed with a quote from Emily Dickinson,
"If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain."

Linda was thanked by Fran, who assured Linda that she had come to a club that has fun, then recounted the many ways our club relates to the points of Linda's presentation.

Member News...
Rod Quesnel has submitted his resignation, citing personal reasons. Rod joined Montreal-Lakeshore Rotary in 1962, during the second half of our charter year. He is one of the longest-serving members of our club, second only to Jules, who joined in 1961. In recent years, it was an occasion to be appreciated when he was able to attend our meetings. We wish him and Carmen well.

Help Wanted...
Treasurer Peter has indicated his desire to step down from that post, in which he has served the club faithfully for many years. Anyone interested in assuming responsibility for this challenging
but stimulating job is invited to get in touch with Club Secretary Bob: bobhabib@videotron.ca.

The Lakeshorian 11 July 2006

2006-07-27T17:56:00.000-05:00

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Art Surette
Vice President & President-elect: Graham Martin
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director: Andy Csisztu
Director: Susan Diening
Director: Fran Hepworth
Director: Jennifer Neville
Director: Knud Petersen

This week's program...
Bill Gray is the Immediate Past President of the Cataraqui-Kingston club. He is here today to tell us about a major health-oriented humanitarian program his club has undertaken to provide surgical relief for children in Kenya with spina bifida.He will tell us about this debilitating birth defect, how it can be corrected surgically, and how we can help provide the financial means to maximize the number of children whose quality of life will be immeasurably altered for the better, and forever.

Birthdays and Anniversaries...
Happy Birthday, Michel Leroy Saturday, July 15th!

Future Programs...
Jul 18: The official visit of District Governor Linda Bradley. Board members please see Art re meeting with Linda Tuesday morning.
Coming Events...
Jul 12: Board Meeting at the home of Bob and Magda, 136 Northview, DDO, 5:30 for 6 o'clock.
Aug 6: Highland Games
Aug 18: Barbeque at the West island Palliative Care Residence.
Sep 11: Our Annual Golf Tournament, Valleyfield Golf Club.

Last week's meeting...
Kudos to Peter for another fabulous year book! The pride that members felt for Peter, the book and the club, translated into big bucks when it came time to kick in the Happy Dollars!
Last week was a special week in lots of different ways:First of all it was the first meeting of the new Rotary year, with our new president Arthur in charge.
Secondly, we had the pleasure of greeting our very own Ambassadorial Scholar, Marie-Geneviève ("M-G") Nightingale, back after her challenging yet very rewarding year of study at the London School of Economics. M-G only had a few days in Canada before she has to take off on her next adventure, but she was determined that her first order of business would be to come and thank our club for giving her an opportunity of a lifetime, and a chance to set her life on a new course for an even higher star. She expressed her disappointment that PDG Bill could not be on hand to receive her personal vote of gratitude for convincing her to apply for the scholarship. "That was a pivotal, life-altering moment for me," she declared.
Her next adventure will be in Egypt, where she will resume her love affair with the Middle East and with renewed determination, continue to develop her language skills so she can work to make a difference in the quest for peace.
Third, we had to say goodbye to Mark Belvedere, who would soon be off to begin his own adventure, as a Rotary Youth Exchange student in Paranaval, in southern Brazil.
Lastly, we had our annual Kirkland Blood Donor Clinic, at the Margaret Manson Elementary School. PDG Bill was in charge of organizing the clinic again this year, a role that kept him from being here for M-G's visit, a circumstance that saddened them both. Bill wishes to thank the 17 people who worked to make the event a success, in spite of the three strikes the competition threw our way: the jazz festival, the World Cup and the lousy weather. As a result we were only able to welcome 63 donors to the school. Nevertheless, we still did our best and we were well prepared to handle every one of the 100 souls who made up our target for the day, if they had all shown up, that us. Our heartfelt thanks to Wayne, Linda, Mark, Susan, Stan, Anita, Fran, Bill, June, Graham, Jennifer, Peter, Doug, Knud, Art, Cameron and Jenny. Well done, team! We plastered the town of Kirkland with posters and fliers and put out a system of signs that even the most geographically-challenged driver could follow. We gave them no excuses, and then the Italians went and won the soccer game, leaving that very Italian part of Kirkland with other things on their mind beside donating blood. Oh well, there's always next year.
Among the announcements...
Don't forget the Board meeting tomorrow evening, July 12th at the Habibs.
Knud announced that he had learned that the Prime Minister of Swaziland would be visiting the site of the first new school to be built as a part of our project. This highlights the importance that the Government of Swaziland places on the work we are doing to give the AIDS orphans a chance for a better life, through education and agriculture.
Wayne wanted to make sure that members did not forget our club's reputation for supporting our friends here at home as well as those in far-off Africa. He urged us to mark our calendars for the Highland Games, the WIPCR barbeque, and our Golf Tournament (see Coming Events). When they're run right, Wayne reminded us, golf tournaments can make a pile of money for charity, and this one is being run right. But that also means a lot of planning and preparation is going into this event. Your help is needed NOW to sell foursomes and participation packages, to get prizes rounded up NOW so we know we will have loot bags that our golfers will be talking about until next year and prizes that will keep them coming back year after year.

2006-07-10T12:41:00.000-05:00

27 June 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE(Chartered February 27, 1961)President: Cameron SherryPres-elect: Art SuretteSecretary: Bob HabibTreasurer: Peter NevilleDirector, Club Service: Graham MartinDirector, Community Service: Susan DieningDirector, International Service: Knud PetersenDirector, Youth Service: Fran Hepworth
This week's program...NO MEETING TODAY! Instead we will have our annual Changeover meeting at the home of Cameron and Winnifred Sherry, 445 Bellevue Avenue, Vaudreuil-Dorion. Directions: From Autoroute 20, turn south at McDonalds, travel south a few blocks, then turn east on Bellevue. 445 is on your left at the corner of Trudeau. Plan to arrive at 5 or a little after. Dinner will be at 6:30. Bring a chair for each person in your party. You'll be billed $40 per person for dinner, and there will be a cash bar available.
Birthdays & Anniversaries...Happy Birthday, Sharon Gallay Thursday, June 29th!Happy Anniversary, Ghandi & Gladys Sunday, July 2nd!In last week's bulletin I asked for birthday and anniversary dates. Nobody sent me any. But I betcha I catch it, the next one I miss!
Coming Events:Jul 04: Our Blood Donor Clinic, Margaret Manson Elementary School, 18750 Elkas Blvd., Kirkland, from 2 to 8 pm. If you offered to help publicize the event prior to July 4th, please call me about getting your posters, etc.
Future Programs:Jul 04: Tentatively, Ambassadorial Scholar Marie-Geneviève Nightingale, back from her year of study at the London School of Economics, will tell us all about her year abroad and her plans for the future. This is also the date of our annual blood donor clinic. Please come to Margaret Manson School, 18750 Elkas Blvd, Kirkland, right after the meeting. We Need Your Help!Jul 11: Rotarian Bill Gray from the Cataraqui-Kingston Rotary Club, will speak to us about his club's WCS project to help finance operations desperately needed by children afflicted with spina bifida. Jul 18: The official visit of District Governor Linda Bradley. Board members please see Art re meetings with Linda.
Last week's meeting...Right off the bat, President Cameron called for the big drawing of the winning tickets for our Heinz Ritter sculptures. Heinz was on hand for the happy occasion, as were the prizes he had donated. It was disappointingly low-key, with Knud not there to flourish the prizes as the winners' names were drawn. After each winning ticket was drawn, the name was read aloud, then the ticket went into an envelope for future reference. Later that day Peter published the winners' names and coordinates by email. They are:4th Prize: Ernesto Gardois, Pointe Claire, 514-695-46683rd Prize: Kim Arsenian, Dollard-des-Ormeaux, 514-626-22132nd Prize: Rob & Stacie Martin, Pincourt, 514-425-38601st Prize: Maurice Bissada, Mount Royal, 514-739-7196[Maurice is the President of the St-Laurent-Mt-Royal Rotary Club. Ed.]PDG Bill promoted the Blood Donor Clinic on July 4th, and distributed samples of posters and other promo materials he had received from Héma-Québec, along with 4 sign-up sheets for the week leading up to the clinic and on the day of the clinic itself. The following persons signed up either at last week's meeting or via email:Distributing Posters & Flyers this week: Susan, Stan & Anita, Wayne, Bill & June.Posting signs the morning of the clinic: Bill & June.At the school on July 4th: 1 - 5 pm: Wayne, Stan, Jenny, Jacinthe, Doug & Shirley, Peter, Bill & June.5 - 9 pm: Susan, Fran, Jennifer, Cameron, Bill & June.Bill also announced that the Board of Directors had declined his request that the Rotaide Foundation contribute $400 to the Vanier College Foundation. However, personal contributions totalling $420 were received from Anne, Wayne, Susan, Fran and Bill. The cash was turned over to Peter who will send a Rotary Club cheque to the VCF in memory of the Late Maurice Scarpaleggia, former Director-General of Vanier College.Our guest speaker last week was Gloria Sweeney, who spoke passionately about the West Island Women's Shelter. She began with a short success story about a lady who had arrived battered, bruised and in tears back in March and now, less than three months later, was well on her way to a new life, with a new home and a new job, thanks to the Women's Shelter's program of counselling, help to get resettled and financially self-sufficient, and a much needed boost to her self-esteem. Gloria told us the WIWS is very grateful to many foundations and organizations, including our Rotary club, who together contribute the $250,000 in cash they need in addition to the $250,000 they received from the Quebec Government.She explained that this year is sort of "special" because they are planning to build a new "Second Stage Home" consisting of 14 apartments, to be called "Alternelle" at a cost of $1.2 million, on a property donated by the City of Pierrefonds. As usual, the location will be confidential and the building will be equipped with a good security system.Gloria turned the program over to Laura, her colleague and our other guest speaker, who brought up a PowerPoint presentation that any Madison Avenue agency would have been proud of. Laura showed us some typical before-and-after shots to illustrate what can be done with some paint and a little sweat equity.Laura told us the financing of many of the apartments will be sought through the Shelter's Adopt-a-Room program that has succeeded so well for them in their existing facility, thanks in part to a grant from the Montreal-lakeshore Rotary Club's Rotaide Foundation. Starting with partitions (walls and doors), floors, closet doors, paint and finally, furniture, the rooms take on a sense of pride that helps enhance the self-esteem of their tenants-mothers and kids who can stay at the shelter up to 11 months at a stretch. That maximum stay is dictated by government regs and tax considerations. But the revitalisation of a life that has suffered a hit, both figuratively and literally, goes beyond the four walls of their room. Laura showed us pictures of a garden, balcony and deck and, on behalf of WIWS Director-General Kim Cairnduff, was lavish in her praise of Rotary and other donors who help make this life-building environment possible.The West island Women's Shelter has been called a "Safe Haven' and a "Harbour," Laura told us adding that, "Life re-building starts with a dream." Her presentation went on to describe the new Second Stage House-14 furnished apartments, a children's day camp and other facilities, including private conference rooms for counselling. This new home will permit the WIWS to increase the number and scope of its caring contributions to the West Island communities it serves.Gloria and Laura took a few moments at the end of their joint presentation to answer some questions from an interested audience.Some of the questions:What is the average length of a stay at the WIWS? Answer: 32 daysIs it true that most women go back to their abusive partners? Answer: The majority of first-time users of the WIWS facilities do go back to their husbands or boyfriends, but equipped with some new tools and a safety plan. Most of them are abused again, some even a third time. But we don't pressure them. Eventually they elect not to return to the abusive environment.Our speakers were thanked by Wayne, who said he has known Gloria for a long time. She and her husband run an aircraft and defence equipment company, located near Wayne's Landcare facility. Wayne thanked Gloria for her deep commitment to the West Island Women's Shelter which, he said, was very evident in her presentation.
Last Friday was Container Loading day at Landcare. Knud was back home from his European trip and was joined by Wayne, Peter, Bill & June, Jennifer & Brad, Jenny & Andrew, Jacinthe and Art, plus a great bunch of Ultimate gamers, and Ste-Anne's rugby players, who packed and loaded up a storm!

For the current issue of The Lakeshorian, check out our website:
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

The Lakeshorian

2006-06-26T22:04:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN
20 June 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect: Art Surette
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director, Club Service: Graham Martin
Director, Community Service: Susan Diening
Director, International Service: Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service: Fran Hepworth
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm
This week's program...
TODAY IS THE DAY! Our big drawing of the winners of the Heinz Ritter bird sculptures has arrived. Enjoy the big event.
Afterwards, if the program schedule is still giving us the real stuff, Gloria Sweeny and Kim Karenduff will speak to the club about the work of the West Island Women's Shelter.
Coming events and programs...
Birthdays & anniversaries:
Happy Birthday, Bill Today, June 20th!
Last Tuesday Graham announced that The Lakeshorian had done it again. We had missed an important anniversary in the Martin household. Sorry about that, Graham, but I'm not sure how we are supposed to divine these dates. Would everyone who isn't sure whether or not the bulletin editor has his or her birthday, that of their spouse and their anniversary, please send those dates to us by email? I don't need the year-just the month and day. Thank you!
Future Programs:
Jun 27: No meeting next Tuesday. Changeover on Thursday, June 29th instead. See below.
Jul 04: Tentatively, Ambassadorial Scholar Marie-Geneviève Nightingale, back from her year of study at the London School of Economics, will tell us all about her year abroad and her plans for the future. This is also the date of our annual blood donor clinic. Please come to Margaret Manson School, 18750 Elkas Blvd, Kirkland, right after the meeting. We Need Your Help!
Jul 11: Rotarian Bill Gray from the Cataraqui-Kingston Rotary Club, will speak to us about his club's WCS project to help finance operations desperately needed by children afflicted with spina bifida.
Jul 18: The official visit of District Governor Linda Bradley.
Future Events:
Jun 29: Changeover Night at the Sherry's, 445 Bellevue Ave., Vaudreuil-Dorion. Details to follow.
Jul 4 Our annual Blood Donor Clinic, to be held at Margaret Manson Elementary School, 18750 Elkas Blvd., Kirkland again this year, from 2 to 8 pm.
Last week's meeting...
Another small turnout was helped by the presence of several guests. The 11 members attending: Cameron, Stan, Wayne, Peter, Jennifer, Jeff, PDG Coos, Graham, Jenny, Jacinthe and PDG Bill. We were pleased to welcome Winnifred, guest of Cameron; Anita, guest of Stan; June, guest of Bill and Helen Surette, with daughter Corianne and grandson Joshua, all guests of Art,, who was not able to attend himself.
President Cameron thanked Vice-President Art (in absentia) for filling in at the podium during the previous two meetings. "And was he ever good!" piped up Peter.
Cameron also reminded us our Changeover Night will take place at his home on Thursday evening, June 29th. He will send out a map showing to get to 445 Bellevue, in Dorion. Include the time you would like us to be there, Cameron, please.
PDG Coos told us a story that happened seven years ago on June 13th, 1999. A visiting Rotarian from Baku, Azerbaijan made up at our club, while she was in Montreal for a Human Rights Conference at John Abbott College. As this topic was very dear to Coos's heart, he invited the visiting Rotarian, Leila Yunus, to spend some time with Coos and Dona at their home. Coos said he and Dona have hosted visitors to that conference in subsequent years. He now attends the conference himself and this year hopes to have one or more delegates at his home for dinner from such countries as Guyana, Russia, the Ukraine and Uzbekistan. "It should make for some very interesting table conversation," he added.
Jeff gave us an update on our Golf Tournament, coming up on Monday, September 11th. He told us the sponsorship sales packages are ready to go, including the registration form. He asked us to send these out to our clients and/or suppliers, corporations and institutions who might be potential sponsors. He also asked us to help ensure that the registrations include all of the players' coordinates. Lastly, Jeff would like to have an email from each member, listing the names of all volunteers available to help on the day of the tournament, so he can complete the schedule of task assignments.
Cameron reminded us of the blood donor clinic July 4th at Margaret Manson Elementary School, located at the west end of Elkas Boulevard in Kirkland. The clinic will be open from 2 to 8 pm and volunteers are needed from 1 to 9 pm.
Sergeant Stan commented on the poor turnout and proposed that all absent members be fined $2. Treasurer Peter offered to take care of the necessary billing. Fortunately, many of the members present donated happy dollars to help fill the coffers.
Before introducing our guest speaker, President Cameron announced that he had received a proposed enactment to be voted on by clubs in the district, in order to decide if it should be presented by our district to the 2007 Council on Legislation. The proposal was from the Saranac Lake club and had to do with two new membership ideas, family and corporate memberships, which would have the unique feature of allowing associated Friends of Rotary to attend in the place of the primary member of the family or corporate membership. Bill and Wayne commented on the proposal and suggested that our club vote not to endorse this proposal, on the basis that it would tend to dilute and perhaps even downgrade the value of a full Rotary membership. Cameron said it would be presented to the Board of Directors for a decision at their next board meeting, which was scheduled to be held last Tuesday evening.

