Volunteers and good work meat
In February 2008, New Hamburg resident Dan Troyer had the chance to travel to Burundi and visit a work-for-food program that was handing out cans of turkey meat as payment for reforestation work. When Troyer helped distribute the meat, he was surprised and delighted to find the cans labeled with the number of the Elmira meat canning project.
The Mennonite Central Committee wrapped up this season’s canning in Elmira this week, with another 40,000 cans of turkey meat loaded onto trucks ready for shipping around the world. Over the past 13 years, the Elmira project has shipped a total of 580,000 cans of meat to millions of poor and hungry people.
Trevor Adams of MCC Ontario holds a can of turkey meat, one of 40,000 filled by volunteers at the Elmira Produce Auction this week.
The MCC canning project started in the United States after the Second World War. Volunteers sent glass jars of food to refugees in Europe, but the glass proved too fragile. So the relief committee switched to tin cans, sealed by a portable canner that could be moved from town to town.
Troyer, born and raised in the United States, had grown up helping with canning every year. When he married a Canadian and moved to this area, he wanted to bring the canning project here.
It took two years to plan, get approvals and fill out paperwork, but in 1997, the canner came to Ontario for the first time. Canning was done at the University of Guelph for a number of years, because it had a licenced facility, then moved to the Elmira Produce Auction Cooperative.
“This is the backyard of many volunteers who come to help out,” said Trevor Adams of MCC Ontario. “It’s very much a social and community event, and Elmira definitely has the heart for it.”
MCC Ontario started out canning beef but switched to turkey five years ago because of the BSE scare. While the meat they were shipping was safe, there were Read more
Women challenged to come out and play
Play time isn’t just for kids any more.
The Women’s Growth Network is holding its fourth annual Women’s Play Day at the St. Clements Outdoor Centre on May 9. In past years, the play day has proven popular with women ranging in age from 20 to 60.
The Women’s Growth Network was started by Brenda Turino four years ago with the goal of educating Read more
St. Boniface preparing to celebrate 110 years
St. Boniface Catholic School in Maryhill celebrates its 110th anniversary next Thursday, making it the oldest Catholic school in Waterloo Region still in existence.
The village of Maryhill – known as New Germany until 1941 – had a school as early as 1834. The current building was the fourth school built by the community, a Read more
For the thrill of the ride
David Brown has spent thousands of hours and dollars restoring a motorbike he’ll never ride, and probably never even start.
The bike in question is a CCM motor bicycle, built around 1909, and one of just four still in existence.
Brown has been collecting and restoring antique bicycles and motorcycles for years; he has a small fleet of bicycles that date from the turn of the 20th century, including a high-wheeled penny-farthing. The collection of bicycles in his garage and basement are only a few of the many cycles he’s restored and sold over the years.
After years of hunting down or painstakingly recreating missing pieces, Brown’s CCM motor bicycle is 95 per cent complete.
Brown got a lead on the CCM bike five years ago, when a friend walked into Elmira’s W.C. Brown & Sons menswear store and told him about a pair of bicycles listed for sale in Toronto.
Brown called the seller and enquired about the bicycles. One was a Massey-Harris bicycle, the man said, but he didn’t even know what the other one was. He described it, and Brown was intrigued; it sounded like a CCM motorcycle, which he’d spent years searching for.
“I said I’d be down in a week or so to look at it. And geez, that night Read more
Senior boys’ soccer team likes its chances
With a strong defence and two solid keepers, good playmaking ability midfield, and good scoring potential up front, the EDSS senior boys’ soccer team’s strongest asset is that it has no weak spots.
“In past years you sort of have one or two of those things, but there’s usually a glaring weakness in another area,” said coach Keith Halley. “For this team, I’m quite impressed with the overall ability shown by all the different positions.”
The EDSS senior boys took on Kitchener Collegiate Institute on home turf Tuesday afternoon. Left, Emmanuel Weber neatly dribbles past KCI’s keeper. Weber scored a pair of goals in the Lancers’ 6-2 defeat of KCI. Right, Luke Baleshta carries the ball up the midfield.
EDSS posted 4-0 wins in its first two starts, over Preston and Huron Heights, and defeated Kitchener Collegiate 6-2 on Tuesday.
Halley saw the beginnings of this team two years ago, when he had a solid squad with a number of Grade 9s who were starters. Those Grade 9s are now in Grade 11 and form the core of this year’s team. Along with the group of Grade 11s, there’s a good mix of Grade 12s and junior players.
“We have a great soccer culture this year too, I don’t think I’ve ever seen as much enthusiasm for the game.”
Read more
Couple talks turkey about break & enter
Chris and Charlene Phillips nearly had turkey for Easter dinner, but it showed up a week late and not on a platter.
A friend was driving by their house shortly after noon last Sunday when he saw one of their front windows was shattered. The Phillipses were away from home at the time, and their cell phones started ringing and didn‘t stop. Charlene tried to reassure the kids that it was probably just a ball someone had thrown, but she thought immediately of a burglar.
Conestogo resident Chris Phillips holds a turkey that crashed through the front window of his home last Sunday.
When they got to the house, they realized with some relief that it couldn’t have been a human that broke in.
