The date for our next “Recycling Day,” a major fundraiser in support of our club’s youth scholarship programs, has been set — Saturday, May 5.

To help make it a success, we have to get the word out!

We’ll be buying some print ads, we’ve posted the flyer below and its on our Facebook page, and we’re asking each and every SRC member to make an effort to distribute the flyer via office and commercial establishment bulletin boards, by sharing copies with friends and neighbors, in local stores, etc.

Let everyone you know that this is a great opportunity to clear out basements, home offices, and garages of unwanted items.

Many people tend to think of ShelterBox as an organization specializing in getting emergency aid to victims of earthquakes, floods, and the like. In reality, is shows up wherever people are in any kind of need because of things beyond their control.

To document that, four British photographers traveled with volunteers from Shelterbox to meet families the organization is helping live through drought in Somaliland and hurricane devastation in the British Virgin Islands, as well as to persecuted Rohingya Muslim families living in refugee camps in Bangladesh after fleeing their native Myanmar.

BBC.com created a gallery of photos excerpted from their work. Click here to view it.

Rather than our usual meeting at Quigley’s next Thursday, March 22, we will be attending a very special Rotaract “International Night” fundraiser dinner scheduled to begin at 5 p.m. at the UAlbany School of Public Health.

In addition to the dinner, entertainment, and a silent auction, a speaker from the Save the Children organization will attend to discuss post-hurricane relief efforts in Puerto Rico. You can click here for some information in advance of that presentation.

There is no charge for the dinner, although contributions would be appreciated. Items for a silent auction still are being solicited. Contact Debbie Rodriguez or Becky Raymond, our liaisons with Rotaract, ASAP if you would like to donate auction items.

Meanwhile, Debbie Brown will be taking names of club members and guests who plan to attend the event, so please be sure you contact her no later than Monday, March 19.

The School of Public Health is located just off Columbia Turnpike in East Greenbush on the Health Sciences Campus (formerly known as the East Campus). Click here if you need more directions.

Meeting at Quigley’s Restaurant
593 Columbia Turnpike
East Greenbush, NY
March 15, 2018

Members Attending (14): Jim Leyhane, Murray Forth, Pat Bailey, Terry Brewer, Peter Brown, Debbie Brown, Debbie Rodriguez, Bill Dowd, April Dowd, Phil Kellerman, Dick Drumm, Charlie Foote, Carole Spencer, Phil Nasca.

Guests (5): Lou and Pat Rubenstein, Betty Brewer, Joan Bishop, John Wadeleski.

Announcements/Business

OPENING — Jim Leyhane, presiding in the absence of President Roberto Martinez,
welcomed members and guests. He also noted that the morning’s monthly breakfast meeting was well attended for a presentation by Guiliana Cianfarrani on support dogs — “A Puppy With a Purpose at Your School.” And, he noted that Marty Mahar, principal at Belltop Elementary School and a former SRC member, attended and expressed interest in rejoining.

OLEY FOUNDATION DONATION — A $400 check created by proceeds from the “Loose Change” donation jar was presented (photo above)  to Joan Bishop of the Oley Foundation tonight, with club member Phil Kellerman, an Oley employee, doing the honors. The next recipient of proceeds from the jar for the next six months or so will be the Rotaract club.

INTERNATIONAL NIGHT — Rather than our usual meeting at Quigley’s next Thursday, March 22, we will be attending a Rotaract “International Night” fundraiser dinner scheduled to begin at 5 p.m. at the School of Public Health. Items for a silent auction still are being solicited. A speaker from Save the Children will be attend to discuss post-hurricane relief efforts in Puerto Rico. Contact Debbie Rodriguez or Becky Raymond, our liaisons with Rotaract, if you would like to donate auction items. … The April 19 breakfast meeting will be a joint one with the Rotaract club at the UAlbany School of Public Health. It will begin at 8:30 a.m. rather then our usual 7 a.m. … SRC volunteers will be preparing dinner at Ronald McDonald House in Albany on Sunday, May 6. Bill Dowd will create the menu and head the kitchen crew. Another set of volunteers will be preparing breakfast there at a date to be determined. … The Blue Star Mothers will hold their annual Blue Jeans Ball on April 25. Details are on our website. Anyone who wishes to attend should contact Debbie Rodriguez who will try to arrange an SRC table.