Cameron then went on to introduce his daughter (not his daughter-in-law, as erroneously reported in last week's Lakeshorian), Wendy Sherry. He told us Wendy had wanted to be a nurse from a very earkly age, and began her pursuit of that dream at John Abbott College, from which she graduated in 1984. She later (in May 2005) graduated "with Honours" from UBC, through that university's correspondence program.
Wendy began by defining the McGill University Health Centre as comprising The Montreal Children's Hospital, Montreal General and Royal Victoria hospitals, The Montreal Neurological Hospital, as well as The Montreal Chest Institute.
When a back injury prevented her from continuing to provide bedside nursing care, she became a clinician for organ and tissue donation. With the aid of a slide show that she distributed in the absence of our club's projector, Wendy illustrated the grim reality of the shortage of donated organs and tissue in Quebec. There are over 1,000 people who are waiting for an organ, and an average of 50 die every year because a life-saving organ was not there when they needed it. The MUHC follows 275 of those on the waiting list. Last year 414 organs were transplanted in Quebec, 107 at the MUHC. She encouraged her listeners to consider becoming asn organ donor and told us the two ways in which this can be done. The first is to undeake a legal agreement with the provinical registry, which requires the services of a notary and leaves the decision as to what organs and/or tissue will be used in the event of your death. The other route is to sign the back of your Medicare card, in which case your family will have the opportunity to decide if there are organs that cannot be taken. Whichever way a donor decides to make their wishes known, it is most important to discuss their decision with their family, so that this will not come as a surprise to them at an untimely moment in their lives-your death.
She spoke to us about tissue donation, what types of tissue can be donated (eye tissue, such as the cornea, skin, heart valves, bone, tendons, veins and ligaments), and what can be accomplished as a result of your wonderful gifts, which could help up to 40 different patients, she told us.
When she told us how skin tissue donations are often very thin wafers, Stan asked if such skin tissue could be safely donated by a living donor. Wendy acknowledged that the question had not come up before, but that she would try to find the answer for him.
She spioke about living donors who donate organs they can survive without, in order to save the life of a loved one to whom they are suaually related by blood. She tod us that kidney and liver "lobes" have been successfully transplanted in Quebec and lung lobes are being considered for future transplants. A lobe is an organ segment.
She spoke about the limitations on the nature of the death upon which organs and tissue can be taken. At present this can only occur after neurological death, which represents only 3% of deaths. The more common type of death is cardiac death, which covers the other 97% of deaths. The isue of organ and tissue donation following certain cardiac deaths is the subject of serious study and debate, but Wendy assured us that it was coming.
She assured us that the religious beliefs and cultural practices of patients and their families are always respected at the MUHC and that a nurse/clinician like herself is available 24-7 to assist and support the family during the process. She aslo is responsible for providing follow-up family care during the subsequent bereavement period.
Wendy was thanked by Stan for an enlightening and thought-provoking presentation of a difficult subject. "Your gentle nature and your nurse's training equip you well to deal with families at a time when they need to feel they can trust the person who is speaking to them about the recent, or possibly imminent, death of their loved one," Stan told her.

2006-06-19T22:43:00.000-05:00

13 June 2006

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect: Art Surette
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director, Club Service: Graham Martin
Director, Community Service: Susan Diening
Director, International Service: Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service: Fran Hepworth

This week's program...
Wendy Sherry, MUHC Nurse Clinician, will speak about Organ and Tissue Donation. Wendy is the daughter-in-law of President Cameron and Winnifred.

Coming events and programs...
Birthdays & anniversaries:
Happy Anniversary, Ted & Patricia Saturday, June 17th!
Happy Anniversary, Rod & Carmen Sunday, June 18th!

Future Programs:
Jun 20: The drawing for our raffle in aid of AIDS orphans in Swaziland. Our guest speakers for that date will be Gloria Sweeney and Kim Karenduff, who will tell us about the work of the West Island Women's Shelter.
Jun 27: No meeting. Changeover June 29th instead. See below.
Jul 04: Our Ambassadorial Scholar, Marie-Geneviève Nightingale, back from her year of study at the London School of Economics, will tell us all about her year abroad and her plans for the future.

Future Events:
Jun 29: Changeover Night at the Sherry's, 445 Bellevue Ave., Vaudreuil-Dorion. Details to follow.
Jul 4 Our annual Blood Donor Clinic, to be held at Margaret Manson Elementary School in Kirkland again this year, from 2 to 8 pm.
Jul 18: Official visit of District Governor Linda Bradley.

Last week's meeting...
President Cameron was away on business again last Tuesday, so Vee-Pee Art got a bit more practice for taking over the gavel permanently in just a couple of weeks' time.
In lieu of our normal grace, PDG Bill was asked to lead the club in a prayer and a moment of silence for Maurice, who had passed away on Sunday.
Art gave us a brief update on the Swaziland project and our next major fundraiser: our Annual Golf Tournament.
Sergeant-at-Arms Stan invited members to put their sad dollars into the pot in Maurice's memory.
Jennifer introduced our guest speaker, Shiellah Quintos, General Manager of Association de l'Ultimate de Montréal, who would speak to us about the novel team sport called Ultimate. Shiellah was born in the Philippines and grew up in Toronto. She moved to Montreal 10 years ago and enjoys traveling, hiking, reading and, of course, Ultimate. She also prizes the many friendships she has been blessed with over the years.
Shiellah told us that Ultimate combines the best features of many popular team sports, like football, soccer and basketball, to name but a few. "Think of football played with a Frisbee," she suggested. They use a disc instead of a ball or a puck; they can't call it a 'Frisbee(r),' because that is a registered trademark of Wham-O Inc., even though Wham-O is one of three approved manufacturers of Ultimate discs, which are 103/4 inches in diameter and weigh 175 grams. They are heavier and sturdier than a recreational Frisbee and the weight, diameter, shape and material generally conform to standards developed by the UPA (Ultimate Players Association).
The field of play is 70 yards in length by 40 yards wide, with two end zones, each 25 yards deep.
Ultimate is a non-contact game played by two 7-member teams. It combines the non-stop movement and athletic endurance of soccer with the aerial passing skills of football. The object of the game is to score a point by catching a pass in the opponent's end zone. As in basketball, a player must stop running when he is in possession of the disc, but may pivot and pass to any of the other receivers on the field. It's a fast-moving game, with players switching from offence to defence with every turnover, which may be due to a dropped pass, interception, a pass out of bounds or when a player is caught holding the disc for more than ten seconds, counted by the opponent guarding the thrower.
At the beginning of the game and after each point is scored play begins with each team lining up on the front of its end zone. The defending team throws (pulls) the disc to the offence.
The game ends when one of the teams reaches a pre-determined point score (usually 15).
One of Ultimate's most unusual and desirable features is its reliance on the Spirit of the Game, a sense of sportsmanship that places responsibility for fair play on the players themselves. Adherence to the rules is important, but there are no referees. Instead, the players self-officiate. There are 'observers' whose job is only to resolve disputes when asked by the players after they have failed to resolve the issue on their own.
Shiellah discussed the "Ten Simple Rules" of Ultimate and talked about the strategy of play. Substitutions may occur after a score or during an injury time-out.
She went on to describe the AUM and give us some statistics. Made up mostly of singles, membership is now greater than 2,000 and is 57% male and 43% female. Francophones now outnumber Anglophones 65% to 35%. The organization's objectives for 2006 include developing a business plan and a field improvement plan and to establish a junior league by promoting the sport of Ultimate in the schools.
We were treated to a short but entertaining video of the game of Ultimate, demonstrating the fast pace of play, after which Shiellah agreed to answer questions from the audience, and there were many. We learned that there are 158 teams operating in the summer, divided by age group into six divisions; that they use mainly two fields in Montreal: on the grounds of the Douglas Hospital and at the Hippodrome. All teams are made up of both men and women, usually consisting of 4 men and 3 women per side. Players wear soccer cleats. Cones are generally used to delimit the field of play. A disc costs $15 and annual membership in the AUM costs $25.
The AUM sponsors tournaments, some of which are fundraisers, and contests using baskets, where the scoring is similar to golf.
The sport of Ultimate was first conceived by a group of students at Columbia High School in Maplewood, NJ, in 1968. It is now played in more than 20 different countries and is recognized by the IWGI as a World Games full medal sport.
Shiellah told us, "Ultimate is not only a very social sport, great for networking, it is also really good for your health. And, it's a great way to learn conflict self-resolution," she observed.
Shiellah was thanked by Jenny.

The Ultimate action photos above are from the AUM website. The one on the left is (c) G Ghiz 2004 from the 2004 Canadian Championship finals.
Before we sang O Canada, Art took a moment to congratulate PDG Coos on his recent marriage to Helmi, and he wished them both many years of happiness.

2006-06-19T22:37:00.000-05:00

06 June 2006

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect: Art Surette
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director, Club Service: Graham Martin
Director, Community Service: Susan Diening
Director, International Service: Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service: Fran Hepworth

MAURICE SCARPALEGGIA, 1926-2006
We were all saddened to learn of Maurice's sudden passing on Sunday evening. He was on vacation in Ireland a week before and was flown home on medical advice, to seek immediate treatment for an illness exhibiting symptoms of severe jaundice. His illness was preliminarily diagnosed as cancer and later confirmed as cancer of the pancreas. During the past few days Maurice received intensive care at the Lakeshore General and Royal Victoria hospitals. He passed away peacefully late Sunday, surrounded by his family.
Maurice was Director-General of Vanier College for 17 years, until his retirement 15 years ago.
Maurice joined the Ste-Thérèse Rotary Club in 1966 and moved to our club when the Ste-Thérèse club folded, around 1980. He continued to maintain his 100% attendance record until long after his absences could have been excused by the "years of age and service" rule.
To say that Maurice followed past RI President Hugh Archer's advice to "Enjoy Rotary" would be an understatement. But the feeling was mutual: Rotary, and particularly the members of our Rotary club, enjoyed Maurice. We appreciated his wit and the jokes he would happily pay a fine for the privilege to relate. Often he would challenge his listeners to match his fine if they enjoyed the joke, and occasionally he would dare us not to laugh at his joke-or groan at his shaggy dog story, under penalty of a fine if we did. We all looked forward to a refreshing smile when Maurice would rise with that twinkle in his eye and ask the Sergeant-at-Arms for permission to address the meeting.
To say that Maurice will be missed by the members of his Rotary club is also an understatement. We have long acknowledged Maurice to be a very private person and we have respected his wishes in that regard over the years. But we have come to know Maurice better as he put his considerable charm to work on behalf of his son, Francis, when Francis sought to become the Liberal candidate in our federal riding, succeed and go on to get elected as our Member of Parliament with huge margins of success-twice! And, as Francis has inherited his father's quiet determination, we predict he will be our MP for many years to come.
Our sincere condolences and prayers go out to Lois and to Francis and his family, so suddenly and untimely thrust into this chasm of grief. We wish them the comfort of knowing that Maurice did not suffer a prolonged illness, and we wish them the strength to accept the extra pain of the suddenness of his passing, in return for that.
On Friday, June 9th Maurice and Lois would have celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary and the following day Maurice would have celebrated his 80th birthday.

This week's program...
Jennifer presents Shiellah Quintos, General Manager of the Montreal Ultimate Association, to tell us all about the fascinating sport called Ultimate. Sort of like hockey played with a Frisbee, or so we understand.

Coming events and programs...
Birthdays & anniversaries:
Happy Birthday, President Cameron Friday, June 9th!
Happy Birthday, Ghandi Friday, June 9th!

Future Programs:
Jun 13: Wendy Sherry, MUHC Nurse Clinician, will speak about Organ and Tissue Donation.
Jun 20: The drawing for our raffle in aid of AIDS orphans in Swaziland. Our guest speakers for that date will be Gloria Sweeney and Kim Karenduff, who will tell us about the work of the West Island Women's Shelter.
Jun 27: No meeting. See next item for the why not?

Future Events:
Jun 29: Changeover Night at the Sherry's, 445 Bellevue Ave., Vaudreuil-Dorion. Details to follow.
Jul 4 Our annual Blood Donor Clinic, to be held at Margaret Manson Elementary School in Kirkland again this year, from 2 to 8 pm.

Last week's meeting...
An unfortunate and unforeseen turn of events dictated that President Cameron be elsewhere last Tuesday, but Vice-President Art pinch-hit for a home run as he presided over our final Club Assembly of this Rotary year.
Only 15 members and one guest were on hand to receive the directors' reports. In no particular order, attendees included Art, Graham, Stan, Wayne, Jacinthe, Knud, Peter, Jennifer, Jenny, Fran, Jeff, Andy, Brahm, Amiel and yours truly. Our guest was visiting Rotarian Bassam Fares of the St-Laurent-Mt-Royal club, whose request for transfer into our club will be presented to our Board of Directors as soon as Cameron gets back.
Treasurer Peter presented his report, with much emphasis on the Swaziland project and its financial impact on the club.
Club Service Director Graham reported that the club seems to be operating on all cylinders. He thanked Stan, Wayne, Bill and, especially Jennifer, who was promoted quite suddenly to Program Chair when Anne Winter moved to Brockville on short notice. Graham also had praise for Secretary and Webmaster Bob, on whose behalf he distributed an easy-to-follow hard copy of the latest club roster. He also distributed, as part of his written report, a calendar of major events in which our members will be interested, from now until the end of December.
Community Service Director Susan was also absent, but a "green paper" (presumably her report) was distributed on her behalf.
Jennifer gave a brief report on Vocational Service-not much happening there-and reported that the Program portfolio was consuming a great deal of her time.
Art called a half-time intermission, to give Sergeant-at-Arms Stan an opportunity to collect happy dollars. Since it was the last regular meeting of the month, Bill suggested that the happy bucks should go into the Rotary Foundation cans.
Following that short break, Youth Service Director Fran gave us a very thorough report, in which she described the long and complex process to be followed when selecting a student for an award, whether RYLA or one of the adventures in which our club participates: Citizenship, High Technology and the Environment. She reminded us that our candidate, James Taylor, won this year's Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship, and will be studying in a university in Africa starting in September 2007 or January 2008, depending on which of his choices the Foundation decides to award him.
She told us the Interact club is coming along quite nicely and said we will be presenting several awards at their graduation ceremonies on Friday, June 9th.
She distributed a flyer on Titaya "View" Preelart, our in-coming Youth exchange student from Thailand. Fran told us we will need three host families to each take View into their homes for approximately 31/2 months each, starting in August. Fran also reminded us that Mark Belvedere will soon be off for his Youth Exchange experience in Brazil. He will leave in July to spend approximately one year in Paranaval, a city of about 200,000 in the southern corner of Brazil.
Fran announced that, in addition to accepting the position of District Secretary, she will also be serving on the District Youth Exchange Committee. The focus of that committee next year will be to become incorporated, so that our district youth exchange program can be certified by Rotary International. She said she plans to meet with President-Elect Art to map out the process of certifying our club.
Jeff brought us up to date on the plans for our Golf Tournament, to be held in Valleyfield on Monday, September 11th. As all of our club funds will have been depleted by the Swaziland project, Jeff told us he has sight his sights on a goal of $25,000 in net proceeds from this year's tournament. He then proceeded to explain how this can be achieved, projected on the screen graphs of proceeds versus sales of the various packages we are offering this year. He said he is looking into the possibility of having an on-line system for registration and payment. He also told us we will need many more volunteers on Golf day this year as many of the holes will have something happening and at least 6 or 7 will involve the handling of cash. He closed with a plea for prizes and gifts for our loot bags.
Last to step up to the podium was Knud, who spoke first about Andy's plans to make another trip to Paraguay this summer. Andy has been promised $1000 from the Montreal-Westward club, and will give a talk to that club in July. Knud told us that communications with the Asuncion club have not gone as smoothly as in past years, and as a result we may not be able to build latrines and teach the children the benefits of sanitation and hygiene, but Andy hopes to at least take another load of medicines to replenish the stock in the hospitals and clinics in that poor nations' capital.
Knud also brought us up to date on the Swaziland project. The second container is assured, he announced, adding that response has been so overwhelming we may have too much even for two. He said he plans to travel to Ottawa to pick up a truckload of donated computers. He said he was also about to sign the contract with Hope International in British Columbia, to permit the construction of the first school building to begin.
Lastly, he told us we will load the first container the weekend of June 24th, with the second container to be loaded a few weeks later.
NOTES:

The Lakeshorian, 30 May 2006

2006-06-19T22:30:00.000-05:00

30 May 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect: Art Surette
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director, Club Service: Graham Martin
Director, Community Service: Susan Diening
Director, International Service: Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service: Fran Hepworth

This week's program...
Today President Cameron and our Board of Directors will tell us what they've done for us lately. Don't be shy to ask questions.

Coming events and programs...
Birthdays & anniversaries:
Belated Happy Birthday greetings to Peter Neville...Last Thursday, May 25th!
What is it with the Neville family and me? Why can't I find their birthdays on my list? Mea culpa, Peter.
Happy Birthday, Kathleen Baker...Friday, June 2nd!
Happy Birthday, Linda Tait...also Friday, June 2nd!

Future Programs:
Jun 6: Jennifer presents Shiellah Quintos, General Manager of the Montreal Ultimate Association, to tell us all about the fascinating sport called Ultimate.
Jun 13: Wendy Sherry, MUHC Nurse Clinician, will speak about Organ and Tissue Donation.
Jun 20: The drawing for our raffle in aid of AIDS orphans in Swaziland. Our guest speakers for that date will be Gloria Sweeney and Kim Karenduff, who will tell us about the work of the West Island Women's Shelter.
Jun 27: No meeting. See next item for the why not?

Future Events:
Jun 29: Changeover Night at the Sherry's, 445 Bellevue Ave., Vaudreuil-Dorion. Details to follow.
Jul 4 Our annual Blood Donor Clinic, to be held at Margaret Manson Elementary School in Kirkland again this year, from 2 to 8 pm.

