Meeting:  chair, Duane; music, Jerome, grace, Butch Balch   for Celebration of Chinese New Year & Robbie Burns Day

 

Attendance/Guests:  33 including Butch Balch, piper; Daniel Malloy, executive director of ARTA; Ken Usher, guest of Bill Buckham; Tim Der, guest of Danny

 

Grand Entrance:  the haggis (spicier than in the past, thus dubbed Mexican Haggis) was piped in by Butch with Brian doing the physical transport.  Jim Johnston addressed the haggis and vented the pudding sack.

 

Cambodia:  Darryll White was welcomed back from his 3 week evaluation of our water dugout project which is under construction.  When it is completed, it will service the water needs for 30 families (unfiltered unfortunately).  Darryll also gave 70 bicycles to local children who cannot get to school without this type of transport.

 

Al Holmes:  Al fell and broke a bone in his lower spine; please visit him in Sturgeon Hospital.  Get well soon, Al.

 

New Member:  Art Lachance was introduced by Bill Buckham on behalf of Al Holmes.  Art grew up in Vimy, Alberta, attended university in Ottawa and University of Alberta; is married with 2 children and 5 grand children.  As a financial adviser, Art has helped many people achieve the funds to enable retirement and has a history of volunteering for the Italian community.

 

50/50:  Chris and Brian did not match cards; $160 carried over

 

Libations:  2 brands of Scotch were supplied as toast for Robbie Burns (one a mild flavour, the other a more peaty flavour).  Moatai was suppled to toast the Chinese New Year.  Fred gave us the benefit of his time in China to advise that Moatai is made from sorghum and is the Chinese equivalent to Scotch.  It had a sweet smell but, at 52% alcohol by volume, it gave a strong, spicy aftertaste.

 

Doug MacDougall on Robbie Burns:  Doug continued in the vein of providing data on well known Scottish Canadians by talking about Sam Steele and General A. McNaughton.  Sam's grandparents came from the Islay region of Scotland.  In 1866, Sam joined the military and in 1873 he was the third officer to join the North West Mounted Police.  In the period of his command he fought the forces of Chief Big Bear, losing the first battle and winning the second at Loon Lake.  Fort Steele, near Cranbrook, and Mount Steele, on the west coast, are named after him.  General McNaughton was born in 1887, served in World War One and became head of the Canadian Artillery Corp.  He used the premises of physics to more accurately gauge the effectiveness of the landing of the artillery shells reletive to the target area than the British.  This helped the Canadian forces to be more effective at Vimy Ridge.  He became head of the Canadian Army but then joined and ran the National Research Council between the wars.  He again served in the World War Two theatre, made sure that the British did not distribute the Canadian troops among the British corps and eventually brought the Canadian contingent to corp strength.  Before the end of the war, he returned to Canada to become Minister of National Defence under Prime Minister MacKenzie King.

 

Doug then talked about Robbie Burns as the most charismatic poet who wrote many poems of which 2 could be considered as  Scottish National Anthems.  Burns thought highly of William Wallace, rebel leader of the Scottish forces in civil war action (recorded in the movie Braveheart).  Robbie Burns might have been an alcoholic but was not as bad as his first biographer depicted.  Doug read verses from many of Burns poems.