“The window was kind of broken from the top, so a person couldn’t have gotten through without seriously hurting themselves,” Charlene said. “So then it was just a matter of figuring out what it was.”
They discovered the culprit was still inside – asleep on the floor beside a decorative wrought-iron bird. The wild turkey was quiet enough until she noticed Read more
Schooled in new challenges
As a teacher at a government school, Emily Nswana had a secure, well-paid job – an important achievement in Zambia – but she wanted more. She wanted to look after her students’ bodies, minds and morals as well as their multiplication tables.
“I worked in Zambian government schools for 20 years,” Nswana said. “In my first appointment, I thought I would do better if I had my own school, because I wanted to reach the whole child.”
Emily Nswana (centre) shared her story of establishing a school in Zambia with students at Linwood PS, including Lousia Sherk (left), Chantelle Weber and Johnny Metzger.
So in 1993, after eight years of researching and planning, Nswana opened the Luwi International School.
Nswana spent two days in classrooms at Linwood Public School. She was supposed to be presenting at a conference in Bermuda this week, but she could get only one Canadian entry visa. If she left the country she couldn’t return, so she ended up with a longer stopover in Canada.
Nswana stayed with friends Gordon and Heather Martin, who she met two years ago at a conference in Germany, and shared her story with the students at Read more
Wealth of knowledge at home show
Twenty years after simplifying finance with his book The Wealthy Barber, David Chilton has another simple message for Canadians: cheer up, already.
“Canadians’ national pastime isn’t hockey, it’s complaining,” Chilton told the audience at the Home Hardware spring show Tuesday. “This country has completely lost the ability to distinguish between a major problem and a minor inconvenience. A long lineup at Tim Hortons is not a major problem.”
David Chilton, author of The Wealthy Barber, was the keynote speaker for Home Hardware’s spring market this week.
Chilton mostly kept the tone of his speech light, sharing behind-the-scenes stories of writing The Wealthy Barber and starting his own publishing company. He admitted he broke one of his own biggest rules, cashing in his RRSP to print the book.
Chilton was only 25 when he started writing it, and he questioned whether anyone would want to buy a book from a 25-year-old. He nearly gave up after sending it to a trio of financial experts for review and getting bad reviews from all of them. Then he gave it to the guys on his slo-pitch team – “beer-swigging, illiterate Canadians” – and they loved it.
“You’d be amazed at how many questions in the book came right from the mouths of the guys on my slo-pitch team.”
The Wealthy Barber was not a runaway hit but it built steam gradually and went on to Read more
Rugby team bounces back after slow start
The rookies on the EDSS girls’ rugby team got a rough introduction to the sport.
Their staff coach, Rob Harvey, popped his Achilles tendon and had to step down a week beforetheir first game.
At the same time, Heather Seiling, the student teacher who was coaching, left for a work term in Uganda.
Tracy Weber (left) tries to shake off a tackle as the EDSS girls took on Huron Heights Secondary in their second match of the season Wednesday. Weber had 18 points in the Lancers’ 38-10 victory over Huron Heights.
The girls played their first game on Monday with two new coaches and without 10 of the senior players, who were on a class trip to New York. The day was miserably cold and wet, and they lost 28-0 to Bluevale Collegiate.
With a start like that, there was nowhere to go but up, and that’s precisely where the Lancers went on Wednesday, defeating Huron Heights 34-10. Tracy Weber scored two tries and kicked three converts, Sarah Van Allen added another pair of tries, and Steph Duench scored her first try, an impressive feat for a fullback.
“We did much better than we did on Monday,” said staff coach Terri Radley. “When we only have 36 kids and 10 of them are away, it’s tough.”
The rugby team doesn’t have a lot of seniors to spare; there are only six or seven Grade 11s and 12s on the team. Fully 15 of the girls are Grade 9s or 10s who’ve never played the sport before.
“A lot of them are still learning the terms because rugby speak is so different,” Radley said. Read more
Students rhyme and have a good time
“After all those years of being stuck on a page, did you ever think you’d see me on stage?”
There will be no question in the minds of the audience, as the Cat in the Hat struts in front of them in living colour and three dimensions.
Students at St. Jacobs P.S. are putting the final touches on their production of Seussical before performances next Tuesday and Wednesday.
St. Jacobs Public School is bringing to life the Cat and a troupe of other Dr. Seuss characters in their spring performance of Seussical Jr. The musical is a mash-up of the plots of several popular stories combined with Broadway-style show tunes and dance routines.
“It’s kind of like you took all the stories, put them in a pot and stirred them together,” explained music teacher Lisa Shuh.
The play is a one-act version of a Broadway show that debuted in 2000 and spawned two national tours. The original version incorporates 18 Seuss books, including Horton Hears a Who!, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Oh the Thinks You Can Think! and The Cat in the Hat.
Shuh said fans of Seuss will see a bunch of their favourite characters, including Horton the Elephant, Gertrude McFuzz, Mayzie La Bird, Jojo, the Grinch and of course the Cat in the Hat.
The plot is loosely centred around Horton, who discovers the people of Whoville living in a speck of dust and attempts to protect them.
It’s been several years since St. Jacobs PS put on a play, simply because of the work involved. This year, the teachers felt Read more