Last week's meeting...
President Cameron introduced our guests: Bassam Fares, a visiting Rotarian from the St-Laurent-Mt-Royal club, who has expressed interest in transferring to our club. We welcome you, Bassam, and I apologize for misspelling your name in last week's bulletin. Our other guest at this sparsely attended meeting was Pam Neville, guest of hubbie Peter and daughter Jennifer.
Cameron also announced that our fundraiser with L'Équipeur and Montreal radio stations, originally scheduled for June 17, will be postponed until August.
Knud thanked those members who came out to help pack some of the goods that have been pouring in from a generous community-not just the West island, but greater Montreal and beyond, even as far away as Pembroke, Ontario-for our project to help AIDS orphans in Swaziland. He also told us that we have enough boxes for now.
In answer to a question about our Changeover Party on Thursday, June 29th, Cameron said the cost for children would definitely be under $40, but the exact price will have to wait till he does the math.
Sergeant-at-Arms Stan seems to have made his quota of happy bucks, so we hear.
Jennifer introduced our guest speaker, Valerie Minnett, an historian whom she met at one of Brad's rugby matches. It turned out they were both "rugby wives" who lived just down the street from each other and soon became friends and exercise partners. Val did her undergraduate work at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario, earned her Master's in Architecture from McGill and is completing her PhD in History at Carleton in Ottawa. Her topic had the intriguing title, "Swatting Flies for Health."
Valerie told us the story that forms the basis for her talk came out of the archives of the Montreal Star in July of 1912. She found it because she was searching for stories about tuberculosis, and that's what this is all about, a fascinating tale of a children's contest to help rid Montreal of flies in the early part of the last century, a tale that Valerie turned into a paper for her studies to become an historian.
In 1912, the Montreal Star (a newspaper that only a few in the audience would claim to remember) organized a contest with a prize of 350 dollars, a king's ransom for a child of that era. What did one have to do to win such a prize? Why, be the one who collected and turned in the most dead flies. And did the flies come in! Similar contests in Toronto and Washington, DC, resulted in totals of less than one million and 7 million, respectively, but Montreal kids collectively brought dead flies by the bucketful, a whopping 25 million flies when the Star staff finished counting them. (They gave up counting by hand after the first couple of thousand; the rest were counted by weight.) Montreal became known as the Calcutta of the West, not exactly a title we wanted to brag about.
The point of the story, Valerie explained, is that children are important participants in public health improvement campaigns.
She told us the reason she was searching for articles about TB while studying architecture at McGill, was that she was working on a major study for the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, around the theme, "Canadian families, including children, youth and the elderly: health care and housing." The study resulted in a paper entitled, Design and practice, tuberculosis in Montreal, 1880-2002. Participants included students and practitioners in architecture, urban planning, epidemiology, history and geography. The design of houses, hospitals, neighbourhoods, cities, and legislation, they maintained, contributes directly to the ways experts and ordinary people have attempted to comprehend and counter disease transmission.
They found direct links between poverty and poor living conditions and a high incidence of disease. Health reform organzations in Montreal launched a number of initiatives to promote healthier living, but youngsters decided which activities and initiatives they would endorse. The fly collection contest was one they found exciting, with a $350 pot of gold awaiting the winner!. Ironically, the contest also increased children's exposure to flies and the diseases they helped to propagate. The Montreal children who swatted flies by the hundreds of thousands were from working class families-there were no entries from Westmount-and they tended to enter the contest in groups.
The theory was that flies transported the TB bacillus from garbage dumps to the surface of food. The following series of pictures from the newspaper stories of the day show flies feasting on a dead fish, then alighting on a baby's pacifier, which the infant then puts in her mouth.
The contest winner was 8-year-old Eddy Cavanaugh, who enticed 1.5 million flies through his window that, predictably, opened onto a garbage dump.
What a huge success-ridding a city of 25 million disease-bearing flies for only $350, and educating a whole generation of future citizens in the bargain! The benefits were even broader in scope. Stories told by the children about where they had found the most flies led health and urban planning officials to see that many of those sources were cleaned up. This children's anti-tuberculosis campaign represented the best of children's projects.
Following a flood of questions, testimony to the popularity of the presentation, Valerie was thanked by Susan for an interesting and entertaining talk that illustrated the power of children to bring about social change.
Peter reminded members that the Rotary Foundation cans would be emptied soon, so fill 'em up. He also told us there are 90 books left to sell for the raffle of Heinz Ritter's sculptures.
Member News...
We have happy news to report, for a change:
PDG Coos and Helmi were wed in their church in Beaconsfield Sunday, with several Rotarians on hand. Graham was kind enough to provide this picture of the happy couple.
Congratulations to you both! We wish you many wonderful years together.

The Lakeshorian, 23 May 2006

2006-05-29T23:15:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian, 23 May 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

This week's program...
Jennifer has invited Valerie Minnett, who is studying at Carleton University for her doctorate in Canadian History, to speak to us on the titillating topic, "Swatting Flies for Health."

Coming events and programs...
Birthdays & anniversaries? None that we know of.
May 30: Our final Club Assembly of this Rotary year.
Jun 6: Jennifer presents Shiellah Quintos, General Manager of the Montreal Ultimate Association, to tell us all about the fascinating sport called Ultimate.
Jun 13: Wendy Sherry, MUHC Nurse Clinician, will speak about Organ and Tissue Donation.
Jun 20: The drawing for our raffle in aid of AIDS orphans in Swaziland.
Jun 27: No meeting.
Jun 29: Changeover Night at the Sherry's, 445 Bellevue Ave., Vaudreuil-Dorion. Details to follow.
Jul 4 Our annual Blood Donor Clinic, to be held at Margaret Manson Elementary School in Kirkland again this year, from 2 to 8 pm.

Last week's meeting...
President Cameron introduced our guests: Teresa Dellar, Executive Director of the West Island Palliative Care Residence, guest of the club, and Ian Candfield, guest of Art. Visiting Rotarians included Claude Bompard, from the Rotary Club de Carcassonne, D1700, France, and Bassam Fares, from the St-Laurent-Mt-Royal club.
Rotarien Bompard échangea des fanions avec notre président et nous donna une brève description de son club et ses activités. Pour plus amples renseignements, svp visitez : http://www.rotary-carcassonne.org/.
Cameron asked Teresa to come forward and accept a contribution from our Rotaide Foundation to the WIPCR.
Teresa thanked our club for its continuing support of her organization and remarked that the gazebo that we erected in their back yard as our club's centennial project is getting a lot of use, and serving the residence's needs very well, for patient outings and special events alike.
Cameron announced that the VON's Ste-Anne's branch needs a handyman to make some needed repairs on the premises. If you can help, please contact Jane Lumsden at 695-8335.

Our president also reported that, at the District Foundation Walk held in Petawawa on May 13th, our club was the runner-up for the Walking Stick Trophy for the largest club contribution. The winner was the Cornwall Sunrise club, which gave $2,800. We gave just over $1700. Next year, Cameron noted, we are the host club for this event, which will take place on May 12th.
Cameron's next announcement was that our Changeover Night will take place on Thursday, June 29th, at his home, 445 Bellevue Ave, Vaudreuil-Dorion. The cost will be $40 per person.
Cameron's last announcement concerned a major fundraiser that our club is undertaking with L'Équipeur and the Montreal Alouettes. It will take place on Saturday, June 17th in the parking lot of the Holiday Inn Pointe Claire and will be co-sponsored by three radio stations. Cameron asked for volunteers willing to be interviewed on the air.
Art gave us an update on the Swaziland project, noting that the article that appeared in the West Island section of The Gazette on May 11th had been very productive. He said there is a distinct possibility that we will have enough school furniture and other goods to fill a second container, though it remains to determine if that one should also go to Swaziland or become the nucleus for a second project. Stay tuned.
Jeff gave us a rundown on this year's Golf Tournament, which will take place Monday, September 11th (as always, on the Monday following Labour Day) and again at the Club de Golf de Valleyfield, who have been so good to work with over the years. Our goal this year will be to raise $20,000 for our beneficiaries, the WI Palliative Care Residence and the Women's Shelter. Jeff described the newly designed sponsor program, with four packages of sponsorship opportunities. He reminded members that we also need prizes and, of course, foursomes, plus a lot more volunteers than previous years, to work the course on the day of the tournament, as we need a Rotarian or a trusted friend of Rotary on every hole where we'll be handling money. "So start recruiting your spouses and friends," he suggested.
Bill announced that our Blood Donor Clinic will take place on Tuesday, July 4th, instead of the 3rd as previously announced. The change was made by Héma-Québec. The location will be the Margaret Manson Elementary School in Kirkland, the same place as last year. The H-Q trucks will arrive at 1 pm and the doors will open to donors at 2, and the clinic will wrap up at 8 pm. Bill acknowledged that having the clinic on a Tuesday will be a bit more of a challenge since it's our meeting day, but felt sure that we would be able to pull it off, especially as participation at the blood donor clinic will count as a make-up.
Sergeant-at-Arms Stan, noticing that we were running short on time, said he would make it simple. "Just throw a tooney into the jar, everyone," he said, "and let's get on with our meeting."
Susan introduced our guest speaker. Mike Homsy is a Phys Ed teacher at John Abbott College, but that's just where they met, not why he's here. "Mike is also a world-class basketball referee," Susan pointed out, "and he has come to tell us what it's like to referee the big games, in the world championships and the Olympics.
Mike thanked Susan for inviting him and got right into his topic, saying, "When I first started refereeing I didn't know what I was getting into."
Backing up a bit, he told us he had graduated from McGill in a'81, then spent a year teaching Phys Ed in Saudi Arabia ("an eye-opener even for me, someone born in Egypt."). Basketball was his passion and back in Canada and married, he had lots of opportunities to work as a player and could have had a position on the coaching staff of any number of teams who wanted him, but his wife soon tired of the 6 r 7 nights a week schedule. "So I switched to referee, where I could control my schedule better."
Because of the kind of guy he is, Mike couldn't be satisfied with the life of a local or even a national referee. He needed to get certified by FIBA, the International Basketball Federation, so he took the course and the certification clinic and exam, got himself certified and started travelling all over the world. He made it sound simple, but it probably wasn't. "Why become a referee?" he asked himself. "
When I gave up playing the game I needed another challenge. I'm a guy who strives for perfection, though the 'perfect game,' call-wise, is almost out of reach. But I honed my conflict resolution skills, and just vowed to do my best in every situation at every game."
Then, in 2003, I found out that I would get the chance to realize a life-long dream-to referee at the 2004 Olympics in Athens, the birthplace of the Olympic Games." He told us how his wife had actually taken the call, while he was out plying his trade on the basketball court, and how she teased him with hints before she finally disclosed the good news.
He recounted the many hours and many games during which he prepared for his Olympic opportunity. "I put the Olympic logo on my computer screen as a background, and wrote a positive story about going to the Olympics," all part of psyching himself up for the experience. "Friends and family rallied to my side," he said, "and expressed their happiness for me. That made it even more special-it had suddenly become a team effort."
He said he had been to Greece twice before, once on his honeymoon and once with the McGill basketball team. "But this time a different Athens greeted me-clean, busy, friendly. Swimming in the clear, blue waters of the Mediterranean. Wow!"
But, he assured us, officiating at the Olympic Games is not what defines Mike Homsy. "I try to remain humble and just a regular guy. Then last summer I got to officiate at the world qualification tournament in Honduras. And now I get to fulfill another dream, to go to the Far East. This summer I will be refereeing the World Men's basketball Championships in Japan!"
Nevertheless, he told us, the greatest treasures he cherishes are the friendships he found wherever he went, "the people who have touched me, the relationships with players, coaches, other officials and with parents of the younger players. I am grateful to all who have helped me to realize my goals."
We need to be a mentor just as much as we need to have a mentor," Mike declared. "Never think you have nothing to learn, or nothing to offer."
He told us his wife and kids are the loves of his life. "I wish I could take them with me on my officiating trips, almost as much as they wish they could come."
He gave us seven words to live by: Learn, Teach, Take in, Give back, Enjoy, Appreciate and Thank.
After his talk he offered to take a few questions in the short time remaining, and shared some good-natured give-and-take with Jeff and some of the other jocks in the audience, including a question from Ian about the changing relationships between officials and players.
Mike was thanked by Jennifer, who told us, "I had the opportunity to learn from this wonderful teacher." She thanked Mike for giving us a unique perspective on the life of a seemingly ordinary guy who keeps adding new world-class accomplishments to his career. "Mike, it's too bad we didn't have a bigger audience today. When our whole club is present, we sometimes need a referee!"

The Lakeshorian

2006-05-22T23:14:00.000-05:00

16 May 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry
http://www.rotary-montreal-lakeshore.org/home.htm

This week's program...
Mike Homsy teaches Phys Ed at John Abbott. That's probably where Susan got to know him. Mike's not only popular as a JAC teacher, he's also famous as a basketball referee who travels the world in his spare time. He officiated at the 2004 Olympics in Athens and this summer he will referee the World Men's Basketball Championships in Japan.
Susan has asked Mike to speak to us today about life as an international basketball referee.

Coming events and programs...
On Saturday, May 20th. AG Peter Neville will begin his 10th year as a Rotarian.
Congratulations, Peter!
May 23: Valerie Minnett, studying at Carleton University for her doctorate in Canadian History, will speak to us on the titillating topic, "Swatting Flies for Health."
May 30: Our final Club Assembly of this Rotary year.
Jun 6: Jennifer presents Shiellah Quintos, General Manager of the Montreal Ultimate Association, to tell us all about the fascinating sport called Ultimate.

Last week's meeting...
President Cameron introduced our guests. Unfortunately, we didn't catch all the names but they included Jane Lumsden, Executive Directors of the VON's Ste-Anne's branch; Lina Talih,
President-Nominee of the Rotary Club of Chouf, in Lebanon; and two Ambassadorial Scholars, Stefan Dannenberger, from Germany, and Nino Marshania, from the Republic of Georgia.
Cameron asked Jane Lumsden of the Victorian Order of Nurses to come forward and accept a donation from our Rotary Club to help offset their operating expenses. Cameron thanked Jane for the work they do in our community, and Jane in turn thanked the club for its ongoing generosity.
Knud updated us on the raffle to benefit AIDS orphans in Swaziland, asking members to watch for articles and photographs appearing in the West island Times, the Chronicle and the Gazette's West Island edition. If you could clip and save copies of those articles, Knud would appreciate it.
Peter, who is in charge of tickets, asked members to turn in books of stubs as they are sold,
along with the money ($25 if the 5 tickets were sold individually, $20 if they were sold as a book of 5).
Following a similarly generous response to Sergeant-at-Arms Stan's call for happy dollars, Susan introduced Beth Clarke, our guest speaker, adding that she just finished her exams yesterday and should be excused a little euphoria today. Susan reminded us that Beth was assisted financially to participate in the Forum for Young Canadians during the first week of April, and had promised to come and tell us all about it at our first mutually convenient opportunity.
Beth thanked our club for its financial contribution to the cost of participating in the week-long
activities in Ottawa. Prior to FYC she had participated in other conferences & seminars, including NATO and a Model United Nations.She told us FYC provides students with a very advanced, hands-on opportunity to experience the busy life of a member of parliament and even, for some lucky students, of a cabinet minister or even the Prime Minister. Speakers included politicians and journalists, and the participants were mostly high school students from across Canada, including Francophones from outside Québec.They visited the House of Commons, then split into groups and participated in three simulations.
In the first one, they formed a party, held a caucus meeting to develop a party platform. Each
group elected a representative, then the groups competed to get their representative elected as
party leader.
In the second simulation they experienced the activity in the House of Commons during Question Period. For the final simulation they changed from the original groups to provincial groups; each elected a federal MP and a provincial premier. Beth was elected MP from Quebec and later Prime Minister. She was given the task of trying to convince the provincial premiers to accept a two-tier health care system, and ended up chairing a First Ministers' Conference.Beth told us she received as a prize a beautiful book on Canada's national Archives. She said she
is interested in journalism and plans to take next year off before going on to university.
Fran congratulated Beth for taking her role in this model parliament so seriously and making us
proud to have been a part of her adventure, and thanked her for sharing her experience with us.

2006-05-15T21:35:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian 9 May 2006
This week's program...
Bethea Clarke will speak to us about the Forum for Young Canadians, a program that brings students in the 15-19 age group to Ottawa for one of four one-week sessions held every spring. The purpose is not unlike that of the Ottawa Rotary club's Adventure in Citizenship, to give students from across Canada first-hand knowledge about our federal government.
Bethea's presentation is her way of thanking us for helping to sponsor her participation in the program, which we did at the suggestion of Susan. I understand she had a great time, and we look forward to haring all about her week in Ottawa.

Coming events and programs...
Birthdays & Anniversaries? none that we know of.
May 16: Susan makes her second pitch of a double header, bringing us Mike Homsy to talk about Being an International Basketball Referee.
May 23: Valerie Minnett, studying at Carleton University for her doctorate in Canadian History, will speak to us on the titillating topic, "Swatting Flies for Health."
May 30: Our final Club Assembly of this Rotary year.

Last week's meeting...
President Cameron introduced Adam Gallay, guest of his papa, Brahm. (that would be Adam's pop, not Cameron's).
Jennifer was asked to report on the District Assembly. She told us about ten of our members attended this event held every year in Cornwall, Ontario, for the purpose of training incoming club officers and committee chairs. She found the ShelterBox display fascinating, especially as we are the club that bought the most ShelterBoxes of any club in the district. The ShelterBox is a complete temporary home for ten people, including all tools and utensils needed for sleeping and cooking. Jennifer attended two workshops: World Community Service and Service Projects.
Susan, Peter, Knud and Cameron will be participating in this year's Foundation Walk in Petawawa on Saturday, May 13th. Bill had also planned to attend but that date was pre-empted by a request that he participate in a Rotary meeting in Quebec City, to discuss ways to encourage more Francophones to join Rotary. Susan mentioned that our club has offered to host the Foundation Walk next year, probably on May 12, 2007.
Cameron announced that the Montreal-Westward club would hold its Annual Lobsterfest at the Montreal-West arena on Saturday, June 3, 2006. The price will be the same as last year: $60 per person, lobster and all the trimmings, all you can eat.
Coos announced that he and Helmi would be married on Sunday, May 28, 2006.
Knud brought us up to date on our Literacy Project to help AIDS orphans in Swaziland. 2500 tickets have been printed and distributed. They are $5 each or $20 for a book of 5.
Adam Galley invited Rotarians to The Lyric Theatre Singers' presentation of Broadway à la Carte, June 1-4, 2006 at Concordia's Oscar Peterson Hall, 7141 Sherbrooke St W. Tickets are $25 per person ($20 for seniors).
Jennifer introduced our guest speaker Elliott Perez, our Ambassadorial Scholar from Texas. Elliott is a member of both the McGill and Concordia Rotaract clubs.
Elliott told us the Second Annual Fundraising Gala organized by the McGill Rotaract Club raised $5,000 with which they hope to participate in Free the Children's Adopt-a-Village program in the West African country of Sierra Leone.
He used a PowerPoint presentation to teach us about Sierra Leone, a small country about the size of New Brunswick, with a population of 5.3 million people. Although Sierra-Leone is known primarily for its diamond mines, it is very poor, with an average annual income of $150 (compared to about $25,000 in Canada).Eleven years of civil war, which ended in 2002, left the population devastated, without schools or health care facilities. The Free the Children organization has launched a campaign by which students can "adopt" a village in Sierra Leone, and proceed to help families obtain clean water, primary health care and basic schooling and to find alternative sources of income.
Elliott told us his goal is to convince the Montreal-Lakeshore Rotary Club to help McGill Rotaract on a continuous basis.Coos asked "Why Sierra Leone?" Elliott replied that Free the Children offers a limited choice of countries.
Fran said that our Interact club at West Island College would like to support the Adopt-a-Village program of Free the Children. Elliott said he would work with her to find a suitable date for him to speak to the Interact club at W.I.C.
Peter thanked Elliott, saying, "You're a good example of why The Rotary Foundation funds scholarships. You will take what you learn and use it to make the world a better place."

