Climate Change: How About Planting A Tree?
It was good to see so much media coverage the last week of September around climate change. Much of it was about Greta Thunburg, the 16-year-old from Sweden, whose outspokenness lead to millions, (many of them young), demonstrating around the…
First Responders – Thank You
Over the past few years, I have heard the term First Responders used more and more. It is a term employed, sometimes generically, to people who are the first to arrive and aid at the scene of an emergency such…
World Ozone Day: An Environmental Good News Story
Sept 16th was World Ozone Day. I heard nothing about it until today, Sept 17th. If I did not hear about it, it likely meant most people did not hear about it either. This is too bad because the UN…
Old But Timeless Values – Thank You Mr. Rogers
Pat and I recently watched a documentary on Netflix on Fred Rogers (Mr. Rogers) called, “Wont you be my neighbour? (not to be confused with the new Tom Hanks movie about Mr. Rogers). For those whose memory fails them or…
Summer Reads
Summer is traditionally a time to catch up on our reading. While summer is more than half over, I thought I would mention a few books I have read recently which you might enjoy. I love to read, and apart…
The Better Way!
Pat and I, our daughter Heather, son Stuart and his wife Jordan recently spent some time with a Rotary exchange student (Amy) from Japan. She was staying with our other daughter Jennifer and her family, (Jason, Hannah and Sam), in…
Dignitas International Winding Down
Sadly, Dignitas International, a Canadian humanitarian organization that has done extraordinary work with HIV/AIDs in Malawi is being wound up. I have worked very closely with them. Among other things, they tested 1.7 million people for Aids (10% of the…
National Indigenous Peoples Day
Friday, June 21st was National Indigenous Peoples Day – first introduced in 1996. Many groups did special things. The Rotary Club of Toronto had Chief Stacey La Forme, the Chief of the Mississaugas of the Credit speak, The Globe and…
June 17-23 – Refugee Week
One of the best family experiences our family had while our children were growing up was having two Vietnamese refugees (then referred to as “boat people”) live with us for about four months. The driver behind this initiative was my…
Bikes and Doing Good
This being National Cycling Week, I thought I would relate several volunteering experiences that involved bicycles. The first story took place in Malawi several years ago. I mentioned briefly in a previous blog that on several Rotary Sweat Equity trips…