EASTER BASKET PROJECT — Completed Easter baskets will be delivered by March 26 to Circles of Mercy for distribution to underprivileged kids. Anyone who has not yet donated items can check out the shopping list on the website. Items may be dropped off at the Greenbush YMCA where Shannon Romanowski is heading part of the effort.

BYLAWS CHANGES — All members have been emailed copies of proposed modifications to our Club Bylaws. We will discuss them and vote on their passage during our March 29 working session. The full text of current Bylaws is available on our website.

ROTARY HOME COOKING — Next up in the series of member-hosted events is a 6 p.m. Saturday, March 24, “Cocktail Social” at the Brewer residence. It will feature hors d’oeuvres, plus wine, beer and root beer tastings and a trivia quiz (a nice practice session before our “4th annual Great North American Whizbang Trivia Test” set for our May 17 meeting!). Rotarians, friends, and families are welcome, and attendees are asked for a $10 admission plus a nominal extra for the grownup tastings. Please contact Terry ASAP if you’d like to attend but have not yet signed up. … We also have a “Surf & Turf Night” scheduled for the Forth residence on Saturday, April 7, and an “International Wine & Cheese Tasting” event hosted by Jim Leyhane, Bill Dowd, and Roberto Martinez at Roberto’s residence on Saturday, May 19.

CONVENTIONS — Registration deadline looms for the Rotary International Convention to be held in Toronto on June 23-27. And, the District 7190 Convention will be held June 1-3 at the Rivers Casino & Resort in Schenectady. Click on the links for registration details.

RECYCLING — Murray Forth suggested, and attendees concurred, that our next “Recycling & Shredding Day” be held in May to avoid conflict with a county event in April, and to have a better chance for good weather. He will check with Josh Wainman about the availability of the Wainschaf Associates warehouse site before formalizing a date.

PROGRAM — “A Retrospective: Capital District Landscapes, Houses and Gardens through the eyes of 1936 residents.”

Club member Debbie Brown presented selected slides curated from a collection of more than 100 that were used in a 1936 program by the Fort Orange Garden Club.

The original program was created to honor the 250th anniversary of the Dongan Charter, the document signed in 1686 by Governor Thomas Dongan that officially created the City of Albany from what had been known as Fort Orange. (Albany and New York City were the only formal cities in New York State until Hudson was chartered in 1785 and Schenectady in 1798.)

The slides were a mix of paintings, engravings, photos, and glass prints depicting onetime or then-current locations around the Capital Region, primarily in Albany, Troy, and Schenectady.

They range from mountain vistas to private gardens and historic homes, including the  Catskills, the Helderbergs, Rensselaerville Falls, the Normanskill, Whitehall Mansion, Schuyler House at the Flats (now a 12-acre park), Fort Crailo, Glen Sanders Mansion, Abraham Yates House, Coeymans Bronk House, Schuyler Mansion, Van Rensselaer Manor House Garden, Vile House, Cherry Hill Mansion, Ten Broeck Mansion, and numerous others. Also included was the Greenbush Cantonement that housed soldiers during the War of 1812 and presently is home to our own Carol Orvis.

Debbie’s full slide show is available on the Program Presentation Archive page of our website.

NEXT MEETING REMINDER: 5 p.m. Thursday, May 22, with the Rotaract club at the UAlbany School of Public Health.

The Southern Rensselaer County Rotary Club is proud to be the sponsor of what may be the world’s newest Rotaract club, especially now during the 50th anniversary year of the Rotary organization intended for young adults ages 18 to 35.

Some of you already have met many of the new Rotaractors who are graduate students studying at the UAlbany School of Public Health. (Their Facebook page is Danes Rotaract.) Quite a few of them have already have joined us at meetings, fundraisers, and service days.

To help spread the word about Rotaract around the globe, Rotary International has put together some very personal looks at Rotaract through the decades. That story follows.

The year is 1968.