The Lakeshorian 2May06

2006-05-08T18:55:00.000-05:00

http://www.montreal-lakeshore-rotary.org/home.htm
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President Cameron Sherry

This week's program...
Ambassadorial Scholar Elliot Perez from Texas will tell us about a project in Africa that the McGill Rotaract Club is sponsoring, called Adopt-a-Village.

Coming events and programs...
Happy Anniversary, Cameron & Winnifred...Thursday, May 4th!
Happy Anniversary, Joe & Gerry Saturday, May 6th!
May 9: Bethea Clarke will speak about The Forum for Young Canadians.

Last week's meeting...
Wow! Your 'umble servant screwed up big time last week. Here it was our annual Alan Liddiard Scholarship contest and I didn't know a thing about it. Sorry for misleading y'all, but I think Jennifer and I must be the club's token mushrooms, the way we are kept in the dark.
President Cameron did double duty last week, adding Acting Sergeant-at-Arms to his regular presidential tasks. As it was the last Tuesday of the month, he invited members to put their happy dollars into the Rotary Foundation cans.
Joe Z distributed a Lester B Pearson School Board questionnaire for members to fill out. I hope you paid a hefty fine for the privilege, Joe!Cameron introduced some of our guests and said the others would be introduced later, so as not to give away the identity of any of our student contestants or their schools.
Jennifer told us about the Rotary Leadership Institute that she and Art attended recently. She told us Part I included some basic Rotary knowledge, including a lesson on "How NOT to Run a Rotary Club Meeting." One of the practical tips she brought back from Part I was an idea for refreshing our Rotary knowledge at every weekly meeting: "The Rotary Minute" would have each member talk for 60 seconds about some small aspect of Rotary, at the end of the year we would have heard the equivalent of three full-size guest speakers' talks, all on the magic of Rotary. She said she hopes Art was as impressed with the idea as she was, and that he would try to implement it next year.Parts II and III of the RLI Rotary Leadership course cover "The E-Learning Center at Rotary.org" and "Being a Good Rotary Leader," respectively.
Art reminded members about the District Assembly in Cornwall on Saturday, April 29th. We had ten members attend, two of whom were presenters-Fran and Bill. All who attended said it was very worthwhile.
PDG Coos presented Cameron with a banner from the Rotary Club of Bloemendaal, where he attended, along with the Haarlem club, during the five months he spent in Europe this past winter. He also donated a Rotary-in-South-Africa coffee spoon to be given as a prize to the First Runner-up of the Alan Liddiard contest.
Knud said he had wrangled an agreement to be granted permission to speak for 60 seconds about our new Swaziland WCS project, which he then proceeded to promote for a much longer period of time than he was allowed. At the end, Cameron cautioned our student contestants that the official timer would not be as forgiving with their time limits.

Joe outlined the rules, noting that each contestant had already earned a mark out of 50 for the first half of the Alan Liddiard Scholarship requirement-with a maximum of 30 points for academic achievement and 20 points for a letter of recommendation from their school and/or community service representative. The remaining 50 points would be based on their performance in the public speaking contest that was about to begin. He said contestants would be called to the podium anonymously, in the sequence they had been randomly given prior to the meeting.
Before calling the first contestant, Joe described Rotary's role in the drive to eradicate polio from the earth. In between each pair of candidates, he took a minute to tell the students present about Rotary Foundation Scholarships, Interact, Rotaract, the tens of thousands of dollars our Rotary club has raised for a school lunch program in West Island elementary schools, Rotary Youth Leadership Awards (RYLA), Adventures in Citizenship, High Technology and the Environment, and Rotary's 2-year master's program of study in peace and conflict resolution.
Contestant No. 1 (later identified as Geneviève Joly but we didn't get the name of her school. Sorry). Having chosen as her topic, The Role of Women in our Society, Geneviève spoke passionately about the continuing shameful exploitation of women for their physical attributes, and expressed her wish that societal values will eventually applaud the beauty within.
Contestant No. 2 (Sean Yaphe, West Island College).Sean's dealt with his chosen topic - Education: Utopian or Pragmatic? - by discussing the value of actual travel to foreign lands, especially where the way of life is quite different from ours and where human rights are often ignored or abused. He spoke about the correlation between human rights and democracy, referring to the Darfur area of the Sudan where horrific stories of genocide are emerging, of El Salvador, which he recently visited, and China, both countries where recognition of human rights is beginning to emerge, due in part to repetitive pressure applied in a pragmatic way by public and privately sponsored missions to those countries.
Candidate #3 (Linda Rozenberg, Riverdale H.S.). She acknowledged being devastated by the death of her father. She said she turned to the education system to overcome her grief and found even more than the consolation she sought. She saw her life ahead of her as a journey where she made the choices that would determine her happiness. She marveled that, "My father had to die for me to be happy!"
Candidate No. 4, Virginia Gruman, Macdonald H.S.) Her began her address on her chosen topic, The Future of My Generation, As I See It, by asking, "How often do our dreams transcend reality?" She compared the choices a student faces and their consequences. "We can use the gifts we are given to become involved, or we can remain uninvolved, succumbing to laziness and apathy. The struggle is to find the motivation to get involved, she acknowledged and suggested it is time to begin, because the future starts now.
Candidate # 5: Anne-Marie Rozon, Westwood High School Hudson), discussed The Role of Women in Our Society. "Sugar and spice and all things nice, that's what little girls are made of. True? If so, we had better toughen up, if we want to succeed in a man's world," she warned. But she was confident that women have what it takes to succeed in a combination that most men would find daunting indeed: being a boss at work and a mother at home. "Working mothers can fulfill their childhood dreams," Anne-Marie declared. "They just have to remember not to try being the boss at home and a mother at work!"
Candidate No. 6 (Sarah Houde, Beaconsfield High School). To introduce her chosen topic, "What Does Community Service Mean to Me?" Sarah admitted that she fought her Mom when she first tried to coerce her into volunteer work. "Needless to say, Mom won. Or did she?" Upon reflection, Sarah had to agree that she also won, because volunteering has changed her life. She said the secret is not to help others anonymously. The secret is to get personally involved in the lives of the people you help. Be a partner with and a friend to every person that fate throws together with you. You will learn what they were going through before you volunteered to enter their lives and the reward that comes from changing those lives for the better will be that much more real because of your personal involvement in them. She end by quoting Anne Frank: How wonderful that no one need wait another minute to start improving the world!

While the judges went out to deliberate and tally their scores, Fran introduced the student contestants and their counsellors, and asked the young people to tell us Rotarians what their plans for the future were.
We learned that Geneviève's hobbies include painting and belly dancing!. Sean is President of the Interact club at his school and participated in the Rotary Interact Mission to El Salvador in March. Linda plans to become an actress, starting with theatre workshops at John Abbott College. Virginia spent time in Alberta with the Canada World Youth Program and hopes to become a radio morning show host. Anne-Marie is destined to become a lawyer and Sarah, who really does love volunteering, cited writing and music as her hobbies.

The judges returned their verdict. Based on the entire scope of point-scoring activity: academic success, letter of recommendation and the public speaking contest just ended, the winner was...Sean Yaphe of West Island College. The Runner-up was Linda Rozenberg of Riverdale High School.
Sean has won the Alan Liddiard Memorial Scholarship for 2006, which is a cash prioze of $750. In addition, the student association at his school will receive $100 to enhance the quality of student life at W.I.C.Congratulations to all our contestants. You have enlivened our Rotary club, not just for one luncheon, but for many weeks into the future. We love to reminisce about and marvel at the untapped talent of Canada's youth, so amply demonstrated by each one of you last Tuesday. Thank you.
And we hope that one day we will hear from you again, as a candidate for a Rotary adventure or the Rotary Youth Leadership Awards or one of our coveted scholarships: www.rotary.org

The Lakeshorian

2006-05-01T23:09:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN 25 April 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE (Chartered February 27, 1961)
President Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect Art Surette
Secretary Bob Habib
Treasurer Peter Neville
Director, Club Service Graham Martin
Director, Community Service Susan Diening
Director, International Service Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service Fran Hepworth
http://www.montreal-lakeshore-rotary.org/home.htm

This week's program...Gloria Sweeney and the West Island Women's Shelter were pre-empted by the Alan Liddiard Memorial Scholarship Contest. Who knew?

Coming events and programs...
Belated Happy Birthday wishes to Wayne,April 20th!
Belated 30th Anniversary Greetings, Jenny & Andrew, April 21st!
Happy Birthday, Carmen Quesnel, Today, April 25th!
Happy Birthday, Jenny, Thursday, April 27th!

May 2: Ambassadorial Scholar Elliot Perez from Texas will tell us about a project in Africa that
the McGill Rotaract Club is sponsoring, called Adopt-a-Village.

Last week's meeting...Twenty members and two visiting Rotarians gathered in the Perno dining room of the Holiday Inn
Pointe-Claire last Tuesday to enjoy the fellowship of our weekly Rotary club meeting.
We were pleased to welcome once again Rodolfo Molina from the Rotary Club of Tampico, Mexico.
Rodolfo, who also answers to the nickname, "Gordo," said he has enjoyed his make-ups at our club
this spring and hopes to visit us again in the summer and/or the fall.
We were also pleased to welcome David Siversky, Past President of the Hawkesbury club.We missed the fellowship of Wayne, Jules, Andy, Randy, Stan, Brahm, Michel, Ghandi, Rod, George
and Joe.
Knud brought us up to date on the status of our fund-raising raffle for AIDS orphans in Swaziland.
He passed around a set of photos sent to us by the Rotary Club of Malkerns Valley, Swaziland,
while he spoke about the need for goods and cash to fill a container that will be shipped to
Africa at the end of May. There are already several drop-off boxes on the West Island, Knud told
us, but even more are needed; he urged members to speak to their pastor of their church or the
appropriate person at their synagogue, to arrange for a poster and a box be installed where
members of the congregation could drop off clothing, books, etc. When the boxes are filled, they
can be taken to the central collection point at Landcare, 102 Leacock, in Pointe-Claire.
The 2,500 raffle tickets will be printed as soon as we have the license from the RACJ. Tickets
will be in books of 5, to be sold at $5 per ticket or $20 per book. Knud said he would be looking
for volunteers to sell tickets at the Pointe-Claire Shopping Centre in early May. He reminded us
that the raffle prizes would include two lovely bird sculptures donated by Heinz Ritter.

President Cameron reclaimed the podium in order to lead a discussion among members and guests on
the question, "Do Our Children Learn Enough Home Coping Skills?" The comments and contributions
were many and varied, and included:
* Children are not taught banking skills, not even how to effect simple tasks, like choosing a
bank, understanding the finer points of various checking, saving and investment accounts and other
options, how to bank on-line, etc.;
* They need to learn the power of asset and equity growth through regular, even though small,
contributions to a growth plan, whether a savings account or a more sophisticated vehicle.
* They need to be given more knowledge of how to develop a reputable personal credit rating and
how to avoid misuse of the credit system, especially credit cards;
* Children do not learn to use hand tools or power tools, nor how to make simple home repairs or
the pleasure of creating a simple piece of furniture, like a toy box;
* Children spend too much time on the computer, much of it in time-wasting pursuits;
* Parents and teachers have stopped teaching our kids even the most basic of social and
inter-personal skills;
* Parents and grandparents tend to spoil a child by giving them things without teaching them the
value of such gifts and how that value can be enhanced or squandered, depending on the amount of
care applied to the gift, whether it's a toy, a tool or an investment...or just a piece of advice;
* The teachers and school curriculum fail to support wheat we as parents try to teach our kids;
* The reverse is equally true...parents need to pay attention to what the kids are being taught in
school and reinforce that learning by providing practical ways for our kids to apply it at home or
in their daily lives;
* We are losing control of our children in terms of their behaviour and the attention they pay to
common-sense rules, and parents are being deprived of traditional ways of encouraging a healthy
degree of discipline among their own kids;
* On the brighter side, teens and young adults are encouraged to volunteer to assist younger
siblings and neighbours' children avoid common pitfalls such as those induced by peer pressure,
and acquire the skills needed for proper social development.

It was generally agreed that this kind of open forum helps us fine-tune our own social skills,
while building a case for getting involved in practical ways of improving educational methodology,
whether at school or at home. Subtle...and well done, Cameron!

The LAKESHORIAN, April 4, 2006

2006-04-24T16:48:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN, 4 April 2006
Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore, chartered February 27, 1961
Cameron Sherry, President 2005-2006
http://www.montreal-lakeshore-rotary.org/home.htm

No Meeting This Tuesday. Have Dinner withthe R.I. President Thursday Evening Instead.

This week's program...
Our regular Tuesday lunch meeting has been cancelled to permit our members to join the rest of the Montreal area Rotary community at the Marriott Chateau Champlain on Thursday, to meet and dine with Carl-Wilhelm Stenhammar, President of Rotary International. President Stenhammar wishes to meet as many Rotarians and their guests as possible during a cocktail hour before dinner and for an additional hour after the meeting.

Coming events and programs...

Happy Birthday, Pam Thursday, April 6th!
Happy Birthday, Gerry Thursday, April 6th!
Happy Birthday, Ruth Monday, April 10th!

Apr 11: Jeff Alcorn will give us his ideas for creating the best Golf Tournament ever.

Last week's meeting...
President Cameron thanked Peter for organizing another successful Sugaring Off Weekend for Youth Exchange and other students. Apparently there were a few anxious moments for the chaperones but we believe everything finally worked out okay.

Knud presented an update on the Literacy Project to benefit 300 AIDS orphans in Swaziland. The project has been expanded to include a second phase-the construction of four schools-with the help of HOPE International. To avoid restrictions on the use of Rotary Foundation funding for buildings, this school construction phase will proceed outside of the Foundation Matching Grant. Instead, HOPE International will provide fund at the rate of approximately $3 for every dollar our club contributes. All in all, we have committed to contribute $17,554 Canadian to the overall cost of four school buildings with furniture, equipment, supplies and books, for those four plus a fifth one to be built later; 27 computers donated by "Computers for Schools" in Ottawa; 3 water wells complete with pumps and gardening tools and fencing, plus transportation of the container to Swaziland.

Wayne introduced our guest speaker, James Hughes, Executive Director of the Old Brewery Mission since 2004. Born on the west Island, Jim was schooled at Windermere Elementary, Beaconsfield High School, John Abbot College and Queens University. He and his wife have three children and Jim has chosen a career that allows him to pursue his passion for helping others.

Jim applauded Rotary "for all the wonderful work you do," saying he was very impressed with the scope of our Swaziland project.
He told us that the OBM was founded by Nina Douglas, whose family also founded the Douglas Hospital. He then proceeded to compare the two. "We are not equipped in Quebec to deal with a homeless problem such as we have here...and the problem is growing!He defined humanitarianism as "helping people survive a tragedy. We give hope, helping people recover from a tragic setback, so they can face the next one that comes along! We don't want to become a new Douglas Hospital."
Consequently, he explained, the plan is to give birth to a new model of the OBM, "call it the New Brewery Mission, if you like."Their new goal will be to reduce the homeless population of Montreal not just provide them with a hot meal and a warm bed. "But the cure for homelessness only happens during the day," he said, "while our present clients only stay with us at night." If we look as homelessness as we would a broken arm, we can make a case for treating a homeless person in a manner similar to an outpatient might receive at a hospital> It's a four-step process: diagnose, stabilize, repair and return the patient home to heal."
I am not drawn to the drama of feeding and housing the homeless," Jim admitted. "We prefer to hand them off to a better place. But this won't happen tomorrow, so let's look at how we operate now, and how we hope to operate in the future."
He told us the OBM is a big organization, with 150 employees, some of them unpaid. "We're the biggest women's shelter in Canada and the largest men's shelter in Quebec," he declared. "Our support groups (service clubs, student groups, et cetera) come and help us after the 15th of every month, because during the latter half of each month we welcome everyone, including people who are not poor but not homeless, those who live in social housing, for example."
Our plan is to pass these 'housed' people over to other organizations, so we can focus on the truly homeless. Our aim to put ourselves in a position to receive more homeless people, and to be able to stop receiving housed people altogether. We plan to keep homeless people for up to 90 days, during which time we will try to get them to a stage where they can move on to a better life, but with help, at the next level."
The average length of time that a homeless person now remains dependent on the OBM, chronically and continuously, is just under one year, Jim told us. "By contract, in Trois Rivières, where they operate an Emergency Response Centre, the average term of total dependency is 6 days!"
One of the obstacles in our path is the shortage of external housing facilities, which are not yet capable of handling the thousands of clients we would like to send them. But where there's a will there's a way. And, to put a new spin on that old adage, where there's a way, there's a will. By that I mean if we show our clients a way to get out of their rut, most of them will find the will to take advantage of that opportunity."
Jim spoke of the danger of being "too good." Good food, clean beds, no charge! Why change? Why leave?"As I said, the average stay is about 355 days; for most it's much less, 3 to 5 days. You do the math...that means some have been with us for 20 years! We will marry counselling with staying in the OBM during the day."
Jim turned the program over to questions from the audience and found out that we had been listening, and forming some pretty insightful questions-and a few doubts-about the ability of the government to put in place the expanded and more sophisticated infrastructure to support the "graduates " of the new Brewery Mission.Art, for example, commented that he had once worked as a volunteer in a 24-7 shelter that coddled and counselled patients who were addicted to alcohol. "We kept them dry for 8 months," Art explained, "then passed them over to unrestricted social housing. Within a few days, many would come back dead drunk!"

