Dear Members
As 2011 draws to a close, I am pleased to have the opportunity to thank everyone who has contributed to any of our fund-raising events during the year. It has been a successful year, in which we have welcomed a good number of new members. Further on in this newsletter, you can read reports of our Garden Party, and the recent Annual Dinner, as well as an item about the visit to Vannes in September of the Fareham Medical Society. You will also find, in a separate attachment, an illustrated record of the sailing trip to Vannes made by Bill Harris, Annabelle McIver and others.
As most of you know, funds are needed to help our various groups with hosting their French visitors. Currently, the committee is making plans for next year’s Twinning Visit from Vannes, which is expected to take place in May. We hope that as many members as possible will be able to join in with at least one activity during this time. Of course, we shall also be requiring hosts – more details in the New Year.
We are all getting ready for Christmas, but I hope you will have time to read about recent events and make a note of future dates. A number of FVTA members enjoyed a recent ‘Soup and Sausage’ evening with the Fareham - Pulheim Association; please see details of their Advent Evening below.
Angela Hick
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ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING
Saturday 14th January
Please make a note in your diaries of our AGM, which will be held at Holy Trinity Church Hall, West Street, Fareham, PO16 0EL, beginning at 7.30 pm. The business of the meeting is usually brief, and will be followed by supper and a ‘fun’ quiz. More details will follow in mid-December.
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Don’t forget that the Fareham-Pulheim Association will be holding an advent evening in the Trinity Church hall at 7 p.m. on Sunday December 4th. Tickets at £7.50 (half price for children) are available from Mollie Aldred, 101 Avenue Road, Gosport PO12 1JZ Phone: 02392 523366
The Garden Party
4th September 2011
Marian and Peter Ellerton were not only kind enough to let us have the use of their beautiful and spacious garden for this event but kindly allowed us to erect our gazebos on the Saturday evening prior to the party. They also lent a willing hand as we puzzled over which piece went where on putting them up. When we had finished, your committee members admired their handiwork over a cup of tea on the terrace in the warm evening sunshine.
Sunday dawned – oh dear! It was raining hard and looked like it was set in for the day. Hasty plans were made to try and have the event indoors. Almost on time, however, the rain stopped and although it was a while before we saw the sun the party went ahead as a garden party should. Of course, in the garden
There was a certain amount of dodging of spots as the water dripped off gazebos but as soon as the sun came out they were steaming in the warmth.
The food; well, what is there to be said about that? An array of meats fit to be served in the gardens of Buckingham Palace was spread out before us as we went into the food hall which was cunningly disguised as Bob and Beverley’s frame tent.
The tables were a delightful sight with a selection of delicious salads to choose from. Not only that, it all proved in the eating to be as good as it looked and a queue for seconds quickly formed. Those that went for thirds must have been regretting it when they saw the puddings and sweets: from chocolate cake to raspberry mousse, from English trifle to lemon meringue pie and at least four pints of cream.
Never mind the calories, there’s a chance to work them off with a friendly, well fairly friendly, game of boules further down the garden. Those of us that didn’t feel like exercise at that point could try their hands at bagatelle or skittles and there were prizes for those talented enough to get the top score.
Two delightful ladies persuaded us to part with a few pence in exchange for a variety of coloured tickets and the chance to win attractive prizes in the traditional raffle. I understand our treasurer was pleased with the results of their efforts and his policy of having more attractive prizes proved popular.
By the time the afternoon was drawing to a close several groups were well established in the sunshine, busily putting the world to rights until it was time to leave.
Those members who were either unable to come or who chose not to missed a most enjoyable afternoon and will do well to ensure that they are able to come next year. Our thanks go to our social secretary Beverley and her hard working team who made it all possible.
Peter Davis
WARSASH BAND
As most of you know, the Warsash Band is affiliated to FVTA. They will hold their Christmas concerts at the Victory Hall, Warsash on Friday 16th and Saturday 17th December at 7.30pm. Tickets are £7 (£5.50 for concessions) – please contact Chris Gorham (01489 572594) or Dave Gasser at the Hall (01489 576913)
Annual Dinner with Wine
19th November
The venue for our annual event was Wallington Village Hall and this year the Deputy Mayor of Fareham, Councillor Dennis Steadman and his wife Mrs Carole Steadman attended to make the evening a special occasion.
