THE LAMORINDAN, February 6

LADY POWER

As explained to us by that Thoughtful ladies' man Rod Ford-Smith, being powerful is like being a lady: If you have to be told you are, you aren't.

MUCH BETTER TO BE LUCKY THAN GOOD

Since football pools are blind, Agatha-Sue Lee stood as good a chance agatha-sue 2-6

as anyone to win the TGITLFOTM special at Alex Arnold's the other night. She has John Fazel to thank for twisting her arm to invest in the last two squares available. She expressed her appreciation that the club graciously allows spouses to get involved in these events. Kudos to Alex and Mary Jane Arnold for hosting a wonderful event, and to Venera and Robert Maysuryants for displaying examples of their elegant furniture construction and upholstering work.

ernie & bob 2-6

Speaking of being lucky, Bob Riegg returned from a South American trip just in time to replenish his shrunken portfolio before leaving for Spain and Portugal, by winning the Raffle.

FLAGS AND WINE

The versatile Mike Edwards showed he is much more than a mere winemaker. He has taken charge of one of the most challenging undertakings in this club: Banners and flags. The banners were not here because he is currently "working on" them, whatever that might mean. But the flags are mostly here, and are ironed and put in chronological order of joining Rotary. Thanks to Michael, we now know that in the early Rotary days, all the clubs were in 5 mostly North mike edwards 2-6

American countries. Now, only 1/3 of the clubs are in North America. The latest country to get on the bandwagon is Kiribati, an island in the Pacific. 11 years ago a club was formed in Antarctica.

Oh, yes, wine is never entirely out of Mike's life. Next week he'll bring a case of his own (which, all kidding aside, is superb) and a labeling kit, and an auction will be conducted.

ROTARACT INVADES THE COMMUNITY

RotarAct clubs around here are mostly connected to schools (UC Davis, Chico, etc.), but Heather Vilhauer is here to change that. She is the point person forming a new RotorAct club covering San Ramon interact 2-6

Valley and Diablo Valley, which is community based with no school connection. RotarAct is for members filling in the gap between InterAct and Rotary, that is, for ages from 18 to 30-ish. It is less costly and time consuming than Rotary, thus appealing to those in school or early career. An informational meeting will be held February 23, 7-8 pm, at the Diablo Magazine Offices, 2520 Camino Drive, Walnut Creek. The first general meeting will be on March 9, 7-8 pm, at the Pyramid Alehouse in Walnut Creek (that should be a draw). Heather is trolling for members (sound familiar?), and anyone she finds who joins will be a lucky one. If you have any leads, please contact Heather at SANRAMONVALLEYROTARACT@GMAIL.COM.

OTHER GOINGS-ON

The club was saddened to learn that Debbie Cooper, due to scheduling conflicts at work, had to transfer her membership to the Lafayette Noon Club. We will miss you, Debbie, and it's the Noon Club's lucky day.

Busy day on February 10th. At 7:00 a.m., a Board meeting at John Fazel's office, and mid-day a pizzafest at Acalanes High School.

Buddy Burke, our Las Tramps Go-To Guy, asked for help there. They have three needs: Assistance with their auction, construction of a french drain, and making creative renovations to a bathroom. Rich Shearer chimed in (not a rare occurrence) by exhorting us to help with the Las Trampas auction since this is not a year for our own Auction.

Chris Lane got his Blue Badge. Having run the whole Art & Wine brad & chris 2-6

Festival this year (not just our part of it, the whole thing), do you suppose he's qualified?

And last and least, Chuck Yeager found himself in Woodburn, Oregon, with a guy he was trying to sell stuff to, and wasn't wearing his Rotary pin. The other guy was equally guilty. It took a couple of hours of Chuck's salesmanship before they discovered they had something in common. Wear your pin!

YOUTH WILL INDEED BE SERVED, SPEAKING OF SOCCER

There were probably more ooohs and ahhhs in the crowd then we've heard for some time. That's because we saw what has been achieved by a bunch of kids.

Jarrett Weiss and Isaac Liang from Monte Vista H.S. have formed 501 jarrett & Isaac 2-6

(c)(3) nonprofit called FundaField. The striking thing is how they implemented it.

This all-kid organization owes its existence to Jarrett's viewing of a World Cup soccer match between Iran and Angola which took place in Leipzig in 2006. This was the first year Angola had ever fielded a team, and Jarrett found out why. The country had been in civil war for 20 years and had been poor before that. Its disadvantages on the world soccer scene, what with poverty, disease, and the usual hardships multiplied many times, were shocking. Of course, soccer fields and equipment were primitive or nonexistent. But the passion of the Angola fans was amazing. Jarrett decided that furnishing fields and equipment would be a good thing, especially in that having such things available at school would be an incentive to go for an education. jarett weidd 2-6

True to its name, FundaField raises funds. About $72,500 so far, as a matter of fact. They sell squares (sound familiar?) for $1, allocating 10,000 for each letter of FUNDAFIELD. Their sales have reached the letter "E". $100,000 is the initial goal.

Management is by 27 team members including 4 managing directors. These are divided into 4 teams which are, to say the least, proactive. There have been trips to Uganda and South Africa, seeing the conditions after the horrors of war. The trip expenses are self-funded, not paid by the contributions isaac 2-6

received by FundaField.

FundaField initiated soccer tournaments in 2008 at Mduli, South Africa, and are doing so again this summer at the fields in Kampala and Gulu, Uganda. Sponsors include Nike and other big outfits. T-shirts with an imaginative logo were almost as big a hit as the soccer itself. Creative sponsorships are available, such as $5,000 to name a field, or $500 to own a piece of the wall.

Jarrett acknowledged that this enterprise was not without adult help. After all, he couldn't yet drive when it started. And he had a "middleman" in South Africa who was invaluable.

Skip McCowan is going to have a little chat with his son, who is the UC Davis goalkeeper. He'd like to get a team donation for $100 squares and send a team picture. He'd also like to spread the word on this all around the league.

Some of our other smarty-pants folks asked about things like succession planning and post-management after construction, but these guys had an answer for everything.

The comments among the club afterward were to the effect that it's a good thing adults didn't get too much in the way.

VISITING ROTARIANS

John Moulthrop, Clayton Valley
Leander Hauri, Livermore red-badger
Heather Vilhauer, San Ramon Valley RotarAct

GUESTS

Jim Huston
Dave Isenberg
David Waal
Agatha-Sue Lee, glad to be here

UPCOMING EVENTS

2/10/09: Board meeting, Fazel office, 7:00 a.m.
2/10/09: Acalanes H.S. pizza lunch
2/13/09: Jerry Holcombe, foreman of 2007-2008 Grand Jury
2/20/09: 4-way speech contest, high school students
2/27/09: Expose Yourself - Kevin Croak, Chris Lane