President Cameron thanked Jim for a very interesting talk, then presented him with a cheque for the Old Brewery Mission as a token of our appreciation for the many thousands of people they have helped over the years.

Maurice Bissada, President of the St-Laurent-Mont-Royal club, invited us to mark our calendars for their Annual Spaghetti Dinner Fundraiser on Monday, may 8th, and for their Annual Golf Tournament in August.He also told us that they would be moving the time of their meeting from 6:30 to 5:30 p.m., staring Monday, April 3rd.

2006-04-03T22:24:00.000-05:00

The Lakeshorian, 28 March 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry
This week's program...
James Hughes, Executive Director of The Old Brewery Mission, will bring us up to date on Montreal's largest charitable organization devoted to improving conditions for the homeless.

Coming events and programs...
Belated Birthday Greetings to Jennifer Neville whose birthday was Saturday, March 25th.

Apr 4: This meeting date wasn't cancelled, so Jeff Alcorn will give us his ideas for creating the best Golf Tournament ever.

Apr 6: RI President Carl-Wilhelm Stenhammar will be the guest speaker at the Marriott Chateau Champlain. The program includes:Meet the Prez from 6 to 7, Dinner and program (he's the only speaker) from 7 to 8:30, then President Stenhammar will stick around to meet and greet for another hour. $40 pp, a bargain!

Last week's meeting...
Andy announced that our club's Hungarian Dinner raised two thousand dollars for his next Paraguayan adventure, which will include new latrines for several schools, as well as more medicine for young leukemia patients and indigenous families. He also told us that the Port St Lucie (Florida) club has committed to donate US$2,500 for this year's projects.

President Cameron reminded us of the RI President's dinner April 6th. See Coming Events for details. He also asked Treasurer Peter to prepare a club cheque to cover those who would like to be billed for the cost of their tickets.

Cameron also announced that the Ottawa Valley Rotary Clubs will hold a joint meeting in Eganville, Ontario, on Friday, April 21st, featuring RI President Nominee Wilf Wilkinson as special guest speaker. See Cameron for more details.

Past President Fran presented a cheque to the West Island Women's Shelter. The funds will be used for the restoration of bedrooms and other facilities in the home for women at risk. We also learned that the WIWS are acquiring another safe house. It is scheduled to open in July 2007.Jennifer introduced our guest speaker, Bob McEwen, "local businessman, friend, neighbour, politician, auctioneer and husband of my former teacher. They say when bad things happen to good people, they turn them around and make them into something great. Trust me, you'll understand the meaning of that saying by the time Bob's talk is over."

Bob not only thanked us for inviting him to speak to us, he donated 20 happy dollars for the privilege! He also congratulated Rotary for the good things that Rotarians do throughout the world.

He thanked Stan and Anita for "raising their daughter Valerie to be such a caring person, not to mention one of the city's best fund-raisers. The Montreal Children's Hospital is lucky to have her."

He told us he was here to talk about the Mingo-McEwen Fund, beginning at the beginning, when Bob's son, Tim, was injured during a hockey game. "I was there, of course, and I saw it happen. Tim was flat on the ice and he wasn't moving. I was over the boards in a flash and by his side, but he remained unconscious for several excruciating minutes. When he finally came to I was so relieved...until he told me he couldn't feel anything from the waist down."

Bob told us the Urgence Santé paramedics were great, as was the cop who flagged him down for speeding, then escorted him safely the rest of the way to the hospital.

While he waited nervously in the Neuro Science ward at the Montreal Children's Hospital, Bob told us he was about to meet a 12-year-old boy who would change his life forever. Brent Mingo had spent a large part of his life in that ward, as a result of having been exposed shortly after birth to bacterial meningitis, a life-threatening infection of the fluid that covers the brain and spinal cord. Bob later introduced Brent to his son Tim. The two became friends and Bob suddenly knew what he wanted to do with the rest of his life-raise money to help fund specialized equipment and medicines that hospitals and other organizations need to treat the indomitable children with incurable diseases.

The Mingo-McEwen Fund was born from that accidental meeting, one that wouldn't have occurred if a bad thing hadn't happened to Tim McEwen. Incidentally, though Tim had suffered a severe neck injury, he was made whole again by the fabulous skills of surgeons and other health care professionals at MCH.

A couple of other happy coincidences came together to help Bob decide how to get started. It turned out that Brent had applied to the Children's Wish Foundation to play a small role with a professional hockey team. That foundation was still trying to find a team that would help make Brent's wish come true when Bob entered the picture. Since Bob was the coach of the John Abbott College men's hockey team, another great idea took form in Bob's head.

First he put a tribute together to highlight Brent's passion for hockey. During this time Brent, whom Bob had named Honorary Captain, came out to all the home games of the John Abbott Islanders hockey team, this in spite of living in Greenfield Park on the south shore, not exactly next door to JAC!

Bob's idea was to turn a special hockey game into a fundraiser to honour and benefit Brent and other child victims of incurable diseases. It seemed to offer some pretty good chances for success.

So, choosing the last game at John Abbott College, Bob arranged for Brent to dress in full team uniform and skate a lap around the rink between periods. "The grin on Brent's face was worth all the effort," Bob told us, "but the best part was when the opposing team, from Lennoxville, raised their sticks to create a tunnel which led Brent down to their goal, where he put the puck in the net. It made everybody's night," said Bob. "We raised $5,500 and decided to make it an annual event. The proceeds from that hockey game doubled the next year and haven't stopped growing yet!"Bob McEwen decided that the best way to raise money is not to beg, no matter how worthy the cause. The best way is to organize special events that highlight the plight of the fund's poster children while giving the participants two things: good value for their money and the assurance that their contribution will really make a difference in the lives of the children and families who are the fund's raison d'être. "Believe in the power of a cause," Bob advised and told us many success stories that demonstrate the wisdom of that advice and the incredible depth of human generosity.He told us several other anecdotes about some of the other youngster's they have helped: Jordan Gillis and Meagan Harney, two pre-teens with epilepsy.

He also told us some of the other ways the Mingo-McEwen Fund raises money for charity, and how the list of the objects of their affections has grown to include the West Island Palliative Care Residence, The Ste-Anne's Veterans' Hospital, The Centennial Regional High School in Greenfield Park and Melissa's Sunshine Camp for Intellectually Handicapped Children.

Bob, a winner of the McKesson Canada Award for his contribution to the advancement of health care in Canada, told us, "running the Mingo-McEwen Fund isn't a job-it's my passion!"

Bob was thanked by Stan, who admitted that Rotarians who, like himself, have been raising money for charity for many years, are amateurs who can learn a lot from the passion that the pros like Bob (and, we're sure, Stan's daughter Valerie, though he was too modest to mention her by name) feel for their cause.

Our Annual Sugaring-off Party...
Peter, you outdid yourself. What a blast! More students from more places and the adults who sponsor and host them, enjoyed the decadent food and warm hospitality of our Montreal-Lakeshore Sugaring-Off Party, 2006 edition, than ever before.

Thank you, Peter. You're too modest to take the credit, but you deserve our admiration for the success of this fabulous event. Here are a couple of pix from a huge collection that scholar Nino Marshania sent us. There are more in the HTML version of this issue, on the club's website.

The Lakeshorian 21Mar06

2006-03-27T20:13:00.000-05:00

Rotary District 7040
Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore
21 March 2006

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect Art Surette
Secretary Bob HabibTreasurer Peter Neville
Director, Club Service Graham Martin
Director, Community Service Susan Diening
Director, International Service Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service Fran Hepworth

This week's program...
Bob McEwen will tell us about the Mingo-McEwen Fund, a charitable foundation that raises money for The Montreal Children's Hospital, the West Island Palliative Care Residence and other worthy charities.

Coming events and programs...
Birthdays & anniversaries? None that we know of.

Mar 25: Our annual Sugaring-off Party, 7 to 11 pm, at Sucrerie La Seigneurie, 2970 Harwood, Vaudreuil. Take Exit 26 off Autoroute 40 west, left on Harwood, then turn right after you pass under the highway.

Mar 28: James Hughes, Executive Director of The Old Brewery Mission, will bring us up to date on Montreal's largest charitable organization devoted to improving conditions for the homeless.

Apr 4: Jeff Alcorn will give us his ideas for creating the best Golf Tournament ever. Or maybe that meeting will get cancelled so we can all go and meet our Fearless Leader, RI President Carl-Wilhelm Stenhammar at the Chateau-Champlain on Thursday evening, April 6th. In that case, hopefully, Jeff will be available to speak to us on April 11th, which was open the last time I checked.

Apr 6: RI President Stenhammar will be the guest speaker at the Marriott Chateau Champlain. Meet the Prez from 6 to 7, dinner and program (he's the only speaker) from 7 to 8:30, then President Stenhammar will stick around to meet and greet for another hour. $40 pp, a bargain!

Last week's meeting...
President Cameron announced that our club is planning a big fundraser in June, involving L'Équipeur and Montreal radio stations, with a goal in the 20 to 30-thousand-dollar range! He is looking for members' suggestions of worthy donees (and why), as it's a well-known fact that identifying the beneficiaries of our largesse in advance increases the take substantially.Peter reminded us about our upcoming sugaring-off party. See info under Coming Events.

Cameron read an email from a Rotarian in France who is looking for a job for his daughter, as a chef. See Cameron if you are in a position to offer to help this young person.

Susan brought Cameron a banner from the Rotary Club of Medicine hat, Alberta, home of the world's tallest tepee (Honest Injun!) Believe it or not, she got it from a M. H. Rotarian she meets in Barbados every year. They both have been promising each other to exchange banners one day and it finally happened.

Acting Sergeant-at-Arms Wayne hauled lots of happy dollars, along with a few "Get Well" bucks for an ailing Stan. Even visiting Rotarian Chris Edgell from the Cornwall Sunrise club got excited enough to throw some cash our way. Thanks, Chris!

Knud introduced our two guest speakers, Andrea Spector and Émilie Lapointe from Engineers Without Borders' Concordia chapter. West Islander Andrea is a third-year Civil Engineering student and the Treasurer of EWB Concordia. Last summer she went to Ziguinchor, Senegal, to work on agriculture and water projects with an NGO called Enterprise Works. Émilie, a third-year Civil Engineering student, is off to Mali this coming summer, to work on a development project as an EWB Concordia Overseas Volunteer.

As a sidebar, it should also be mentioned that (a) we had a projector that worked, thanks to Susan, and a bonus slide show during lunch, courtesy of Andrea and Émilie.

Andrea had some more sidebars for us. First, next week (that would now be this week), the EWB club is 45 years old; and, second, she has found a lady who has 100 books to give us for our Swaziland project. Knud was positively beaming! And lastly, Andi expressed Diane Cousineau's regrets that she was not able to be with us last week, due to a last-minute change in her schedule.

She also gave our club a huge "Thank you" for helping her pay her way over to Senegal last summer, before going on to tell us about EWB in Canada-a student-based organization with a couple of professional chapters as well. Its goal is to make Canada the most "pro-development" nation in the world, through member education and one of the most ambitious international community assistance programs out there. Their educational and member awareness programs include development workshops, national conferences and high school outreach campaigns.

[Editor's note: I went on-line to check out what EWB has been up to lately and guess what I found? A front-page photo of our very own Francis Scarpaleggia in their February newsletter, with the following comment: The highlight of the day was an invitation from the Liberal incumbent Mr. Scarpaleggia to the chapter to visit him if re-elected (he was) in his office. He also pledged for the first time in front of reporters at the event to push the government to adhere to a timeline of 2015 for allocating 0.7% of Canadian GDP to foreign aid." Let's hear it for Francis! Ed.]

Émilie told us a bit about what the Concordia chapter has been doing. To hammer home the slogan, "Put a Dent in Poverty" they held a car collision event. Needless to say, it was a "smash hit." They also make presentations to local high schools to engage students and increase their awareness of Third World needs and how engineers are well equipped to find solutions.

With the aid of a well-developed PowerPoint presentation, the girls also told us about short-term and long-term Overseas Placements, a program to help poverty-stricken foreign communities improve their quality of life by building local capacity. EWB Canada sticks to simple sustainable development projects, such as water and sanitation, food processing, energy and information technology.

Countries where EWB volunteers are offering a helping hand include Cambodia, Cameroon, East Timor, Ghana, Mali, Nepal, Philippines, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda, Uzbekistan and Zambia.
They described a typical project by telling us about WaterAid Mali, an NGO that Diane Cousineau worked with last summer, improving the water supply and sanitation in a small village, and teaching the inhabitants about the importance of good hygiene in disease prevention.

Andrea also told us about her own experience, in Senegal. Working with Enterprise Works Senegal, she was engaged in a project to improve the scope of cashew exports by showing cashew growers how they could process cashews locally. Instead of simply picking and shipping the whole fruit, called cashew apples, they could roast them and shell them to separate the kernel, which is the familiar cashew nut, from the fleshy pulp, which can be candied or used for juice extraction. Care must be taken during processing because the shell contains a thick and poisonous acidic tannin that must be neutralized by pressure-cooking in brine. She acknowledged that there was some reluctance on the part of the cashew farmers because they were afraid of losing their main customers for cashew apples.

Émilie told us she would be going to Mali this summer but she did not know as yet what field she'll be working in, or who her NGO employer will be. Consequently, she said she would describe the work that is involved in preparing for the short-term Overseas Volunteer program.She told us she must undergo a solid week of intensive training in Toronto, then went on to define the budget for a short-term volunteer.

During that training week, she must pay her room and board, a modest cost of $300 for the week.Pre-departure costs include $550 of vaccinations, $500 for insurance and $2,500 (average) for the airfare.

And while overseas her food and lodging will cost $300 a month or $1,200 total, plus an estimated $100 for local travel and miscellaneous expenses.

The total cost is $5,150, without any frills. She said she was unabashedly seeking our financial support, hoping that we would agree to provide $1,000 toward the cost of her overseas placement.Several thought-provoking questions indicated they had hit the mark with their audience.Andrea was asked what the future held for her when she graduated as a civil engineer. She replied that she was eligible for a long-term overseas placement with EWB, and was giving such an opportunity serious consideration. She said that last summer's experience had made her much more mature, but it also meant that she had to redefine the meaning of the terms "poverty" and "war" in her mind.

Asked if security was a problem, and if so, did she receive any assistance from Canada's embassy in Dakar, the capital of Senegal, Andrea was quick to applaud the close relations between our two countries, both members of La Francophonie. She said the recent end of the civil war had left the country with a more stable political climate, but landmines were plentiful, and farmers were afraid to plough the soil. "But they are well-marked," Andrea said. "Everybody knows where they are, so the danger is not that great."

[Editor's note: Just three days after Andrea and Émilie spoke to us, Senegalese separatist rebels from the Casamance region around Ziguinchor crossed the border to the south, into Guinea-Bissau, where they clashed with Guinea-Bissau troops and caused widespread panic among the local residents. A passenger bus carrying fleeing families hit a landmine near Sao Domingos, Guinea-Bissau.]

Andrea and Émilie were thanked by Graham Martin. A retired professor and Vice-Rector of Concordia University, Graham lauded the excellent quality of their presentations, and congratulated them on their humanitarian sentiment and desire to put their engineering knowledge to use in the war on poverty. "You've made me proud to be an ex-Concordian," he declared.

The World Water Crisis...
Water is life. An adult can survive without food for weeks, but the human body can't go more than a few days without water. Yet in our world today, an alarming number of people struggle every day to get it-1.2 billion without access to safe drinking water, 2.4 billion without sanitation." According to the United Nations, some 6,000 children die every day from diseases associated with the lack of safe drinking water, inadequate sanitation, and poor hygiene.

The painful irony is that water appears to be abundant on our "blue planet." It covers more than two-thirds of the earth's surface. But only 2.5 percent of that water is fresh water. And 99.7 percent of that freshwater is unavailable, trapped in glaciers, ice sheets, and mountainous areas. This means that only 0.3 percent of the planet's freshwater is shared by all of its people.

Few things affect human survival as directly as water does. How can Rotary clubs approach the issue with any hope of making a difference?

Simple, affordable technology exists to assist in solving the vexing problem of purifying water. Biosand filters are a cheap, reliable way to turn contaminated water into drinkable water.An even cheaper tool for water purification seems almost too good to be true: plastic soda bottles. Bottles made from polyethylene terephthalate (PET) can be filled with dirty water and placed in sunlight. The sun's rays do all the work.

[Adapted from The Rotarian, January 2005 (c) Rotary International.]

The Lakeshorian 14 Mar 06

2006-03-20T22:50:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN
Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore
14 March 2006

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry

This week's program...
A little over a year ago three Concordia Civil Engineering students spoke to us about Engineers Without Borders and a program called Overseas Volunteers, providing students and young engineers an opportunity to spend four months in a developing country, working and learning how to use their engineering skills to improve the availability and quality of food, water and sanitation. Two of them are back to speak to us about their summer in Africa, and they have brought along a new EWB recruit.
West Islander Andrea Spector is a third-year Civil Engineering student and the Treasurer of EWB Concordia. Last summer she went to Ziguinchor, Senegal, to work on agriculture and water projects with an NGO called Enterprise Works.
Diane Cousineau, graduated from Concordia last May with her B. Eng in Civil Engineering. She spent the summer of 2005 in Mali, where she worked with WaterAid, an NGO specializing in water supply, sanitation and hygiene promotion. This year Diane is the President of EWB Concordia.
Émilie Lapointe, a third-year Civil Engineering student, is off to Mali this coming summer, to work on a development project as an EWB Concordia Overseas Volunteer.
Last year we learned that the aims and objectives of Engineers Without Borders are very much in tune with those of Rotary. This year we will find out how these young entrepreneurs were able to advance our common cause: to reduce hunger and poverty while improving health and prosperity.

