Brian Simmons had already e-mailed in his resignation as Vice President. He wanted to continue with the Club, but did not wish to attend meetings. He said he would help out with events as needed.

Throughout February, the meetings on Tuesdays were ill-attended. This was due in part to members having classes at that time.

Cindy Digulimio sent out two questionnaires asking the members (and those on our e-mailing list) asking when would be the best time to meet. We debated monthly meetings and afternoon meetings. We finally compromised on alternating meetings between the old time, 11:30 am on Tuesdays in CLR-125, and Thursdays at 2:30 pm. The latter meeting time proved to be unsuccessful: we could not get CLR-125 at that time, so we met on the CLR-111 stage.

On Thursday Evening, 24 February, Brian Simmons helped and sat with the first round of Spring Semester's "Coffee & Information" in the name of the International Club.

Brian printed up and posted around campus new International Club signs which stated our new meeting times. Our March meetings proved equally unsuccessful. On one Thursday, a seminar was scheduled in CLR-111. The two members who showed up waited around for others in the hall.

Bobby Watkins, Brian Simmons, and Cindy Digulimio, who saw each other regularly on campus, did come up with some events to "save" the semester however. These included a trip to the Monacan Indian Village, the St. Leonards, Maryland Celtic Festival, a speaker or two (perhaps at College Fest), a big trip to Florida (or elsewhere), and a one-day Foreign Film Festival.

On Thursay, 6 April, Cindy Digulimio, our club driver, told Brian Simmons that the St. Leonard's Celtic Festival was off due to a work conflict for her and the unavailability of a college vehicle.

On Friday, 7 April, Brian Simmons e-mailed the Bulgarian Embassy to request stuff for our Classroom Building bulletin board.

On Saturday, 8 April, the Muhibbah Club of Wilson College held their Spring Semester International Buffet from 5:30 to 8:00 pm. in McElwain Dining Hall.

Ticket information was available at
717-262-2773, 262-2589, 717-264-4141 (the Wilson Switchboard)

Tickets were priced:

General: $8 Wilson Faculty/Staff: $6

Senior Citizen: $7 Students with ID: $4

Wilson Students: $2 Children under 8: Free!

We could not get a college fleet vehicle, so we carpooled up and back, leaving the HCC CP Building parking lot by the Greenhouse at 4:50 pm for this 45 minute trip.

Fourteen signed up, but eleven went, as three professors cancelled at the last minute. Those who went were: Professor Terrie Angle, James Arsonault, Frances Cain, Cindy Digulimio, Walter Gostowski, Mira Kofkin, Professor Dixie Myers, Brian Simmons, Professor Loretta Thornhill, Bobby Shawn Watkins, and Han Xiao.

The women at Wilson put even more effort into this one. The college choir sang, there was a Powerpoint presentation on Japan, and more.

Our club especially liked the banana and chicken soup, the Czech chocolate cake, and the almond extract/cherry cake. We all had a banana slushie.

As it was raining, the turn-out was smaller than is usual at this event.

On Monday Morning, 10 April, Brian Simmons finished making up the information sheet and sign up sheet for our Monacan Indian Village Trip on Friday, 21 April. Cindy Digulimio was to get them stamped and put them up.

On Tuesday Morning, 11 April, Cindy Digulimio, Brian Simmons, and Bobby Watkins met for an hour and a half discussing club business.

The lecture series was co-opted by Phi Theta Kappa. We may still have one lecturer, a photographer, discuss South Asia during the Art Show in May. Cindy Digulimio has made contact with the gentleman already.

A one-day Foreign Film Festival may have to be scrapped. Cindy Digulimio said she just has too many other events (and finals) to help with that. We may start planning an early fall Film Fest before this semester ends. Club Fair may be the time of this one.

The three decided to call a special Thursday meeting at 2 pm.

Ohio, Philadelphia, an international fair, and a return to Virginia Beach all we discussed as possibilities for the Big Trip. Florida was ruled out for lack of a sponsor.

On Friday Morning, 21 April, Cindy Digulimio called the other two who signed up for the Monacan Native American Village Trip at Natural Bridge, Virginia and cancelled the outing, as it was raining here and there, and was expected to do so all day.

Trip costs were to include one's lunch; the wax museum (if interested), $7; and the cavern (if interested), $7. It did not seem as though they were to charge for the Village itself.

On Tuesday Evening, 9 May, the Club went to dinner at the Tara Thai Restaurant on Rockville Pike, Montgomery County, Maryland. We left the CP parking lot at at 4:30 pm sharp.

We advised participants to bring at least $25; active members were to be reimbursed a percentage of the meal's cost.

We sponsored "The International Club's First Annual Find the Country Contest" to promote awareness of other cultures.

