Bulletin of the Ottawa International Y Service Club Area Canada & Caribbean World Service Award 2015

Area Bulletin Award 2017

Immediate Past International President Home Club 2017-18 Regional Director Home Club 2017-2018

Area Youth Representative Home Club 2017-18 Web site: http://yservice.ca/

November 2017 “Remembrance and reflection how allied!

What thin partitions Sense from Thought divide!” ― Alexander Pope, Essay on Man and Other Poems

Remembering forward: November (Team B)

18th Saturday Carlington Chaplaincy Annual Fund-raising dinner/silent auction. **From 12 noon on. Set up and staff the Silent Auction. Set up and take down for dinner. Have you let Dave H. know how you can help?**

28th Tuesday Dinner at Kristy’s, 6:00 p.m., 809 Richmond Rd. Speaker: Susan Palmai—a perspective on what the Y is doing in Israel-Palestine, empowering youth and planting olives!

29th Friday Christmas trees arrive. **Have you let Joan know if you can help with setup?**

December (Team A)

2nd Saturday Christmas Tree sales start. **Have you confirmed your slot with Joan?**

6th to 9th

Wednesday to Saturday

Christmas Bazaar in the Y lobby, 180 Argyle. **Have you let Dave H. know when you can help?**

ongoing Sleepwear collection for Interval House. Details to come from Marni. **Bring your donations to the Christmas potluck dinner.**

12th Tuesday Christmas potluck dinner, 6 p.m., at St. Paul’s Presbyterian Church, 971 Woodroffe Ave, Ottawa, ON K2A 3G9. Prepare to be surprised!

November Dinner Meeting. Susan Palmai thinks the East Jerusalem

YMCA is doing a fantastic job with a great partner, the Palestinian YWCA.

Come and find out why, and what Y Service Clubs have to do with it. We will

be back at Kristy’s, a good place for intergenerational memories.

Thinking back:

October dinner meeting

Our time with a team from Ottawa Salus Corporation was wonderful[salus = Latin for

wellbeing]! Bruce Potter was joined by Serge Gagnon for the presentation, and Serge invited his

wife, Sheila. In addition to the talk and questions, Bruce Potter and Bruce Peterkin joined Dave

H. and Cathy to lead some singing.

Salus provides housing and mental health support. They serve about 400 people at any given

time, 200 of whom are in Salus housing. About 1000 are on their waiting list. Housing stays are

2-10 years before a change to something more permanent. In some of their locations, Salus is

part of Resource Centres for Ottawa Community Housing, and serves all tenants, not just those

specifically referred to Salus.

Mode of operation:

Case management (one-on-one): includes referral to

services.

Community development: Staff members are onsite to

facilitate client problem solving and mitigate housing

issues, and they work on community capacity building,

identifying community leaders and addressing the

overall wellness of the community.

Transitional rehabilitation: Clients referred by hospitals and Mental Health Support Services of

Ottawa (coordinated by Canadian Mental Health Association) learn skills to move away from

being at risk of homelessness. Goals are independence, enhanced skills and capabilities, success

and satisfaction in future living situations, and expanded possibilities for wellbeing.

Recreation and wellness: Music, marathons … the client’s choice is supported. The Big Bucket

Band is part of Salus’ work in the Carlington Community.

The most significant client problem is social isolation.

Money available does not match the demographic served.

It was good to have Mark there with superb technical support, and to have Nat, Joan, Marni,

Cathy, Bruce Peterkin (chef extraordinaire), Marg, Dave H., Andy, and your editor in the

company. There were orchids for Bruce Potter and Serge, and for Bruce Peterkin’s work on the

food (rice and kidney beans, curried chicken with dumplings, jerk chicken, and coleslaw).

"It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize,

accept, and celebrate those differences." ~ Audre Lorde

Carlington Community Chaplaincy Choral Fest

Thanks to Dave H. for all the organizing work. About $1500 was raised. Dave H. and Marg

(Kitchissippi United Church) and Marilyn (Glebe-St. James United Church) were with the choirs

from supporting churches, and Elodie and Naomi Nindorera were there with the kitchen crew

from City View United Church.

November planning meeting and social

Thanks, Cathy and Rebecca! Great hosts for a wonderful turn-out! In attendance: Seham,

Elodie, Andy, Marni, Bruce, Godefroy, David N., Naomi, Marg, Nat, Dave, Rebecca, Cathy, Joan,

Mark, and Area President Reg Springer on Skype.

Coming up in 2018 (2017 events are on p. 1 of this bulletin):

Jan. 23 – dinner at the Y - Team C (4th Tuesday of 5 in month). The speaker will be Sarah

Posthuma, Program and Volunteer Co-ordinator at the Carlington Community Chaplaincy.

Feb. 20 – Time of Fast Dinner - Team A; will try to do something a little different this year.

Mar. 20 - Team B; planning meeting on second Monday (Mar. 5); dinner meeting speaker TBA.

Fundraising:

• Christmas tree signup schedule passed around - new folks need to sign up with someone

else who can train them.

• Christmas plant sale in lobby [note change in date] December 6-9. Signup sheet passed

around. [Note that a new schedule has been circulated by e-mail for signup.]

• Valentine’s Day flower sale—To be determined, as February 14th is on a Wednesday and

flowers usually arrive on Thursdays.

International officer elections; constitutional matters—Candidates and issues were duly discussed,

votes taken, and our ballot will be submitted.

APE: By acclamation, the new Area President-Elect for Area Canada and the Caribbean is

Murray Dunbar of the Pictou County Club, Nova Scotia, a small but gutsy club.

