Rotary Club of Marana
 
                                                                            
The day started a bit chilly in the Sonoran Desert. 
Guests included:
Prospective member Beckie
Mary’s daughter-Lily 
Randy’s wife-Deb
Janette Butcher- interested member 
 
Announcements:
 
Randy. Gave out invitations to our November 9th Rotary Membership Open House. There will be three different kinds of meats, a wine pairing and “children’s drinks” for those of us who don’t drink 
Richie- October 20th Days of Caring Project. October 20th 8am at Roadrunner Elementary School. Our Interact club will be there and brining 9 youth to help with the projects
Maeve- reminder about El Tour aid station on November 17th. Same location as last year. We need people to sign up and volunteer. The board voted to have a flag banner for the tour station.
Dan- next week we will begin our planning meetings for the Tour de Cookie. 
Happy Bucks:
John is happy to be home. Forrest fires were a big issue 
Mary- She was happy that Lily ate Javiers breakfast
Rachel is happy about visiting her best friend on earth as well as going to the Balloon Festival In Albuquerque. 
Maeve- (from her 8 year old granddaughter) a knock knock joke about remembering her... we all didn’t 
Bob- had a lawyer joke... out in the woods... the check is in the male....
People were happy for John to be home, the weather and our several guests
 
Our guest Janette won and then lost the raffle.
 
 Randy and Mary presented on their trip to Cameroon. For international projects there has to be two clubs. One is the host club (Cameroon) and the other is an international club (Marana). We write the grant and raise the money and the host club is responsible for oversight and implementation for three years. 
MAROUA is the capital of the Far North Region of Cameroon. The area borders Nigeria and Chad. In the river that they use for their water source there are people who was their motorcycle, rugs and clothes. They also use it to bath and use the area around it as a bathroom facility. This is a big reason why the project is necessary.
Millet is their primary food source. Millets are a group of highly variable small-seeded grasses, widely grown around the world as cereal crops or grains for fodder and human food
We have two goals with the project: Economy and Education. We want to focus on education but we cannot get there without addressing the economy. When we asked the villagers as to why they want this issue fixed, the primary reason is money. They want their daughters educated and not married off at a young age. 15 is the legal age for young women to be married off and most are due to financial constraints on families in the villages. 30% of the Net proceeds will go to families to help defray a majority of the costs for families that can not afford it. 
Sustainability is a long term goal of this project. Our project will get the village up and going for the first year. We will provide fabric, sewing machines, embroidery machines etc.
On the education side we need to do many things. The first is to build a well for the use of a garden to feed children. The idea is primarily for kindergarten students as they miss out on early childhood education because they can’t walk home to get lunch. We will also build 6 latrines for the school use. We will also buy 30 heads of cattle to provide milk for the students and eventually meat for the village. Finally we will be providing the school with supplies for their classrooms. 

Richie