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February 17 - Rotary In Action

Matching Grant Project
As announced on page 6, I worked on a Matching Grant project for the Dharamshala Rotary Club. They want to buy 5 computers, with all the peripheral equipment, to have a computer vocational center to provide free computer training to the community. I worked with the local Rotarians to define the project and get the necessary quotes for the equipment. The total budget of the project is $8,025. The project is now published on my Matching Grant website, with grant number 180. Now we only have to find an international partner to help finance the project. With all the matching from the Rotary Foundation, District 3070 (India), and possibly District 5340 (San Diego), we only need a $1,150 contribution from a Club outside India. I hope to find that in the next couple of weeks, as the deadline for projects this year is mid-March.

Hiking to Naddi Village
On the Saturday, the weather was perfect to go hiking. There are plenty of places to see around McLoadGanj. I chose to go to Dal Lake, and I continued onto Naddi Village. The village is only 4 miles away, and 300 feet higher, but it already much more remote. There are less cars, and the view on the mountains is gorgeous.

I was accompanied by Dianne Aigaki, a newly met American friend, who settled in Dharamshala 5 years ago. Dianne is a grant writer, and she has been around the world to give training seminars on how to write grants. She has attended the last two Rotary meetings, and she is about to join Rotary. I gave her a big sales pitch on Rotary last week, and I believe it worked... She is also working on a big proposal to create parks and green areas around McLoadGanj so that people stop dumping trash everywhere. She knows many people in the community, including John, another American who settled in Dharamshala. John is in charge of an adult school to teach English to the people in need. There are no fees to attend the school, their only resources are external donations.

Inner Wheel Conference
On Sunday, I went with a few Rotarians from Dharamsala to the Inner Wheel District Conference in Pathankot, 80 miles away. This was a good opportunity to meet with the District Governor Nominee for District 3070. Dr. Beena Misra is a member of the Pathankot Rotary Club, and she will be the first woman District Governor in District 3070. She owns the biggest nursing home and clinic in Pathankot. I went to see her with my friends from Dharamshala and she gave us a very warm welcome. We discussed one of the projects she wants to undertake next year: a community blood bank, to provide blood to people who cannot afford the regular fee. The blood will be provided for free to the people in need, provided some family member donates blood (not necessarily the same type). If the person has no family, the local Rotarians will donate instead.