Coming events and programs...
Happy anniversary, Andy and Kathleen, Sunday, Mar19th!
This Week is World Rotaract Week!
Mar 21: Bob McEwen will tell us about the Mingo-McEwen Fund, a charitable foundation that raises money for The Montreal Children's Hospital, the West Island Palliative care Residence and other worthy charities.
Mar 25: Our annual Sugaring-off Party, 7 to 11 pm, at Sucrerie La Seigneurie, 2970 Harwood, Vaudreuil. Take Exit 26 off Autoroute 40 west, left on Harwood, then turn right after you pass under the highway.
Mar 28: James Hughes, Executive Director of The Old Brewery Mission, will bring us up to date on Montreal's largest charitable organization devoted to improving conditions for the homeless.
Apr 4: Jeff Alcorn will give us his ideas for creating the best Golf Tournament ever.

Last week's meeting...
President Cameron invited PDG Bill to give us an update on the visit of Rotary International President Carl-Wilhelm Stenhammar on April 6th. Bill said the plans for the Montreal leg of the visit were in the process of being finalized, though it had been confirmed that President Stenhammar would arrive by car from Ottawa about 4:30 pm Thursday, April 6th and depart from Trudeau airport at 1:45 pm the following day. Thursday evening there will be a multi-club, bilingual dinner meeting somewhere in Montreal. As far as our own club is concerned, Bill said he hopes we would consider cancelling our regular meeting on April 4th in order to ensure maximum opportunity for all of our members to meet President Stenhammar on the 6th.
Knud announced that former member and Past President Heinz Ritter has offered to donate four exquisite hand-carved sculptures of birds, with a total value of ten thousand dollars, for our club's raffle to raise funds for AIDS orphans in Africa. All club members are cordially invited to visit Heinz Ritter's home studio at 47 Malcolm Circle, DDO on Thursday, March 16th at 7:30 pm. Beverages (coffee, tea or cold beer) and pastries will be served.
Knud also announced that Jacinthe is coordinating the distribution of posters and the collection of books for Swaziland.
President-elect Art observed that, except for Abie Budman's return to the fold, we have not recruited a new member thus far into 2006. Forewarned is forearmed.
Jennifer introduced our guest speaker, Tiara Letourneau, a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship winner from west coast District 5060 (parts of British Columbia and Washington State). Tiara will begin her course of study in international development at the University of Kwa Zula-Natal in Durban, South Africa, in February 2007.
A recent business graduate of the University of Alberta, Tiara spent much of 2005 in Tunis, Tunisia, with an NGO called Enda inter-arabe, applying her business acumen and penchant for entrepreneurship to the promotion and management of microcredit loans to women and young people.
Jennifer told us that would be the subject of Tiara's address to our club.
Tiara told us that she and her husband, Loren Letourneau, decided to go to Tunisia because they believed that the future of such a developing country could be guided in the right direction through the empowerment of women and youth to find within themselves, through entrepreneurship, the leadership qualities Africa so desperately needs.
Through an emotionally moving and powerful slide show, Tiara demonstrated the proof of her premise. Microcredit loans, enabling poor but courageous women to pursue small businesses, are the key to the future of developing economies, she told us. "The proof is in the payback rate," she declared, "99 percent!" Another aspect, which she had not expected to find, was that Tunisian women proved to be fiercely competitive. So much so that the conventional wisdom of micro-banking, that borrower co-ops would allow women to work together, learning from and helping each other, were not popular because the women borrowers were not prepared to share the 'secrets' of their entrepreneurial success with their neighbours.
Throughout her presentation, Tiara demonstrated her passion for helping others reach their own potential. She closed with a quotation from Ralph Waldo Emerson, "It is one of the beautiful compensations of life that no man can sincerely help another without helping himself."

The LAKESHORIAN 7Mar06

2006-03-13T22:59:00.000-05:00

Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore (D-7040)7 March 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry

This week's program...Tiara Létourneau spent several months in Tunisia last year and she really got in touch with the people there. She's our guest speaker this week. Come and hear what she experienced during her "Adventure in Tunisia."

Coming events and programs...Birthdays and anniversaries? None that we know of.
March 13th - 19th is World Rotaract Week!
Mar 14: West Islander Andi Spector is a third-year Civil Engineering student at Concordia. A year ago she was one of three student members of Engineers Without Borders who spoke to our club about their plans to spend part of the summer of 2005 in Africa, as EWB Overseas Volunteers. Andi went to Senegal and her friend, Dianne Cousineau, went to Mali. They will speak to us about their experiences. They will also bring Émilie, who will be going to Mali as an OV this summer.
Mar 21: Bob McEwen will tell us about the Mingo-McEwen Fund, a charitable foundation that raises money for The Montreal Children's Hospital, the West Island Palliative care Residence and other worthy charities.
Mar 28: James Hughes, Executive Director of The Old Brewery Mission, will bring us up to date on Montreal's largest charitable organization devoted to improving conditions for the homeless.

Last week's meeting...
President Cameron thanked Andy for a successful fundraiser the previous Saturday. Andy's delicious Hungarian fare and Anne Myles' sweets-not to mention a few well-priced wine offerings-got everybody digging way, way back into their musical repertoires to satisfy Sergeant Stan's urging for song.
Wayne announced that the Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue Rugby Club would be holding a Casino Night at Harpell Hall on Saturday, March 11. Admission is free and there will be some unusual entertainment. Place your bets! It's for a good cause.
Lakeshore Players will present the comedy Beyond Therapy by Christopher Durang, Tuesday, April 18th at Lindsay Place High School. Ticket price: $22.
Peter has Alouettes' season tickets on the 40-yard line, or at least he did last Tuesday. They're probably gone by now, but call him anyway.
Knud brought us up to date on his campaign to collect a container-full of children's books in English for our WCS project in Swaziland. The posters are printed and ready for distribution among West Island public libraries and other spots where they might catch the eye of readers who have such books available to donate to this good cause. Take a poster and find a clean box to put under it, then call Knud to find out where to deliver your "catch."
PDG Bill confirmed that Rotary International President Carl-Wilhelm Stenhammar will visit our district from noon on April 5th until noon on the 7th, in response to an invitation Greg made to his boss a year ago. Greg promised the RI President the opportunity to experience three different cultures in three consecutive Rotary club meetings. They program will wrap up in Montreal with a soiree hosted by the Rotary Club of Montreal-Ville-Marie on Thursday April 6th, giving us all a rare opportunity to celebrate Rotary up close and personal with our fearless leader. More details to follow. Stay tuned.

Art introduced our guest speaker, Allan Mackinnon, saying he thought he would wow us with the comment that he has known Allan for more than 30 years, only to learn when Allan walked in the door that Stan has know Allan for 60 years! Art told us Allan has been in the education business all his working life, and has been associated with Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Montreal for18 years.
Allan thanked Art and Jennifer for inviting his to address our Rotary club. He also said he was sworn to secrecy, but he suggested we might hear a few juicy stories if we were to ask Stan about their mischievous childhood pranks.He went on to inform us that Big Brothers was started in Cleveland in 1903, putting it in good company with Rotary, which was started in Chicago in 1905.
A young man found a little boy going through a garbage can. Obviously hunger, the boy admitted that he was one of six children of his widowed mother. Although the man was young, recently married and was just starting out in business-not a guy with a lot of spare time on his hands or a need to find something else to do-he decided to befriend this young lad...and the rest, as they say, is history.
"My first 'little brother,' Gordon, was 7 when we each became an important part of each other's lives, " Allan told us. "He's now 25 and we still keep in touch. He even taught me to hate Def Leppard!"
Big Brothering is not parenting," Allan explained, "it's about being a friend. It is also not about preaching."
He told us he took up the cause when he and his wife became empty-nesters, but before they became grandparents. He said it requires a commitment of about 800 hours a year.Getting into the stats, Allan told us Big Brothers operates in 35 countries. It came to Canada in 1913 and there are now 264 Canadian chapters, with a total of about 20,000 matches. The largest is in Vancouver, with over 400 matches; the smallest is a small town in Saskatchewan, with 3.
"The movement is growing because the need is growing," he said, adding that such growth can sometimes be overwhelming. "Most adult volunteers are Big Brothers, rather than Big Sisters," he noted. "Why? Because typically a single mom with a son will ask for help, where she may not think to ask for help to raise a daughter.
"This year marks the 30th anniversary of the West Island chapter," he said, "and we still cannot find enough volunteers. There are, in fact, 40 little boys waiting for a Big Brother right here. About 40 percent of our financing comes from Centraide, the rest we raise ourselves. In fact, here in the West Island, we have two challenges: attracting volunteers and raising funds. You can help us with both," he declared. The phone number is 694-6100. Or send an e-mail to bbbsofwi@aol.com.
Asked what a Big Brother's typical profile might be, Allan replied that, apart from being an adult (i.e., at least 18 years of age) and of good character, there are no other criteria, other than the desire to take some time to enjoy outings with a child with whom they share interests. "Big Brothers doesn't 'fix' problems," he remarked. "It prevents them."
In response to a question, Allan told us that Mentoring is a relatively new program of Big Brothers Big Sisters. It pairs young children (Kindergarten to Grade 4) who have low self-esteem and/or learning or behavioural problems with an adult volunteer who meets with the child at school for one hour per week. The Mentor acts as a tutor and a role model as well as a friend.
The many questions that his listeners posed were a tribute to Allan's interesting way of presenting a topic that caught our fancy.They also led to a story about a Little Brother in Toronto who called his former Big Brother in Montreal one day. They hadn't seen each other for several years but had kept in touch by phone and e-mail. He announced that he was getting married and asked if his Big Brother would be his Best Man. "I'd be delighted," was the happy reply, but why me?" He was told that the young man's priest suggested that "the best choice for Best Man is one's best friend...and that would be you.
"Allan was thanked by Brahm, who said, "Rotarians sometimes think we're the only ones doing good in the world. You have opened our eyes to another organization that does wonderful, important work. Thank you."

A letter from Rotary Foundation Trustees Chair PRIP Frank Devlyn...
Wherever I go, I like to ask Rotarians to tell me about the best day they ever had in Rotary. Everyone has a story about Rotary service. What stands out for me is how Rotarians will often talk about a defining moment when Rotary really came together for them; a profound Rotary moment that touched them and changed them forever. It amazes me to learn how many Foundation programs are involved when Rotarians tell me about their best day in Rotary.
A Rotarian and good friend of mine from Windsor, Ontario, Canada, Bob Gallagher, recently told me about his best day in Rotary: "Four days after my daughter Michelle was born, I joined Rotary. During my first few years, I was a member of a Rotary club. I participated in projects. I went to luncheons and made friends in my Rotary club. I was like most members of Rotary. "After six years, I finally attended my first district conference. As we left the plenary hall following the Group Study Exchange presentation, I casually mentioned to my club's president-elect that someday I would like to become involved in GSE. Life has a way of moving faster than we expect. Only 10 short months later, I truly became a Rotarian while leading a GSE team to the Philippines. "It was during my GSE experience that my eyes were opened to what Rotarians can do when they serve with love and practice Service Above Self. While in the Philippines, I observed a Rotarian veterinarian teach villagers how to successfully raise chickens (donated by his Rotary club). This was a wonderful example of using one's vocation for service. As the leader of the GSE, I was privileged to visit an operating room where Rotarian surgeons donated their vocational services in removing cataracts from the elderly hill people who would never be able to afford the operations themselves. These grandparents would return to their families and for the first time see their grandchildren. In 1992, that was my best day in Rotary. "A few years later, I traveled to Africa in the far northwest corner of Ghana to record our local Rotary district's projects. On this trip, I had the opportunity to immunize against polio a child who had been born since the previous National Immunization Day (NID). To this day, those two drops still represent my best day in Rotary. Last year I returned to Ghana to take part in a full NID. This experience was truly a wonderful day in Rotary.
"Each of you has had a best day in Rotary. I ask you to make sure you tell your fellow Rotarians about it. It will inspire them to know about the good work Rotarians accomplish every day. I know, for many of you, your best day was an experience with The Rotary Foundation. Bob's certainly was. Mine certainly was. Rotarians are the heart and soul of Rotary, but our Rotary Foundation is its backbone. It is the success stories that we hear and witness every day that inspires Rotarians to participate in and contribute to our Foundation. Each success we have will lead to more projects, more education, and even more lives improved. It is all thanks to you, the Rotarians who commit yourselves to service, through our Rotary Foundation.

Social Get-together at Heinz Ritter's Studio

2006-03-06T23:14:00.000-05:00

We are cordially invited, members AND partners (for coffee, tea and
pastries - or a cold glass of beer) at Heinz Ritter's studio and
display room at (his home): 47 Malcolm Circle,
Dollard des Ormeaux, - on Thursday evening, March 16th at 7:30 p.m.
------------------------------------------
Heinz (a previous club menber and past president) is donating 4 exquisite, handcarved sculptures of birds for our upcoming raffle ticket fundraiser for AIDS-orphans in Africa. Total value exceeding ten thousand dollars!
His workshop is fascinating beyond description!! He is not only an artist, but an artist consumed by his passion for sculpturing.
Regards,
Knud.

The Lakeshorian, 28 Feb 06

2006-03-06T22:42:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN
Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore
28 February 2006

ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect Art Surette
Secretary Bob Habib
Treasurer Peter Neville
Director, Club Service Graham Martin
Director, Community Service Susan Diening
Director, International Service Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service Fran Hepworth

This week's program... N.B. LAST-MINUTE CHANGE!
Allan Mackinnon will speak to us about "Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Montreal.

Coming events and programs...
Happy Birthday, Susan, wherever you are...Saturday, March 4th!
Happy Birthday, Andy...Sunday, March 5th!
Mar 1: Board meeting, 9675 Côte-de-Liesse, Suite 101.
Mar 7: Tiara Létourneau spent several months in Tunisia last year and she really got in touch with the people there.
March 13th - 19th is World Rotaract Week!
Mar 14: West Islander Andi Spector is a third-year Civil Engineering student at Concordia. A year ago she was one of three student members of Engineers Without Borders who spoke to our club about their plans to spend part of the summer of 2005 in Africa. Andi went to Senegal and will speak to us about that experience.
Mar 21: Bob McEwen will tell us about the Mingo-McEwen Fund, a charitable foundation that raises money for The Montreal Children's Hospital, the West Island Palliative care Residence and other worthy charities.

Last week's meeting...
A rather sparse turnout last week-only 14 members and five visiting Rotarians, including our two guest speakers and the spouse of one of them! I know there's a flu bug making the rounds but Stan was under the weather and he came. Come on folks, this is Canada. We get colds and flu every winter, but we keep on truckin' just the same.
We were pleased to welcome our two guest speakers, PDG's Bob French (from the Petawawa club) and Bette Miller (Cornwall Sunrise club), Bette's spouse Dale Miller (Cornwall Noon club), Showket Hossain (Dhaka Central club, Bangladesh) and Malcolm Young (Montreal-Westward club).
Members present were President Cameron, Amiel, Andy, Anne, PDG Bill, Bob, Doug, Jacinthe, Jennifer, Knud, Maurice, Ted, Stan and Wayne.

