The Flywheel
Archive issue

NEXT MEETING: May 23, 2014

TRAC : The Bay Trail through Richmond

Bruce Beyaert, Founder and Chair of the Trails for Richmond Action Committee (TRAC), will describe the many accomplishments and partnerships involved in completing 20 miles of new Bay Trail in Richmond during the past 15 years. The San Francisco Bay Trail in Richmond was recently featured during the Bay Trail 25th Anniversary celebration attended by about 200 people at the Bay Model in Sausalito.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

• Pate Thompson is a retired Physician, member of the Berkeley Rotary Club, and a key driver of the RotaCare Medical Clinic in Richmond. Pate was on hand to personally thank the club for its support of RotaCare, which takes place on Tuesday nights from 4-8pm. The staff is 100% volunteers. Only 1/3 of their patients speak English and 88% are below the poverty. Last year RotaCare cared for 967 patients. A good case indeed.

• Liliane reminded us that June 14th will be Peace-Garden Maintenance Day (well, morning, 9am-12). Also, this is Bocce Ball day in Martinez for our mystery two teams. And last but not least, Mark Howe’s joint auction-prize BBQ will take place that same afternoon at his house. Will this day ever end?

• David Brown asked for and got instantly three volunteers to read three essays from Salesian High School seniors and vote on their merit for possible scholarship awards.

• Liliane had made a request for children’s text/reading books to be collected at the club for children in India. The request was answered today by Pam Jones and Neville, Alan Baer and last week by Jon Lawlis. We and the kids thank them.

• Tom Butt praised the club for its recognition at the recent City of Richmond’s Historic Preservation Awards ceremony for partnering with the East Bay Center for the Performing Arts in putting on the play, “Lost Secrets of the Iron Triangle”. Congrats to Ex. Pres. Jim Young. Tom then reminded everyone that May 25th from 2:00-6:00pm was his BBQ & Bluegrass event at his home at Nicholl Knob, 235 East Scenic Avenue, Richmond 94801. Bring side dish or dessert.

MEETING OF May 16, 2014

Welcome

Our lady President, Liliane Koziol, welcomed the 22 present. A moment of silence for peace and justice on earth was led not by Stonie but first-reserve, Herb Cole. Sid Chauvin had this thought for the day: “Obviously, there’s little to learn from doing nothing.”

Visiting Rotarians.

• Jeff Mulivihill of Reading Rotary was back again. (Feels like he has never been away.)

• Pate Thompson of Berkeley Rotary.

• Linda Delehunt of Orinda Rotary.

• Neville Guard of San Ramon Valley Rotary.

• Our Speaker, Dorothy Herzberg, brought a guest, Beth Jerde.

Recognitions and Happy/Sad Dollars

• Jim Young received a special pin for membership growth.

• Ralph Hill was happy to make a public safety announcement: He renewed his driving license for five more years. Look out everyone. Good to see him back.

• Erle Brown had sad dollars for the passing of Jules Myer, a friend of the club.

Norm’s Nonsense

More Ponderisms…

– Whatever happened to Preparations A through G?

– As income tax time approaches, did you ever notice that when you put the two words “The” and “IRS” together, it spells “THEIRS”?

– Why do they put pictures of criminals up in the Post Office? What are we supposed to do, write to them? Why don’t they just put their pictures on postage stamps so the mailmen can look for them while they deliver the mail?

Program

Nigeria's Post-Independence Through the Eyes of a Young Peace Corps Worker

This was the second visit of Dorothy Herzberg to our club. She was here to promote her newly published book, “Me Madam: Peace Corps Letters From Nigeria, 1961-1963″ (available on Amazon.com). She decided to read extracts from her book. This is becoming a habit by some speakers at the club. She chose not to read directly from her book but from photocopied notes.

I think the notes were a little out of focus because she had trouble reading from them plus the fact she held the notes up to her face between her and the microphone so one heard more paper interference noises than spoken words. The words I did hear were very amusing anecdotes of her teaching services in a newly forming independent Nigeria. This is one I heard (I think): She was showing a class a map of Europe and pointed out its country make-up, including Spain, France and England. The class erupted and said ”No, Madam, No!  England is not so small!”  She could not convince them otherwise. When asked at a later date what the class thought of their teacher, they said “She was good but had very silly maps.” There were more.

She ended by offering her book for sale. We thank you, Madam.

Returning Scribe, Alan Blavins