Aus dem Mitteilungsblatt von Belleville Sister Cities Inc.

November 2006

Grußworte der Präsidenten

President's Message

Our organization has just completed a busy couple months, with two of our major fund raisers taking place, as well as exchange visits and visiting.
I wish you could have all been present at the August general meeting to hear the enthusiastic reports from the people who took part in the six week student exchanges, the three week exchange and our exchange teacher. Each o f the participants found the trip to Paderborn to be a highlight of their life. I hope that all of you who are able will be able to visit our Sister City Paderborn or be host to one of their residents in the future, so you to can have experience these same emotions.
I am considering planning a complete tour, visiting Paderborn and continuing to several eastern European countries in 2008, God willing and the creek don’t rise! Since we alternate years, it is Paderborn’s turn to visit us in 2007, so make plans for 2008 and let me know of your interest..

The Oktoberfest food stands did not do well financially because a heavy rain wiped out one of the two days. There was lots of work and time that went into the event, and I thank all those who helped. Special thanks to Doris Roach, stand chairman and the St. Libory members who made 150 lbs. of German potato salad.

We are proud that Our Taste of Germany dinner and program was well attended and well received. The Larry Haller Duo and Northwinds Concert Band provided crowd pleasing music. We were honored to have State Representative Tom Holbrook, Mayor Mark Eckert and Lansing Hecker, honorary German Consul of the Federal Republic of Germany as our special guests.

I had the pleasure of presenting Special awards to two most deserving of recipients. (separate article) We are most grateful to Rich Berkel who arranged the affair, and to the ad committee who made it a financial success.

The Board officially welcomed the three Paderborn teachers who spent two weeks at O’Fallon High School. Board members accompanied them to meet our Mayor Eckert, gave them a short tour of downtown Belleville and had them as our guests for lunch at the Pie Pantry. You will find their very interesting observations in their included report. We thank Kathy Ashby for making the arrangements and the host teachers.

Rich Berkel and I attended a ceremony at the Art on the Square building where we, along with several other organizations were officially awarded a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, presented by Representative Tom Holbrook.

Our group along with the Columbia, Waterloo, Millstadt and Carbondale Sister Cities are now in the process of preparing plans for the 2007 SCI State Conference, to be held at Our Lady of Snows Shrine next April 20 & 21. Now is the time to mark your calendar to attend the conference.

I hope to see you all at the General Meeting at Fischer’s on November 16, and the Stammtisches. We are not all about work! The Stammtisches are fun times to meet and eat. Look over the schedule, mark your calendar, make a reservation and join us. Please note the December Stammtisch was moved up a week.

Norma Bergkoetter

News from Paderborn

Paderborn is proud of the historical exhibition “Canossa” dealing with the Middle Ages, i.e. the time around 1200 A.D. The exhibition will end on November 5th. Up to now 150,000 people have come to see the exhibits, the works of art and documents of this period.

We have heard that this year’s “Taste of Germany” again had an extraordinary attendance. Congratulations!

The three teachers from Paderborn, Gabriele Lambrechts, Almut Ulama and Nadia Weber, returned from Belleville with wonderful experiences. They are involved in the exchange of teachers between O’Fallon Township High school and Goerdeler Gymnasium in Paderborn. This exchange has been initiated by BSC and German-American Friendship Society Paderborn-Belleville. We are indebted to Linda Driesner and Joerg Erdmann. We are proud that it has been a great success.

We want to thank Mayor Eckert for receiving the group at City Hall; our thanks are also extended to President Norma Bergkoetter and BSC for taking them round. We thank especially the principal of OTHS and the teachers who were hosts and everybody who was involved. While Kathy Ashby stayed in Paderborn in June 2006, Patrick Hasenstab and Alan Elfrink will come to Paderborn in 2007. Let’s hope that this first exchange is the foundation for further visits of teachers of both Sister Cities and around. Look for the report (with pictures) of the stay on our homepage (also in English): www.dafk-paderborn.de also look at Kathy Ashby’s homepage: http://www.oths.k12.il.us/foreignl/ashbyk/paderbornexchange-contents.htm

Hopefully there may be an exchange of students, too. That would be a wonderful continuation of what took place in 2004 and June 2006.

We are looking forward to our Thanksgiving Dinner. This has really developed into a social event of which we can be proud of. In the room of the dinner Andreas Kopp will present some of his works of art that he showed at Belleville’s “Art on the Square” in May.

We wish all the members of BSC and our Belleville friends a Happy Thanksgiving.

Bernd Broer
President

Dr. Otmar Allendorf
Secretary