A wall divides East and West Berlin as the Cold War rages on. The U.S. and the Soviet Union are locked in a space race, and Apollo 8 becomes the first manned spacecraft to orbit the moon, sending back pictures of Earth from deep space.

And Rotary members in North Carolina charter the first Rotaract club, to provide young people opportunities for service.

A half-century has passed since the first Rotaract clubs began inspiring young leaders to take action to improve their communities. The world has changed, as has the way Rotaractors connect with one another. But the underlying values of the program, and what attracts people to it, remain remarkably the same.

To celebrate Rotaract’s 50th anniversary, we asked former Rotaractors from six decades to share their experiences of the program and explain how it shaped their lives.

Click here for their stories.

Feel free to share this flyer with anyone you think may be interested. And, our thanks to the Blue Star Mothers military family support organization for sending a contingent to our recent “Bowling for Vets” event.

The next “Rotary Home Cooking” series event is much more than a dinner. It’s  a “Brewer Social.”

What, you may ask, is that? It will be an evening of hors’ d’oeuvres, plus a beer tasting component, plus a wine tasting component, plus a root beer tasting component (can these Brewers ever stop?), plus a lot of social interaction among Rotarians and their guests.

It’s set for 6:30 p.m. Saturday, March 24, at the residence of SRC members Terry and Geoff Brewer. The cost per person is mere $10, with an additional $5 for the tastings, with all proceeds going to the Rotaract program that has been recently enhanced by our club’s  sponsorship of a new Rotaract club (ages 18-35) at the UAlbany School of Public Health.

In addition, there will be a trivia contest with prizes for the winners. (A great warmup for the upcoming major May 17 SRC event, the “4th annual Great North American Whizbang Trivia Contest.”)

Terry tells us he needs to know who plans to participate by no later than Wednesday, March 21. Anyone who hasn’t already signed up can e-mail him at tlbrewer12piseco@gmail.com or call him at 518-465-0934 ASAP.

As always, Rotarian, spouses, significant others, and family members are invited to attend.

It’s that time of month, a day when we have both a breakfast meeting and a dinner meeting on the same Thursday.

• Guiliana Cianfarani will speak at the 7 a.m. breakfast meeting at the Greenbush YMCA. Her topic: “A Puppy With a Purpose at Your School.”

• Debbie Brown will speak at the 6:15 p.m. dinner at Quigley’s. Her topic: “A Retrospective: Capital District Landscapes, Houses & Gardens Through the Eyes of 1936 Residents.”

A continental breakfast will be available at the Y, while we will mark St. Patrick’s Day a bit early with a traditional corned beef and cabbage meal.

Members and guests are invited to attend either or both sessions. We just need to know no later than Tuesday evening who plans to participate. Breakfast RSVPs shouild go to Terry Brewer or Shannon Romanowski, and dinner RSVPS to Debbie Brown.

P.S. Don’t forget to bring your donations for our Easter basket drive for Circles of Mercy to distribute to underprivileged kids.

Here’s who has signed up so far for dinner. Debbie will be glad to add you to the list:

Pat Bailey
Terry Brewer
Debbie Brown
Peter Brown
April Dowd
Bill Dowd
Dick Drumm
Murray Forth
Ray Hannan
Phil Kellerman
Jim Leyhane
Becky Raymond

• From Rotary International News Service

On the nightly news and around her city, Dr. Pia Skarabis-Querfeld saw the refugees arriving in Berlin, Germany, after fleeing war, persecution, and poverty in their home countries.

Wanting to help, she gathered a bag of clothes to donate and headed to a nearby gym filled with refugees. What began as a single act of charity eventually evolved into an all-encompassing volunteer project: Over the next three years, Skarabis-Querfeld would build and run a network that, at peak times, would include more than 100 volunteers helping thousands of refugees at community centers, tent camps, and other shelters across the city. Today, her nonprofit, called Medizin Hilft (Medicine Helps), continues to treat patients with nowhere else to turn.

That day she went to the gym was a few days before Christmas 2014. Skarabis-Querfeld had been busy with work and preparing for the holidays. She was looking forward to a much-needed break, and she thought clothes for the refugees would be a kind gesture befitting the spirit of the season.