Ted and I always look forward to the Annual Dinner, not least because three different wines are provided, one being served with each course of the meal. The evening used to be called Dinner with Wine Tasting because each different wine that was served was presented by a connoisseur and the person who guessed closest to the total purchase price of all the wines was the winner.
It has now evolved into the present most enjoyable format of the light hearted “Call by Bluff” where a panel of three presenters tell us their version of the qualities and origin of each wine.
As usual the panel was ably introduced by Tim Manhire.
The three members of this year’s panel consisted of Richard Aitken, Janice Childs and Don Lucas who entertained us with some very convincing true and false descriptions of each wine. After a tie-break, Vic Bird was the eventual winner of the Norman Stokes trophy (and a bottle of wine).
The meal itself was excellent with a choice of soup or spring rolls with sweet chilli sauce for starters accompanied by a Pinot Grigio. The main course was chicken with a mushroom and white wine sauce or steak pie or a vegetarian option of mushroom and aubergine provençale accompanied by an excellent Côtes du Rhône wine, and the dessert was either chocolate gâteau or fruit crumble eaten with the last wine of the evening which was a Chardonnay-Semilon
After this very enjoyable meal came the raffle. There were many good prizes on offer including whisky, wine and chocolates. There was great anticipation as David Douglas, who is our usual and very able raffle number caller, called out the winning numbers in French first and then in English just to clarify for people not conversant with French.
The evening ended with thanks being offered to the excellent caterers and Beverley and her team of organisers and helpers, then some of the excess unopened wine was offered for sale and was snapped up by us and others.
All in all a thoroughly successful and enjoyable evening was had by everyone.
Barbara Collins
FAREHAM MEDICS GO TO VANNES
Remember the heatwave weekend at the end of September? Well, that weekend the Fareham Medical Society went to Vannes for our 20th Anniversary Jumelage. 17 adults and 14 children from Fareham went over and were hosted by 42 French people (Vannes doctors and their families)
15 of us went across on the Friday and enjoyed the Fôret Adrenaline in Rennes (Acrobranches) on our way to Vannes. On the Saturday our French hosts treated us all to a 4 course meal on board a sightseeing boat which took us round the Golfe du Morbihan, then dropped us at a beach on the Isle aux Moines for a chance to sunbathe and swim in the sweltering heat. In the evening we were entertained by a Breton dance teacher who valiantly tried to teach us Breton dancing. It was hilarious.
We had an educational meeting on Sunday morning with talks from the French on aspects of medicine. The translation was facilitated by excellent French speakers within our group and excellent English speakers in theirs.
As the weather was still amazingly warm (frankly boiling) we had an impromptu picnic provided by our French hosts for Sunday lunch in the pretty grounds of one of their houses.
The weekend was packed with opportunities to get
to know the French families and to improve our French. There has been an influx
of new French and English families to the twinning, so the Medical Jumelage is
going from strength to strength. Next year they will come to us, and we are
already starting our planning....
Fiona McCrae
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French Conversation Evenings
Why not join us on the first and third Tuesdays of each month at Titchfield Community Centre from 7.30 to 9 pm, for an entertaining evening while improving or practising your French.
Here are the suggested topics to start each evening off:
6th December 20 Questions
3rd January New Year’s Resolutions, Christmas and hopefully Une Galette des Rois
17th January A Favourite City
7th February Word Games – bring along French crosswords, word searches and anything else to extend our vocabulary
21st February Une Saison Préférée
6th March What’s in the News – home and abroad?
20th March Guess the Advert – bring an advert – cover up the clues and everyone else guesses the product with
questions
3rd April Des Régions de la France
17th April Who’s Who ? Describe a person or character for everyone to guess…
I would be really pleased to receive topic suggestions for future French conversation evenings.
Thank you
Val
Call Val Brown on 01489 573854 or Nigel Sharpe on 01329 230683 to find out more - or just turn up.