His slogan:

“Take a chance on change. Think different: teamwork makes the dream work”

Project work

Interval House of Ottawa—Reminder from Marni to collect PJs.

highJInx! monthly lunch, usually the last Wednesday in the month. The Hamiltons and Bruce Peterkin are

on for November; sign up roster passed around for 2018.

Sock project, presented by Nat—For a Youth day, Saturday, January 13th, both youth and adults will

gather in the morning to make sandwiches and distribute them and socks to homeless people along

Bank Street. A speaker is planned for the afternoon. Everyone is encouraged to collect wooly socks, and

to spread the word on social media. The hope is to distribute socks and sandwiches monthly through the

cold months.

Youth connections—Nat and Elodie met with Camille and Florette of the Burundi We Want youth group

which hopes to change the mindset of Burundian youth here in Canada to build a better Burundi. They

want to work jointly with groups like our Y Service youth to do volunteer work, and are interested in

helping with the Sock Project, highJinx! and Christmas trees.

Area President Reg Springer joined us by Skype. His plan is to join meetings of every

club in the Area over his two years as AP and work more on small club issues (under

15 members) along with his other duties. He encourages short articles and pictures

from our projects: YMI World Editor Koshy Mathew wants more coverage of

Canadian clubs. Joan spoke for supplying the same articles for a Community Service

Web site being developed.

All of this was packed into an hour and a bit!

Social: What followed was sharing of some great games and a marvelous selection of goodies and

munchies. Kudos to Andy for sharing his homemade game, Snail Race, and thanks to all who shared

goodies and snacks.

Joan and Andy took fantastic notes! Thanks!

Interval House of Ottawa Our gifts: We will be collecting cozy sleepwear for children who will be at The House over the

holidays, and toiletries as special treats for resident mothers, and newly-arrived families. Watch

for details about sizes, special needs, and requests, and put the call out on your social

networks! Please bring what you collect to the club Christmas social, December 12th.

From the IHO newsletter: Moving ahead with a dedicated animal housing area.

Interval House has been hearing from women who delayed leaving abuse, fearing

for a pet’s wellbeing. Construction on the new animal housing area begins this

winter, and they hope to receive furry family members in early 2018.

Project Rise—The Hotel Westin offered to work with Interval House Ottawa to provide resident

families a needed mental health break. During the summer, two families were provided with

one week of accommodation at the Westin, meals, and arrangements for local activities

including transportation—a well-deserved break for families on their journey to recovering

from violence.

Have you looked at the new IHO Web site? Visit www.intervalhouseottawa.org.

More about Time of Fast projects and what your 2016-17 donations make possible:

[One-pagers are at:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_OBMw6HYdd1WmIzbDJpRDE3OTA/view?usp=sharing.]

Note: 1 USD = 1.00915 CHF (about par); 1 CAD = .78 CHF.

TOF 17-02 YMC Valparaiso/YMCA Valparaiso, Chile – Building Community in Situations of

Critical Social Vulnerability in Marginalized Neighbourhoods of Valparaiso. The full amount

requested, CHF 26 749, has been pledged for a project period of 12-18 months. This project

will enable local people to develop skills, access basic services, and regain or develop a dignified way of

life after forest fire disruption in 2016. About 120 people will directly benefit, and 50-100 more will gain

indirect benefit from recreational workshops for children (alternative to day school), young adult

leadership training, recreational and formative camps for minors and teens, venture workshops,

environmental micro projects, and coordination with local service groups for collective action.

TOF 17-03 Azeitão YMCA. Portugal/YMC Østenstad Asker, Norway – Empowering

Young People through Education and Sustainable Development Initiatives. The full

amount requested, CHF 12 614, has been pledged to support 36 months of what will

be an ongoing project. This is about one-fifth of the total cost of the project. Beneficiaries will be 750-

1000 people, and indirect benefits will affect 5,000-10,000 others. Project scope includes environment

and nature education events, training of young leaders and staff co-ordinators, open events for families,

development of a Bio-Swimming pool as an outdoor classroom for study of ecosystem and water

preservation, staff and volunteer training in other European partner YMCAs, e.g., Serbia and Kosovo,

promotion of Y’s Men International to community leaders, and pioneering and investment in a wide

range of sustainable development projects with schools and student-led project groups.

TOF 17-04 YMCA Manila/YMI Philippine Region, YMCA Rizal Youth Leadership Training

Institute, Manila, Philippines. The request funded is for CHF 9 170 to support youth

leadership training over 1-3 months. This is seed money for an ongoing project to

develop transformational leadership for highly motivated young people, using current trends in leader

formation. During the project, they anticipate 10-50 direct beneficiaries to spread indirect benefit to

350-500 others.

TOF 17-06 YMCA Belarus/YMC Malta, Empowering Young People for their

Employment through Providing Educational Programmes and Vocational

Trainings, Belarus, Lida District, Ponomontsy village. Over three years, CHF 26 238 is pledged to enable

the YMCA Belarus Youth Centre to provide services to young adults, contributing to youth employment

and the development of a healthy, competent, active workforce in Belarus. About 575 people will

immediately benefit, and the educational work for young people will be continued.

If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito. ~ Dalai Lama

In our circle: We hear that Mark has a part-time job delivering pizza. Great news!

If we don’t see or hear from you often, please check in with someone. We miss you.

Remember those who serve us all who are doing challenging work, and must be with the club in

spirit.

Remember those who have health issues, family concerns, continue a journey through

bereavement, or are beyond busy.

Remember those who are new to Canada and finding their way.

“When I say it's you I like, I'm talking about that part of you that knows that life is far more than anything you can ever see or hear or touch. That deep part of you that allows you to stand for those things without which humankind cannot survive. Love that conquers hate, peace that rises triumphant over war, and justice that proves more powerful than greed.” ― Fred Rogers

Marilyn