When she arrived at the gymnasium to drop off her donation, she found sick children, most of them untreated because hospitals in the area were overrun. Helpers were not allowed to give out pain relievers or cough syrup due to legal constraints. All they could do was send people to the emergency room if they looked extremely ill.

Seeing this, and knowing about the treacherous journeys the refugees had just made across land and sea, Skarabis-Querfeld, who is a medical doctor and Rotarian, returned that same afternoon with medical supplies and her husband, Uwe Querfeld, who is a professor of pediatrics and also a Rotarian. The couple spent most of that holiday treating patients in the gymnasium.

“The suffering of the people, their bitter fate, it wouldn’t let go of me,” says Skarabis-Querfeld.

In 2015, the German ministry in charge of refugees received more than 1 million applications for asylum, straining the public health system.

Germany was a popular destination during the mass migration of people from Syria and other countries with conflict, in part because Chancellor Angela Merkel embraced them. Unlike some other European leaders, Merkel said it was Germany’s responsibility to help, and she called on citizens to welcome those escaping hardship elsewhere.

By 2017, the political winds had changed. Many Germans had become indifferent to or skeptical about the immigrants. The balance of power in Germany’s parliament shifted during the September election, and the country continues to grapple with the logistics and cost of helping refugees and their families.

While the politics played out at the famed Riechstag building in the heart of Berlin, Skarabis-Querfeld and other volunteers were treating patients only a few kilometers away.

“I had a young girl whose whole family was almost beaten to death because they were Christians,” says Skarabis-Querfeld, a member of the Rotary Club of Berlin-Tiergarten.  “The girl began to have epilepsy after being beaten into a coma. I’m not used to seeing these kinds of scars and burns.”

In another case, Skarabis-Querfeld treated a Syrian girl named Saida who had fever and bronchitis. When the examination was almost over, Skarabis-Querfeld noticed Saida was limping. She coaxed Saida to take off her shoes and saw both feet were infected.

“I had seen a lot of children with small shoes on. Some had probably started walking in those shoes and worn them for one year,” Skarabis-Querfeld says. “The soles of both feet were infected. These are things that you just don’t forget.”

Click here for the rest of the story.

Meeting at Quigley’s Restaurant
593 Columbia Turnpike
East Greenbush, NY
March 8, 2018

Members Attending (16): Roberto Martinez, Murray Forth, Pat Bailey, Terry Brewer, Peter Brown, Debbie Brown, Jim Leyhane, Phil Kellerman, Dean Calamaras, Ray Hannan, Dick Drumm, Stewart Wagner, Julius Frankel, Kevin Leyhane, Monika Annis, Ron Annis.

Guests (5): Gary, Debbie & Sally Holden; Dan Annis; Mike Prusser.

BUSINESS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

OPENING — President Roberto welcomed members and guests, and showed a video of former SRC member John Sawchuk being interviewed on Fox News about the gun incident at Columbia High School in light of the current spate of school violence.

BOWLING FOR VETS — The final tally for the March 4 event held at the East Greenbush Bowling Center showed $2,493 raised for the Bell Top School military service dog project and other veterans services. We had about 70 bowlers of all ages, and 25 individual and company lane sponsors at $100 each.

MEETING VENUE CHANGES — Rather than meeting at Quigley’s and the Greenbush YMCA, two of our upcoming sessions will be held at the UAlbany School of Public Health, located on the Health Sciences Campus off Columbia Turnpike, Rensselaer. They are the dinner meeting on March 22and the breakfast meeting of April 19. The latter will begin at  8 a.m. rather than our usual 7 a.m. The dinner meeting, set for 5 to 7 p.m.,  will be free as part of a Rotaract fundraising event, which will include a silent auction in which we are invited to participate.

ROTARACT UPDATE — Roberto suggested the club provide a $2,000 “scholarship” for one or more Rotaract members to attend the Rotary International Convention in Toronto in June, or for another Rotaract project. There was discussion about whether need a dedicated fundraiser to support this idea. The entire matter was referred to the Community Services Committee headed by Debbie Rodriguez and Becky Raymond who also are our club liaisons with Rotaract.