Clues were given in various places including Internet sources.
• 1st Prize was a subscription to National Geographic magazine. Angela Zeger won, as she e-mailed us first.

• 2nd Prize was a subscription to National Geographic Traveler magazine.
Edward Sweet won this, as he was the second to e-mail us with the correct country.

• 3rd Prize was a subscription to National Geographic Adventure magazine. It was still available to win at the end of the contest. Though we stated the contest would end on Thursday, 1 June, we kept the flyers up and the information on the web page until Friday, 30 June. We had no entrants after the spring semester ended.

Clues for the contest were like the following, which appeared on our home page.

Clue #3 In the 8th Century, you would have seen Guru Padma Samhava make his legendary trip from India to this country on the back of a flying tigress.

Flyers were around campus for Clue #1 and our club bulletin board in the Classroom Building was the site for Clue #2 (beside CLR-125).

Clue #4 was at College Fest on Sunday, 30 April at the International Club table.

On Wednesday Afternoon, 10 May we presented the lecture: "Wandering in South Asia" by photographer Schuyler Fonaroff.

Mr. Fonaroff was very interesting; he spoke of his photographic assignments in India and Southeast Asia mostly. How to maximize the success of the planned shot--as well as the grab shot--was explained.

Included were stories of when he happened on a mother and child who were just attacked by a swarm of bees (and he got a photo) and of the time he opened his tent flap and met the stare of a leopard (and he got a photo).

He also explained his association with an American organization that helps treat world leprosy outbreaks: he attended Johns Hopkins University, majoring in physical pathology, and would take photographs to supplement his reports.

Soon the photography became his major life's work, and his contacts at Hopkins asked him to go to India to record with pictures the results of a new treatment for this neurological disease.

The lecture was held in the Kepler Theater from 4 pm to 5 pm . There was no admission; we underwrote the costs with our budgeted money that we received from the 1999-2000 Student Activities Fund.

We thought that such a "crossover lecture" (international travel and photography) might help bring guests to the Art Club's Student Art Show in the Kepler Lobby.

We put together a Niagara Falls, Ontario Trip
Tuesday Morning, 23 May thru Thursday Night, 25 May
        --using the fifteen passenger van
Leave at: 7 am sharp               Return: Late at Night on Thursday
Sponsor: Matt McIntosh, Wellness Center Instructor
Primary Driver: Cindy Digulimio Staying at: Ramada Parkway Inn & Convention Centre, St. Catharines, Ontario (905/688-2324)
327 Ontario Street--by a mass transit stop. We've booked 4 rooms. Pack a swimsuit: there's an indoor pool!

Hamilton
Hamilton has a population of 416,000--the ninth largest Canadian city, the fourth largest city in Ontario.
• Art Gallery of Hamilton ($3 admission, 905/527-6610)--includes 7000 works of art.
• Royal Botanical Gardens, Hamilton ($7 admission)--2,700 acres of breathtaking gardens and spectacular nature sanctuaries.
• Dundern Castle, Hamilton ($7 adults, $5.50 students--full-price admission includes admission to the Hamilton Military Museum)--Dundurn Castle has been restored to the year 1855 when Castle owner Sir Allan Napier MacNab (1798-1862) was at the height of his career as a lawyer, landowner, railway magnate and Premier of the United Canadas (1845-56). Over forty rooms, above and below stairs, have been furnished to compare the life of a prominent Victorian family with that of their servants. Costumed staff guide visitors through the home, illustrating daily life from the 1850s.
• Whitehern, downtown (41 Jackson Street West) Hamilton, ON.
• A. J. Jackson Square Shopping Complex
• Battlefield House Museum, Stoney Creek, ON ($2.75 admission). This house, built in 1796, was important in the War of 1812. Experience life in the early nineteenth century, as the museum staff, dressed in period costume, demonstrate the lifestyle of the Gage Family.

Niagara Falls
• Maid of the Mist ($10.65), 9:45 am until 5:45 pm (7:45 pm the 23rd)
• Behind the Falls ($6)      • Butterfly Conservatory ($7.50)
• Skylon Tower ($7.95)       • Fort George ($4 students, $6 admissions)
• McFarland House, Niagara-on-the-Lake ($1.75)
Gaming: 19 or older to play. There is no admission cost to Casino Niagara.

More info at: Niagra Falls Tourism  Niagara Falls, ON  Regional Tourism  Casino Niagara

St. Catharines
St. Catharines was founded by British loyalists and has a population of nearly 130,000.
• Folk Arts Festival      • Pen Centre 150 plus stores

Originally 6 hours away--actually, 7-1/2 at least.

Main Page was last updated on Friday Afternoon, 30 June 2000.