President Cameron exchanged banners with Mr Hossain, who is both a Past President and President-Elect of his club. He told us that his club's goal is to be a 100% Paul Harris Club. He is a PHF himself, he assured us, as are 32 members of his club's total complement of 36, which gives them just under 90% PHF.
He also told us he has a personal maxim that he lives by and that he urges every Rotarian he meets to adopt: "Do one Good Turn Every Day, for someone less fortunate, if possible."
His club has a several community service projects, including eye camps (primarily for cataract surgery), other medical health camps and the active and continuous promotion of education. They also do their best to alleviate overcrowding, corruption and flooding.
He extended a sincere invitation to our members to visit his club in Dhaka at any time. "If you do, I will personally take you to Nepal, which is only one hour away by plane."
Cameron announced that the proceeds from the recent fund-raising Gala of the McGill Rotaract Club amounted to $7,500, of which $4,000 was raised by the silent auction alone! Club President Alexandra Rhéaume thanked all who participated.
Knud informed us that Malcolm Young of the Montreal-Westward club has 62 years of perfect attendance. Congratulations, Malcolm!
Knud also told us he is making posters to publicize our campaign for English schoolbooks and other reading material for the AIDS orphans in Swaziland. He plans to distribute them to public libraries throughout the West Island, Vaudreuil and Dorion.
Bob Habib said he had been to London many times but this trip he finally did something he had been meaning to do for years-he visited the Victoria and Albert Museums, colloquially known as the V&A. He said it was wonderful, in the literal sense of that word, and he urged anyone who was considering a trip to the UK to be sure to include a visit to the V&A in their itinerary.
PDG Bill extended a warm welcome to his colleague PDG's Bob French and Bette Miller, saying they had come to talk to us about a 3-H (Health, Hunger and Humanities) mega project they have put together. Its goal is to help four villages in the Ashanti region of Ghana rise from the depths of poverty. The Rotary Foundation will provide a 9-to-1 match of contributions from clubs and District Designated Funds. Bob & Bette are hoping to raise $15,000 from clubs, which the district will match; TRF will then raise the total to $300,000. Bill welcomed Bob to the podium.
Bob announced that the headline of today's news was shocking: more than twenty thousand people died yesterday of extreme poverty. He went on to give a breakdown of the stats of that calamitous news, then told us that the only reason this true story doesn't actually make the headlines every day, is that it is no longer news! But it is now less true and no less shocking for being a daily occurrence, Bob pointed out. That fact just makes it all the more urgent that we take immediate steps to bring an end to poverty.
He went on to quote from The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for our Time, by
Columbia University professor Dr. Jeffrey Sachs. Bob used a metaphor of a 30-rung
Development Ladder to partition the world's population into income groups ranging from great wealth to extreme poverty.
Following the framework of need that Bob had established, Bette filled in the history of this particular project, initiated one year ago as a proposal to harness the Rotarian resources in Districts 7040 and 9100 in a multi-faceted program to improve the quality of life for children and their parents in four villages ranging in size from 600 to 12,000 population.
The scope of the program will include literacy, nutrition, water and sanitation, health care, income generation and support, environmental renewal and Rotary capacity building.
To ensure the success of such an ambitious program, they have enlisted the support of several partners, including Free the Children, who will build schools where the need exists; Ryan's Wells, who will drill wells to provide access to clean, safe water for drinking, cooking and hygienic uses; and The Canadian Teachers Federation, and others.
With a thorough and well-organized slide show, Bette and Bob walked us through the
highlights of the individual village projects, each of which will target a major need with the aim of meeting it, and build upon an existing strength with a view to adding value to make it an even greater regional asset.
Among the many examples, we saw the scope of assistance to be provided to the existing health care facility, St John's Health Centre in Domeabra, a town of 5,000 people. Bed nets will help prevent malaria by keeping out the mosquitoes. We will provide for qualified health care professionals to train hospital staff and we will build upon and improve the existing electrical power source, based on a modern system of solar panels and storage batteries.
Eliminating the use and ingestion of polluted water by drilling new wells and repairing existing ones, will curb the incidence of Buruli ulcers, a flesh-eating disease similar to leprosy that preys upon children.
Lastly, they explained how they have worked with local Rotarians from the Kumasi and Kumasi East Rotary clubs, taking care to respect and adhere to tribal traditions that require painstaking explanation of each project to the appropriate tribal chief and seeking his blessing and thumb-print of approval before finalizing the plans to proceed with any project as soon as the Rotary Foundation endorses our proposal and approves our funding request.
Following such a thorough presentation there were few areas of information that invited or required further clarification, which was a good thing because we realized we had run short on time for questions.
Bob and Bette were thanked by Wayne, who acknowledged that Rotarians in affluent countries like the US and Canada have a tendency to become complacent. "So we are delighted when two Past District Governors remind us of our responsibilities by "leading the way´(to put the 2006-2007 Rotary theme to use at an early stage). The fact that you are devoting so much of your personal lives to help these poor villagers in western Africa, tells us that this is a worthwhile cause, being financed by an effective Rotary Foundation funding program. I am sure that our club's Board will see their way clear to find some seed money to help get this
3-H project off the ground in the future."

Late-breaking news:
The Lakeshorian has learned that Rotary International President Carl-Wilhelm Stenhammar may be visiting our district as soon as the first week in April, hopefully favouring us with a two-day visit, which would permit us to develop a very meaningful program of activities to the mutual benefit of all.
The possibility was mentioned in an email message to DG Greg Campbell in response to an invitation Greg made to his boss a year ago. The visit has yet to be confirmed but if and when it is, we will have a rare opportunity to celebrate Rotary up close and personal with our fearless leader, possibly right here in Montreal for at least a part of the time that he's here.
Stay tuned.

2006-02-27T19:45:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN

21 February 2006

Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore

RI President-elect Bill Boyd’s Theme for 2006-07:

This week’s program…
PDGs Bette Miller and Bob French will tell us about the 3H (Heath, Hunger and Humanity) project they are planning in Ghana. Their presentation is entitled “Global Sustainability…One Village at a Time.”

Coming events and programs…
Happy Birthday, Andrew Wood tomorrow, Feb. 22nd!
Happy 101st Birthday to Rotary Thursday, Feb. 23rd!
Happy 45th Birthday to our club Monday, Feb 27th!
February is World Understanding Month!
Feb 25: Annual Hungarian Friendship Dinner, Fritz farm.
Feb 28: Nadia Gagnon of Encore Gourmet Foods, will tell us all about “The Spice of Life.”
Mar 1: Board meeting, 9675 Côte-de-Liesse, Suite 101.
Mar 7: Tiara Létourneau spent several months in Tunisia last year and she really got in touch with the people there. You have to read some of her blog posts to get a feel for what she experienced during her “adventure.”
Try http://nightintunisia.blogspot.com/ for a start.
Mar 14: West Islander Andi Spector is a third-year Civil Engineering student at Concordia. A year ago she was one of three student members of Engineers Without Borders who spoke to our club about their plans to spend part of the summer of 2005 in Africa. Andi went to Senegal and will speak to us about that experience.

Last week’s meeting…
Seventeen members and seven visitors gathered in the dining room of the Pointe Claire Holiday Inn last Tuesday to hear Phil Slominski tell us about his new sport: marathon running.
We were pleased to welcome Cheryl Andreoli, Daniel Bernier, Mike Beaudry, Tom Molnar and Jorge Nouda, guests of our speaker, as well as June Hodges, guest of PDG Bill, and visiting Rotarian Malcolm Young of the Montreal-Westward club.
We missed the fellowship of Jeff, Wayne, Abie, PDG Coos, Randy, Bob, Michel, Graham, Ghandi, Doug, Rod, George, Amiel and Joe.
President Cameron read a note from PDG Coos, who is making up at a Dutch club while wintering in the Netherlands. This club, Coos reported, begins each meeting with a quotation. A recent one went like this, “Money does not bring happiness; in that respect it is not much different from poverty.”
Andy reminded us that tickets for our Hungarian Friendship Dinner are still available. This popular event will take place at Fritz Farm on Saturday, February 25th, starting at 6 p.m. and Andy needs to know how much food to buy. If you have any unsold tickets, please return them without delay.
Cameron also reported that, due to circumstances beyond his control, the Hudson Legion Curling Rink will not be available for us on Saturday evening, March 18, 2006. At Bill’s suggestion, Cameron will check to see if it’s available during the day.
Bill told us that Wayne sent his regrets; he was delivering Valentine posies for the family floral emporium. But he wanted us all to know how happy he and Linda are to report that their son, Mark, has been accepted into the Rotary Youth Exchange program and will be going to Brazil in the fall.
Bill also presented President Cameron with a banner from the “Chicago One” Rotary Club, courtesy of that club’s President-Elect, Don Garner, who joined us for our New Year’s Breakfast Meeting, December 27, 2005.
AG Peter offered congratulations to Jules who celebrates his 45th anniversary as a member of this club. Jules just missed being a charter member but was one of the first to be recruited into the new club after it was formed at the beginning of 1961.
Sergeant-at-Arms Stan found that the room was again teeming with happy campers willing to part with happy dollars.
Fran introduced our guest speaker by telling us that she and Phil Slominski go back 20 years, to when they joined London Life together, in 1986. Phil joined Great West Life in 1997 and since 1999 he has worked in the private wealth management field, most recently as Regional Vice-President of Mackenzie Financial Corporation. In April 2002 he became Vice President for Quebec of Freedom Financial 55, division of London Life. Phil and his wife, Grace, live in Ste-Julie, Québec, with their two children, Alicia, 11, and Alex, 9.
Phil said his parents have inherited his most prized character trait—his sense of humour. To cite an example, he said, as he was leaving for work that morning he checked the family’s “To Do” list on the fridge. At the top of Alicia’s list was “Change parents!”
He also recounted an example of the peculiar difficulty francophones have with his name. Following a recent hockey game at Kingsey Falls in the Eastern Townships. The Ste-Julie team, for which his son is the goaltender, had just played a close game against Victoriaville, and the local announcer was reporting on the starts of the game. “pour Victoriaville…Marcel Tremblay! Et pour l’équipe de Ste-Julie…(pause)…the goaltender!”
Phil said he recently became interested in running in a big way…running the marathon…but the story about how his interest was peaked is also interesting. He told us he was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes in 1999, not long after one of his sports heroes, Doug Wickenheiser, died of cancer at age 37, leaving three young children.
He illustrated his presentation with an excellent PowerPoint slide show.
“I was not too thrilled about having to take insulin four times a day,” Phil confided, “but I decided I would have to learn to live with my new…and permanent condition. My research soon confirmed that weight control and physical fitness would be high on my priority list, so I became determined to find a sport or physical activity that I could adhere to with alacrity.”
He told us he later heard about Team Diabetes through a friend at the office. On the Internet he learned that this wonderful organization raises money for diabetic research by sponsoring participation in marathons. Not just diabetic runners but anyone interested in this means of raising money to fight diabetes. “I decided that I would help raise money for this cause,” Phil told us, “so I sent out a letter asking people to support me. My target was $10,000. I ended up raising $30,000!”
Phil said he decided to enter the Amsterdam Marathon, which was to be run in October 2005. “I started training with a goal of running 2,500 km before we got to Amsterdam. That’s like running from, say, Montreal to Miami!” As part of his training regimen, he entered the Ottawa Half-Marathon in May and the Calgary marathon in July.
One of the slides he showed us, taken in Amsterdam, was a good luck note from Grace and Alicia and Alex, who all went with Phil to Amsterdam. He had run the half in 1:43 in Ottawa and the full marathon in 3:51 in Calgary. His goal for Amsterdam was to break 3 hours 45 minutes.
There were 50 runners from Canada, but the total field was an enormous crowd of 16,000! The race started in the Olympic Stadium and wound through the beautiful…and flat!…Dutch countryside, along a lazy river, past a lot of beautiful homes. 42.2 kilometres later he came in first of the 50 Canadians, with a time of 3 hours, 40 minutes.
“There were a lot of Canadian flags as I entered the stadium. Grace and the kids were up on the second floor, ready to join me for the congratulatory photo shoot. Unfortunately I was so exhausted it took me 10 minutes to climb the stairs to the second level.

Phil’s address prompted a lot of questions from a fascinated audience. He was later thanked by Peter, who is also a Type 1 diabetic. Peter told Phil about Levemir, a new type of long-acting insulin. He also explained the mission of Light a Dream, the Pointe Claire based organization from which we buy our speaker gifts: to build autonomy, self-confidence and self-esteem among young, intellectually delayed adults, through a productive business environment, manufacturing and marketing quality candles to enlighten the world around them.

Speaking of marathons…
Marathon runners now have an additional incentive to run: The top male and female winners of five major marathons over the next two years, starting with Berlin September 23-24, 2006 will split a prize purse totalling US$1 million.
Marathon organizers in Berlin, Boston, Chicago, London, and New York have formed the "big five" of running competitions. The first winner of World Marathon Majors, a new moniker for the running competitions, will be announced after the New York Marathon in 2007.

Good News in the Fight Against Polio…
In the battle to eradicate polio the list of polio-endemic countries is down to four—an all-time low! Our newest tools in the battle against polio are next-generation monovalent vaccines aimed at the two surviving strains of poliovirus: types 1 and 3 (Type 2 was eliminated in 1999). Monovalent vaccines were first used in Egypt in May 2005 and are credited with the prevention of new cases of polio in that country for over 12 months, the criterion for removing a country from the endemic list. “Polio has been endemic in our country for all of recorded history,” said the Egyptian Minister of Health. “The best tools of our age have finally defeated this enemy who has plagued us since pharaonic times.”
The other country to be removed from the endemic list is Niger, a nation with a sparse and often nomadic population and a well-traveled border with Nigeria, making our success there cause for even greater joy.
Only Nigeria, India, Pakistan and Afghanistan remain polio endemic, although we continue to fight cases in certain concentrated containment areas of eight other countries, resulting from poliovirus exported from Nigeria last year. Those eight countries, including Somalia, Indonesia and Yemen, will be the targets of massive campaigns using the new vaccines, which will also figure prominently in mass immunizations scheduled for all four endemic countries this year.

The LAKESHORIAN, 14 Feb 2006

2006-02-20T21:46:00.000-05:00

Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore, District 7040
14 February 2006
Happy Valentine's Day!

This week's program...
Phil Slominski is Vice-President-Quebec for Freedom 55 Financial, division of London Life Insurance Company.
He is also an avid marathon runner, which is the topic of his address today.

Coming events and programs...
Happy Birthday to Mary Saad Saturday, February 18th!
February is World Understanding MonthIt's also the month of Rotary's 101st birthday (Feb 23rd) and our club's 45th (Feb 27th).
Feb 21: PDGs Bette Miller and Bob French will tell us about the 3-H (Heath, Hunger and Humanity) project they are planning in Ghana. Their presentation is entitled "Global Sustainability...One Village at a Time."
Feb 25: Annual Hungarian Friendship Dinner, Fritz farm.
Feb 28: Nadia Gagnon of Encore Gourmet Foods, will tall us all about "The Spice of Life."
Mar 1: Board meeting, 9675 Côte-de-Liesse, Suite 101.
Mar 7: Tiara Létourneau spent several months in Tunisia last year and she really got in touch with the people there. You have to read some of her blog posts to get a feel for what she experienced during her "adventure." Try http://nightintunisia.blogspot.com/ for a start.
Mar 18: Curling for Fun, Canadian Legion, Hudson.

Last week's meeting...
Twenty members gathered in Rotary fellowship at the Holiday Inn last Tuesday. We missed the fellowship of Abie, Jules, PDG Coos, Randy, Brahm, Michel, Ghandi, AG Peter, Rod, George and Maurice.
President Cameron reminded us that tickets for our Hungarian Friendship Dinner are now available from Andy, recently returned from Port St Lucie, Florida. This popular event will take place at Fritz Farm on Saturday, February 25th, starting at 6 p.m.
Cameron also reminded us that our annual Curling-for-Fun fellowship event will take place at the Hudson Legion Curling Rink, 56 Beach Rd, Hudson, on Saturday, March 18, 2006.
Director of Youth Service Fran confirmed that we will be sending a student to RYLA this year. He is David Leroux Petersen, son of Jacinthe and grandson of Knud. David is studying biology at Concordia and will soon be off to the Galapagos Islands, about 600 miles off the coast of Ecuador, where he will participate in a conservation project from Feb 16 to Mar 6.
Cameron announced that he has copies of RI and TRF annual reports for 2005-05, if anyone would like to peruse one or both.
Knud recounted the story behind the so-called "cartoons" depicting the prophet Mohammed in Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. Last summer, as part of an ongoing series of articles about free speech and self-censorship by journalists tiptoeing around the reporting of Islamic traditions, the newspaper took a position that it is untenable for non-Muslims to be bound by Muslim scripture. They invited Danish illustrators to submit their known personal interpretations of how the prophet might appear and, on September 30th, published the 12 illustrations that were submitted. There was subsequently much debate among Danish Muslims with those who felt most strongly condemning the newspaper in the Arab press. In an expression of support for the principle of free speech, a Norwegian newspaper reprinted the caricatures in January and the rest, as they say, is history.
Knud also reported that two travel packs of medicines (one PTP and a Dentist's Travel Pack or DTP), travelling with Alexandra Vinograd and destined for the street kids in Lima, have become stuck in Peruvian customs. Knud is trying to send replacements via his own parish priest.
Lastly, Knud distributed a summary of a literacy project our club is about to undertake in Swaziland, in which we would help equip five neighbourhood care centres with learning shelters, furniture and books. He asks members to contribute textbooks and other books of interest to children, in English.
Sergeant-at-Arms Stan found that the room was teeming with happy campers delighted to contribute happy dollars.

Fran introduced our speaker, Jenny Wood who would be giving her Classification Talk. Fran said she had a very complete bio for Jenny but if she read it all, Jenny would have nothing to talk about. "But I can tell you," added Fran, "that Jenny, one of our new members this year, has been happily married to her husband, Andy Wood, for 30 years, and they have two children, Nathalie and David."
Jenny said she loves being a court transcriber-a career she has cultivated for almost 20 years-because it permits her to work at home. She told us she started her first stretch of duties in legal transcription in 1987, but in 1995 was invited to accept a position as Assistant to the Vice President of Standard Life Assurance Company, a job she held for two years. From 1997 until 2001 she was the Administrator of the Pulp and Paper Research Centre at McGill University. Since 2001, she told us, she is back doing legal transcriptions, and happy to be back in her home office environment.
In a brief aside, Jenny talked about her other passions and hobbies. "I love to read. And I have been playing the piano since my mother sent me to my first piano lesson at the age of 7. I studied classical piano for a while, but now I prefer to play jazz, which is fun and allows for more personal interpretation of the music than classical.
"Returning to the changes that the art of legal transcription has undergone over the years she has been at it, Jenny recalled that in 1987 she had to learn how to read the paper tape of shorthand that the court stenographers generate on stenotype machines, then convert it to text on an electric typewriter, with real carbon copies. Errors had to be corrected with whiteout on the original and every copy."
Then we were introduced to the electronic 'word processors,' which were still basically typewriters, but you could type a line or two and see your work on a small screen, allowing you to proofread it before you committed it to paper. Ultimately we graduated to computers, and now we do everything via the Internet-a piece of cake by comparison with the old days!"
Jenny described how the courtroom drama becomes the official record. "Besides the court reporter, there are three microphones-one for the judge, the defence and the plaintiff. We have to determine which person is speaking at any given moment, and that is sometimes not as easy as it sounds" She recounted several anecdotes, without giving away any state secrets, and told us she had worked on some famous cases, including the Hells Angels trials and the Olympic Installations Board investigations.
Language issues often present special challenges, she told us. "Sometimes I record the actual words in the language of the speaker and sometimes the words of the court-appointed simultaneous translator-and they sometimes make mistakes in their effort to keep up with a fast talker!"
My latest endeavour," she said, "is learning how to do real-time steno-typing." In real-time court reporting the stenotype machines are linked directly to the computer. As the reporter keys in the symbols, they instantly appear as text on the screen. This process is used not only in courts but also for closed captioning for the hearing-impaired on television.
Following a seemingly endless stream of questions from an enraptured audience, Jenny was thanked by Susan, who started with, "Having received a subpoena yesterday..." She went on to congratulate Jenny on having such an interesting job and on describing it so well and in such an interesting way.
"It's a testimony to the quality of your work that the courts keep calling you to serve on short notice, on days when we need you at Rotary!" Susan added.