RONALD McDONALD HOUSE — We are in the process of scheduling a dinner preparation there, and are scheduled to make a breakfast. Volunteers so far for the breakfast effort are Peter and Debbie Brown, Julius and Effie Frankel, and Phil Kellerman. No firm date yet for the dinner effort, although we have requested May 6..

EASTER BASKETS PROJECT — Members are asked to continue bringing donations for the annual Circles of Mercy Easter basket drive to our next breakfast meeting and/or next dinner meeting. The shopping list is available by clicking here.

BYLAWS CHANGES — Bill Dowd is drafting language changes pertaining to the recent committee restructuring, and Terry Brewer and Murray Forth will work on new language pertaining to dues as a result of a change in the dues structure by RI. The proposed language will be presented to the membership for a vote at our March 29 meeting.

OPIOD CRISIS TRAINING — On Saturday, April 7, all Rotarians in District 7190 are invited to attend the annual District Training Assembly. This year the training theme will focus on an issue affecting us all: the opioid crisis. Click here for details on the event.

DISTRICT CONFERENCE —This year’s 7190 District Conference will be held in a very different sort of venue — the new Rivers Casino & Resort in downtown Schenectady. The event will run over parts of three days on June 1 through 3, beginning with a traditional Friday “District Day of Service” that will involve projects for all abilities being offered in and around Schenectady. Click here for details and a link to registration information.

UPDATES — We hope to get the RYLA students we supported to visit a dinner meeting. … Bill Dowd has asked all committee leads to provide names of all committee members so he can update the “Committees” page on the website. Only one committee has responded so far. … Anyone interested in participating in the upcoming “Rotary’s Got Talent” event is asked to contact Roberto ASAP. The Thursday, May 3, talent showcase is sponsored by the District 7190 Next Gen Committee at the Lucky Strike entertainment center at Crossgates Mall in Guilderland. Each three-minute act will be eligible for prizes — $500 and a traveling club trophy for first place, $250 for second place, and $100 for third. Admission will be $25 per adult, $15 for kids 7-14, and free to kids 6 and under. Further details will be posted on Next Gen’s Facebook page closer to the event.

ROTARY HOME COOKING — The next event in the annual series of member-hosted gatherings, “A Cocktail Social, Plus,” is set for Saturday, March 24, at the Brewer residence. The cost of the event will be just $10 per person. Please see Terry ASAP to sign up. All are welcome to the event that will include hors d’oeuvres, wine and beer tasting, and other fun items. … Two more events will complete the series — an April “Surf & Turf Night” hosted by Murray and Maggie Forth, and a May “International Wine Tasting” hosted by Jim Leyhane and Roberto Martinez.

NEXT MEETINGS — Next Thursday, Giuliana Cianfarani will speak on “A Puppy With a Purpose at Your School” at the 7 a.m. breakfast meeting at the Greenbush YMCA, and Debbie Brown will present “A Retrospective: Capital District Landscapes, Houses & Gardens Through the Eyes of 1936 Residents” at the 6:15 p.m. dinner meeting at Quigley’s.

PROGRAM: “Yuri: A Life Lived”

Club member Julius Frankel, who was called “Yuri” by Russians who took over his home area in his youth, spoke about his life.

Julius displayed a map of Eastern Europe, where he was born in 1935 at the edge of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Russian forces moved in and took control of a slice of Romania, so, heeding the advice of a Russian officer, Julius’s father decided to leave their home in 1939 in a horse-drawn carriage.

The Frankel family was allowed to cross the border, but the Russians took them to an internment camp. They stayed in Romania and his father did business in the textile industry as an intermediary in the capital city of Bucharest with the Swiss Red Cross. By 1947 they knew Russians were increasing their stranglehold on the area and it was time for them to move again.

They were smuggled into Vienna, Austria, where his father continued in the textile business. The family at first planned to stay in Austria, but by the end of 1947 decided to emigrate to the United States. Here, Julius went to high school and graduated in three years. However, his father could not find work here, so he returned to Europe.

Julius received a scholarship to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy to study physics. He also worked on Wall Street for a while, but did not enjoy the experience, so he returned to RPI where he eventually became head of the ultrasonic lab in the Physics Department. He stayed there for the remainder of his academic career until he retired.