Sunday, February 24, 2019

From the President


Chers Amis
Welcome all to our first edition of La Mouette for 2109. I hope that you have all survived the droughts, bush fires, heat waves, hail storms and all of the other events we have been subject to over the last few months. I for one look forward to the passing of the peak of the summer season and the coming of that most beautiful and calm time of year, autumn. Last year we celebrated our 30th anniversary and enjoyed a full calendar of events.
In 2019 we won’t be celebrating any particular anniversaries but we will be nonetheless looking forward to an action-packed program of Alliance activities including our regular petanque games which have already begun, our Annual Welcome Party which will be held on Saturday, 9 February (details later in this edition), a cabaret featuring Eliane Morel at Oaklands at the end of March, dinners, wine tastings, cooking classes, film nights and lots more.
This year we have overnight billeting arrangements in place for those who live out of town and want to attend any of our evening functions but are reluctant to drive home at night. Please let me know if you want to attend an evening function and need this assistance.
It was with great anticipation of a brilliant success that I attended pétanque last Friday as I was accompanied by my secret weapon, Foucault Delesalle, a Rotary exchange student who will be staying with me during the next two months. Foucault is from Lille and is enrolled in year 12 at Eden Marine High School but will return home to France at the end of June this year. He is apparently a gifted football (soccer) player and all-round sportsman but Clive dashed my ambition of achieving immortality in pétanque by allocating Foucault to someone else’s team! The best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley, as they say in Lille!
I look forward to seeing you all again and celebrating our love of things French in 2019.
Amicalement
Rob McCombie