The Lakeshorian, 7Feb06

2006-02-13T20:19:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN
Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore
7 February 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect: Art Surette
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director, Club Service: Graham Martin
Director, Community Service: Susan Diening
Director, International Service: Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service: Fran Hepworth

This week's program…
Jenny Wood's classification is "Legal Transcription." I think that means she takes the paper tape (or would it be a computer file or diskette these days?) from the court stenographer, backed up by the audiotape, and creates the official transcript of a wide range of judicial proceedings, from a deposition to a full trial. Jenny's Classification Talk today will answer all our questions about Jenny's fascinating profession.

Coming events and programs…
Happy Birthday to Gladys Mazid today, February 7th!
Happy Birthday to Jules tomorrow, February 8th!
Happy Anniversary, June and Bill Monday, the 13th!

February is World Understanding MonthIt's also the month of Rotary's 101st birthday (Feb 23rd) and our club's 45th (Feb 27th)

Feb 14: Phil Slominski will speak to us on the topic, "Running a Marathon."
Feb 21: PDGs Bette Miller and Bob French will tell us about the 3-H (Heath, Hunger and Humanity) project they are planning in Ghana. Their presentation is entitled "Global Sustainability…One Village at a Time."
Feb 25: Annual Hungarian Friendship Dinner, Fritz farm.
Feb 28: Nadia Gagnon of Encore Gourmet Foods, will tall us all about "The Spice of Life."
Mar 1: Board meeting, 9675 Côte-de-Liesse, Suite 101.

Last week's meeting…
We were a comfy crowd, gathered in Rotary fellowship at the Holiday Inn last Tuesday. Twenty members, including our friend Abie Budman, returning to the fold after a brief hiatus. We were also delighted that Abe brought his daughter Cheryl and grand-daughter Haley to liven up our luncheon.
We missed the fellowship of Jules, Andy, PDG Coos, Randy, Brahm, Michel, Ghandi, Anne, Doug, Rod and George.
President Cameron reminded us that tickets for our Hungarian Friendship Dinner are available from Stan. This popular event will take place at Fritz Farm on Saturday, February 25th.
Fran offered kudos to Jenny for being the "star trimmer" at Curves in January. Jenny's magic number was 53, which is the total pounds and inches lost during the month. Congratulations!
Fran also told us we have a candidate for RYLA this year, which will take place at Ski-le Gap in Mont-Tremblant in mid-May.
Lastly, Fran announced that any member who wishes to participate in any connection with youth must either sign the district affidavit or get a police check.
We got two Sergeants-at-Arms for the price of one last week. Stan and Wayne did a good-cop-bad-cop routine, with Stan calling for happy dollars and Wayne fining perps right and left.
Finally, Art introduced our guest speaker, Jeff Alcorn by admitting that they met on the Internet. "Where do I go from here?" asked a flustered Art when he realized that what he had said could be taken a couple of different ways. Jeff was eager to get involved, Art told us, so much so that he was an active fund-raiser before he even became a member of our club!
Jeff started by introducing us, pictorially, to his wife, Jenny, and his "Boss," Emma, pictured below. He told us his first business, Pinpoint-dot-com, specialized in search engine optimization. He and his partners sold it "just in time," before the search engine companies decided to do that stuff themselves, rendering Pinpoint virtually pointless.When he learned they were going to have a baby he decided to go back to school, get a degree and go into business with his dad. Then his father got cancer, which he ultimately beat, and now Jeff pretty much runs their wealth management business.
Jeff said he thought the best way to do a talk about his classification would be to tell us about one of the least understood but most talked-about vehicles in the investment business: income trusts. He defined it as an equity investment vehicle designed to distribute cash flow from an underlying business to investors in a tax-efficacious manner (from the Standpoint of the business, of course).
He went through the pros and cons of income trusts in general and how to assess their value, which he summed up with this nugget of advice: Buy the business, not the yield!
He went on to explain the new income tax rates and calculations proposed for Dividend Tax Credits by last year's Liberal government and did the arithmetic on a couple of examples. The gross-up on the dividend (from a taxable Canadian corporation) goes up from 25% to 45% and the tax credit rate goes from `3.3% to 19%. The end result is that the DTC on $10k of dividend income goes from $1,662.50 to $2,755.
Jeff was thanked by Jennifer, who quipped that Jeff had been her back-up speaker for about two months. "That's the only downside of your excellent presentation, Jeff," she said, "now I won't have you in my back pocket any more!"

Knud & Ruth, Jennifer & Brad and Bill & June attended the McGill Rotaract Gala last Saturday evening. Besides the Rotaractors who have come to our club over the past few weeks to plug their annual fundraiser, Ambassadorial Scholars Elise Adams and Nino Marshania were there, along with a dozen other young people and their dates, and over forty Rotarian couples, including PDG Bob French & Charlene and DGE Linda Bradley & James, bringing the total Attendance to 100.
Marc Kielburger of Free the Children was the keynote speaker and entertainment was provided by a combo from McGill's music faculty during the cocktail hour and by McGill's acclaimed a cappella group, Effusion after dinner.
An excellent assortment of silent auction items added to the excitement of the evening, not to mention the cash it added to the total funds raised by the McGill Rotaractors. The target beneficiary of their funds this year is Free the Children's Adopt-a-Village program. You can learn more about this very worth-while organization by clicking on the following link:
http://www.freethechildren.org/

The Lakeshorian, 31Jan06

2006-02-06T17:27:00.000-05:00

THE LAKESHORIAN
Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore
Rotary International District 7040
31 January 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President: Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect: Art Surette
Secretary: Bob Habib
Treasurer: Peter Neville
Director, Club Service: Graham Martin
Director, Community Service: Susan Diening
Director, International Service: Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service: Fran Hepworth

This week's program…
I believe Jeff will get to do his Classification talk this week. Hope I'm right about that; I haven't had much luck predicting the flavour of the week recently.Jeff heads Alcorn Financial Group, a wealth management arm of CIBC Wood Gundy.
Coming events and programs…
Birthdays & anniversaries none that we're aware of.
February is World Understanding Month
It's also the month of Rotary's 101st birthday (Feb 23rd)and our club's 45th (Feb 27th)
Feb 4: McGill Rotaract Annual Fundraising Gala, at the Loews Hotel Vogue, 1425 Mountain Street, starting at 6 p.m. See details under announcements.
Feb 7: Jenny Wood will tell us about her classification, "Legal Transcription."
Feb 14: Phil Slominski will speak to us on the topic, "Running a Marathon."
Feb 21: PDGs Bette Miller and Bob French will tell us about the 3-H (Heath, Hunger and Humanity) project they are planning in Ghana. Their presentation is entitled "Global Sustainability…One Village at a Time."
Feb 25: Annual Hungarian Friendship Dinner, Fritz farm.

Last week's meeting…
[A BIG tip of the hat to Susan, who took such copious notes during last week's meeting so we could summarize the goings-on in this week's bulletin. Thank you, Susan!]
Sixteen members and four guests were on hand to hear our re-elected MP, Francis Scarpaleggia give us a sneak peek at what happens next in Ottawa and in his riding.Present were Brahm, Knud, Bob, Susan, Joe Z., Amiel, Jules, Ted, Peter, Wayne, Jennifer, Jacinthe, Stan, Art, Maurice and Cameron.We were also pleased to welcome Linda Tait, guest of Wayne, Anita Frost, guest of Stan, Helen Surette, guest of Art and Greer Nicholson, Secretary-Treasurer of the McGill Rotaract Club.
Among the announcements…
Cameron reminded us of the Hungarian Dinner Feb. 25 at Fritz Farm. Tickets are available from Stan and Anne Myles.
Susan announced that John Abbott College is participating in the Student Involvement Recognition program where-by students are urged to volunteer 60 hours per semester and an SIR will be added to their transcript. More info from Susan.
Greer promoted her Rotaract Gala at the Loews Hotel Vogue, 1425 rue de la Montagne, on Feb 4: $90 per person, cocktails at 6, dinner at 7. Entertainment includes a Jazz Ensemble, an a cappella group (Effusion) and Mark Kielburger from "Free the Children" as guest speaker. Proceeds will go to the Adopt-a-Village program of Free the Children in Ghana, as part of the funding for the 3-H project being put together by Bette Miller and Bob French (See the program for Feb. 21st).
When Sergeant-at-Arms Stan invited members to pony up their Happy Dollars, he was "Liberally" inundated with them, including a $300 donation from Maurice to the Foundation to cele-brate his reunion with a son he hadn't had much quality time with in a while. Jules also had happy dollars to give, along with kudos for his grandson, whose recent performance at Carnegie Hall was written up in the New York City papers.
After he was introduced by his Dad, Francis thanked us for our voting and campaign support. He noted that one of the most telling quotes of the campaign was from Marc Garneau, who said it was more demanding to run for parliament that to train for space!What happens after an election?As Francis is now a 'veteran,' he expects a closed door caucus meeting during the next ten days, which will include Liberal Party senators. Candidates who did not win will be able to address the caucus, for the last time.

The government will take 5-6 weeks to prepare the Throne Speech and due to their minority position, they will have to negotiate the terms of the speech with the other parties. Hence, Francis will be in his Pointe Claire office during the next weeks.
The new rookie MPs will have the clerk of the House of Commons give them an orientation session regarding the rules of the House. However, procedures take a lifetime to learn. Each party has an expert who knows the ropes.
Then the 308 MPs will elect a speaker. All names are on the list unless you specifically take your name off. The longest serving MP will chair the session. It may take 6-7 ballots. The 'winner' is ceremoniously reluctantly taken to the chair, a tradi-tion from old England.
Then comes the Throne Speech. For 1-2 weeks, MPs can speak in response to this speechFrancis is looking forward to continuing his Liberal committee on Water QualityJoe Z asked about the leadership convention. Francis feels it will be held in June.
All in-process legislation died on the table when the election was calledLinda asked 'who is running the country?' Francis said that Ministers don't tend to get involved with the day-to-day oper-ations of government during a campaign. Their staff and the bureaucrats do their thing. All files are delayed. In a crisis, MPs would be called back to deal with it.
Joe asked 'Now that you are in the opposition, what do you oppose?'Francis said it would be a game of chicken and spin.Bob asked about the different party platforms. As an MP, must you always adopt main Liberal policy? Francis replied that many votes are not 'confidence' votes. Most votes are free. You can never know all of the complexities of an issue and often the minister of that department recommends how you should vote. Francis was not pressured when he voted against same-sex marriage though, in response to a question from Jules, he acknowledged that 'there is always a cost.'
Ted asked if members were paid during the election process. Francis replied 'yes'.
Jennifer asked which were the 3 main issues. Francis said Gomery, taxes and health care. Going door-to-door, many said that they would vote Liberal 'next time.' At the door, they don't ask about issues, they just want to connect to the candidate.Peter asked about the caucus committee on Water. Francis hopes to start it back up.
Francis said that the Liberals remain a 'central' party and the Conservative idea of remitting your transportation passes for tax relief was initially a 10 year old Liberal/NDP idea.
Wayne thanked Francis, saying he was happy to see him here today and honoured that he picked our Rotary meeting to kick off his second term as our Member of Parliament. 'We are happy you were elected,' Wayne assured him, adding that at the campaign office Maurice seemed more nervous than Francis! 'Thank you for your explanation of procedures and thank you for saying that gun owners are the best citizens. Although the election results were not perfect, you have a majority at our Rotary Club. On behalf of all of your friends, congratulations and thank you!'
Don't forget the McGill Rotaract Gala this Saturday!See Bill for more info.

The Lakeshorian 24Jan06

2006-01-30T20:08:00.000-05:00

District 7040
Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Montreal-Lakeshore
24 January 2006
ROTARY CLUB OF MONTREAL-LAKESHORE
(Chartered February 27, 1961)
President Cameron Sherry
Vice President & President-elect Art Surette
Secretary Bob Habib
Treasurer Peter Neville
Director, Club Service Graham Martin
Director, Community Service Susan Diening
Director, International Service Knud Petersen
Director, Youth Service Fran Hepworth

This week's program…Ruth Bissoon of IMS Health Canada will tell us about her company and the role it plays in community health by keeping the public informed about trends in Canada's pharmaceutical industry.

Coming events and programs…
Happy Birthday, Brahm Tomorrow, January 25th!Happy Birthday, Helen Surette Saturday, January 28th!
January is Rotary Awareness Month
Jan 31: Jeff Alcorn will give his Classification Talk. Alcorn Financial Group is a wealth management arm of CIBC Wood Gundy.
Feb 4: McGill Rotaract Annual Fundraising Gala, at the Loews Hotel Vogue, 1425 rue de la Montagne, starting at 6 p.m. See Rotaract letter (next page) for details.
Feb 7: Jenny Wood 's classification is "Legal Transcription." She takes the paper tape from the court stenographer, backed up by the audiotape, and creates the official transcript of a wide range of judicial proceedings, from a deposition to a full trial. Jenny will give us her Classi-fication Talk on this date.
Feb 14: Phil Slominski will tell us about "Running a Mara-thon."
Feb 25: Friendship Dinner, Fritz Farm Dining Room.
Mar 18: Curling for Fun and Fellowship. Hudson Legion Curling Club.
Mar 25: Our Annual Sugaring-Off Party for Youth Exchange and Interact students. All club members welcome.

Last week's meeting…[A big "THANK YOU, BOB!" for taking notes last Tuesday.]Eighteen members and two guests were on hand to hear Ambassadorial Scholar Nino Marshania deliver an entertaining presentation about her native country, the Republic of Georgia, which she obviously loves very much…and loves to talk about!We were pleased to welcome Richard Lynn Studham, guest of Knud, and visiting Rotaractor Greer Nicholson. We missed the fellowship of Jeff, Jules, Andy, PDG Coos, Susan, Randy, PDG Bill, Michel, Ghandi, Rod, George and Amiel.We learned that Richard Lynn Studham teaches Art Education at McGill and is will be the first non-Danish President of the Danish Club of Montreal. He speaks Danish, however, having studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Art in Copenhagen.Greer Nicholson is the Secretary and Treasurer of the McGill Rotaract Club.
Among the announcements…...Club Service Director Graham announced that the hotel will begin offering a new, lighter lunch and earlier food service, on a trial basis. [Acting Editor's comment: Unless the cost will be lighter, too, I don't see why. Please note that editorial views expressed herein are those of the individual expressing them and are not necessarily endorsed by The Lakeshorian. Ed.]...President Cameron announced that our annual Curling for Fun and Fellowship evening will be at the Hudson Legion on Saturday, March 18th, beginning at 7 p.m....Cameron also reminded us that the Hungarian Friendship Din-ner will take place at Fritz Farm on Saturday, February 25th....Rotaractor Greer gave us a follow-up and sales pitch for the McGill Rotaract club's second annual Fundraising Gala. This year the proceeds will go to Free the Children's Adopt a Village program, which "delivers holistic community develop-ment to children and their families in Kenya, Sierra Leone, China, and Sri Lanka." The gala will feature the well-known a cappella singing group Effusion, plus jazz and a silent auction. Last year's first annual gala was a blast! Tickets are again $90 per person. Support the McGill Rotaractors again this year.
Peter introduced our guest speaker, telling us he first met Nino Marshania when Stefan Dannenberger brought her to the Nevilles as his guest. He told us that Nino, a journalism graduate from Vilnius University in Lithuania, is studying communications at the Université de Montréal. "And she speaks five languages," Peter added.Nino told us she is grateful to her sponsoring Rotary club, T'bilisi, and The Rotary Foundation for allowing her to study in Montreal for her Master's in Communications on a special two-year ambassadorial scholarship for low-income countries. She told us the topic of her thesis is "The Role of the Media in Political and Social Change."She also proved that she belongs in the communications field by presenting a PowerPoint slide show about her native Georgia that had her audience mesmerized by her charming speaking style and drooling over her descriptive travelogue.To give a specific example to any reader who, like our editor, was unable to witness this show in person, here's what she said about the beauty of this picturesque country: When God was distributing land among the peoples of His newly created earth, the Georgians (who have always loved wine, dancing and partying) were indulging in a big party. When they realized that they had missed out, they went to God and told Him they had been partying and celebrating how great He was, so God gave them the land He had been keeping for Himself."Nino told us her country is now called Sakartvelo in the local language of Georgia.Nestled between the Greater and Lesser Caucasus mountain ranges, it comprises an area of 70,000 square kilometres, with a population is 4.7 million, about one-quarter of whom live in the capital, T'bilisi.It is famous for the "Rose Revolution," a bloodless coup in 2003 that deposed then-President Eduard Shevardnadze, leading to the election, in January 2004, of Miikhail Saakashvili, the current President.It is also famous for wine (which, she assured us, was in-vented in Georgia), its unique culture (including its haunting polyphonic music and historic folk-dancing) and its friendly, fun-loving people. This also happens to be a place where people as a rule live to be very, very old. Nino said this could, perhaps, be attributed to a liberal inclusion of walnuts in their diet. Almost all Georgian dishes contain walnut in some form and content, she told us. She described some of the more popular native dishes that, she said, are the "best combinations of healthy and delicious foods."Important words that Nino thought we should learn in order to appreciate Georgians are Gamarjoba (which means Hello), Madlobt (which means Thank you) and Gagimarjos (which means "Cheers!" This is, after all, a country where people offer a toast at the drop of a hat. But only with wine, to be sure — you toast someone with beer only as an insult!)Finally Nino suggested some famous, beautiful and interesting places we will want to visit when we travel to Sakartvelo. She punctuated her suggestions with some beautiful and interesting photos, from the sprawling capital, T'bilisi, a couple of smaller but no less fascinating cities, the mountains of Svaneti, and the cave city of Vardzia, to whet our appetites.After answering several questions (always a sign of a capti-vated audience), Nino was thanked by Jennifer, who said our bulletin editor appreciates really good presentations. "He will be sorry he didn't get to be here for yours," she added.