This Week: Dave Standing, former Brew Consultant to SAB will talk about Beer.

 I recently attended a talk that Dave Standing gave on beer and I must admit that I thought it was going to be about brewing your own beer which I wasn't interested in at all.  It wasn't;  it ranged from the history of beer to how beer is made today and various types of beer and there was an international perspective.  Dave answered the many questions and I immediately snapped him up to talk to us.

Brewing, other than tea, is the production of beer by steeping a starch source (commonly cereal grains, the most popular of which is barley) in water and fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with yeast.

I am sure it will be a very interesting meeting.

STOP PRESS - Unfortunately,owing to circumstances beyond his control Alton Werrett is unable to take up the position of President next Rotary Year but Andrew Paschalides has stepped into the breach.  Andrew had to cut short his presidency last Rotary Year owing to his wife's illness and so we are delighted that he can now effectively continue where he left off.

Last Week

It was a Business Meeting.  There has been quite a lot of progress relating to existing projects and now the roof and guttering renovation at Bethany is about to start, weather permitting thanks to Bill Brunjes' perseverance.

If anyone has a bakkie or some other vehicle that is able to collect the 10 wheelchairs we have ordered from Northcliff Rotary Club, please contact Ron McCormack.

We are going ahead with the proposed project at Rest-a-While in Germiston though we are very concerned with the inability of the Department for Social Development to pay the grants that NGO's and institutions like Rest-a-While are dependent on for survival.  We have already heard of one orphanage and a hospice that has had to close as a result and we are concerned about what happens to the people that were previously cared for. 

This is a major problem and there have been meetings of affected organisations to discuss the problem.  All we can do is to hope that Government does find the money from somewhere.

Next Week - Project Meeting

Much of the meeting will be concerning our increased involvement with Retina SA and possible ways that we can support them as individuals as well as Club involvement.

International - Suriname

Passing rates on secondary school entrance exams that have dipped as low as 50 percent have vexed officials in Suriname. The Rotary Club of Paramaribo Residence, whose members include several teachers or retired educators, is aiming to improve those results and reduce dropout rates. In October, the club instituted a mathematics training project for around two dozen teachers at schools serving older children. The programme includes courses on topics such as set theory, equations, functions, plane geometry, and trigonometry. “You have to use mathematics at every level of your life, and statistics show that in Suriname kids have low grades” in the subject, says club member Yvonne Mohabir. A retired school dean and Rotarian, Ewald Levens, leads the sessions, which are funded with the support of the Dutch Association of Mathematics Teachers.