Advice to 13 year old girls

My advice for thirteen year old girls, The most important thing to remember is to work hard and study in school, because working hard now is how you can make sure that your future is full of good opportunities. You also can ask your parents for help and follow their advise because they lived long lives and know what is better for you at this age.

 It is important to have good friends that you can trust and who can help you and give you advice if you need them to.

 It is important not to waste your free time and to use it wisely , you can read literature, play music, or even go to the cinema with your friends. You should help you community and family by volunteering or helping your relatives. I used to help the lonely elderly people with cooking and cleaning.  Make the right decisions and choices. You can learn from and teach your siblings.

 When I was in grade eight or nine I used to volunteer and help the younger grades put on and prepare performances for their friends and family. I helped teach them stories, poems and songs and even some plays.

Our First Video Blog

Here at Bubbies & Zaidas Blogging we have been working with the youth at Calgary Jewish Academy and we have been inspired to make videos.    We have been working with this new concept to tell stories and overcome some inhibitions.   

Here is a preview of one of our videos by Manny called:   

From the Good Old Encyclopedia Days to the Google Days

click on it to view it:

Come view the rest of the videos!

We invite you to join us at our: 

Video Premiere & Blog Celebration.   

April 30th at The Calgary Jewish Community Centre, in the Seniors Lounge from 6 - 7:30 

For a Dessert Reception.

Please RSVP to Shula Banchik at  403 537 8596

Following Your Dreams

By Sandi


At the young age of 66, I have experienced an interesting journey that took many twists and turns.

As a child, my dream as some young adolescent females, was to be happily married…have four children…first a son, then a daughter...the order of the last two children did not matter. I wanted a son, Todd, first so that my daughter, Tanya Leanne, had and older brother to protect her if needed. My third child either, Wade or Leah would also have their older brother to guide them.

My dream home was a bungalow consisting of a large kitchen, a bedroom for my husband and me and bedrooms for each child. The yard would be large so that my children could enjoy the outdoors as much as possible. We would live on a safe street with other young families and in time become friends. The purpose for the large kitchen other then the obvious, cooking and eating, was for my family and I to sit around the kitchen table and chat, play games such as crib, board games etc. and to get to know each other by communicating.

Dreams take many turns.

At the age of 21, I joined the Air Force. My journey from Nanaimo commenced January 3 1969 by taking the boat from Departure Bay to Horseshoe Bay. My journey continued from Vancouver by an enjoyable train ride to Halifax N.S. The last trek of the journey was via bus to CFB Cornwallis. At CFB Cornwallis, I commenced my military career as a very proud recruit (Private Starling) with basic training during the very cold and miserable winter months of January, February, and March of 1969. I lived in a barrack block that was identified as South Block with many other women who were military career oriented. Some women wore the army uniform, some the navy uniform and others including myself wore the air force uniform. We did not have the pleasure of wearing the actual uniform until the last week of basic training…instead; we wore dresses, which signified the three military elements. My choice to join the military was one of the best I have made and I would do it again. People thought I was a “bit out to lunch” as one of the routines I enjoyed during my journey was drill…marching…looking sharp, ready for inspection on the parade square. I felt very proud of myself…in fact was complimented once by the inspecting officer.

My military journey took me to CFB Borden for my trades training which was finance. The last trek of my military journey ended at CFB Rockcliffe…a very beautiful base in Ottawa. Along with my career at CFB Ottawa, I volunteered to be on the Base Defence Force. I learned out to use a gas mask…take an FNC1 rifle apart and put it back to together…how to use a baton during a riot.

As a volunteer with the Base Defence Force, I experienced two outstanding highlights:

·       A Commonwealth Convention was held in Ottawa and I had the privilege to be on duty at the Airport terminal when the dignitaries arrived. One of my duties was to check for identification. If I had any doubt that a person should not be going to the tarmac, I would ask for ID this also applied if I had suspicions of anyone who was entering into the building where I was on duty.  It was a great privilege and honour to be in the same building with numerous leaders from around the world….I even had the opportunity to give the odd direction when asked. The second duty was to be on guard outside of the VIP lounge and allow only classified personnel to enter.

·       The second highlight while on the Base Defence Force was being on duty at the Officers Mess at CFB Rockcliffe during the presentation of a medal to an honoured gentleman by the Queen. My location of duty was by the clothe room where I hung up various coats of VIPS. In attendance at this prestigious event were Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip, Princess Ann, Governor General Lège, Prime Minister Trudeau and other dignitaries. After the presentation of the medal was over and the VIPs were preparing to leave, I had the honour to hand Prime Minister Trudeau his “Top Hat” white gloves and scarf…it feels like it only happened yesterday.

I still remember what Queen Elizabeth wore. She had on a beautiful middle green velvet coat, and a gorgeous hat to match. Pinned to the lapel her coat was beautiful pin. I was within five feet from Her Majesty.

I requested and received an honourable discharge from the military, the end of March 1974. I lived and worked in Ottawa as a civilian until June 1976 and eventually moved to Calgary.

You might ask me why I choose to move to Calgary as compared to Nanaimo, the city I am from...my answer is “a voice inside me told me to do so”…I listened to my intuition.

Living in Calgary has had its experiences (ups and downs). I compare my life experiences to climbing up Mount Everest…one climbs so high…stops because of some plateaus or crevices and then commences climbing a bit more. Another analogy is “the little train that could”. I experienced 28 wonderful and educational years with various departments within the Federal Government: (Revenue Canada as a administrative support with Special Investigations; Agriculture Canada as a Staffing Classification Assistant; Human Resources Development Canada as a Senior Contract Support Assistant) I won’t go into the last 10 ½ years of my career with the Provincial Government. (There were more downs than ups)

Volunteering in various capacities helped to make my life seem more successful.

·       During my career with the Provincial Government I was involved with Calgary Corporate Challenge…great experience…this was the best learning experience for me as a Provincial Government Employee as it took me out of my comfort zone and taught me how to become a leader.

·       I joined the Royal Canadian Legion in 1976 and eventually became involved as an executive…for some reason, this gal, me…seemed to have a problem just being a member…she always had to jump in with both feet and be on the board.

·       As if I didn’t have enough on my plate, I joined an Air Cadet squadron and became a civilian officer for a couple of years. This part of the journey took me to Maelstrom Air Force base for an enjoyable weekend tour with other officers and cadets where I challenged myself to rapell Aussie Style down the outside of a small building.

·       My self-esteem and confidence needed a good boost; therefore, I became a Toastmaster. I was a Toastmaster for 15 years and again concentrated on being involved with the planning and organization as compared to concentrating on doing speeches and presentations. Over the 15 years I was involved in two separate clubs. The second club, Twin Rivers, was where I think I burned out. The club was identified as “the old boys club”…, would you believe, I had the honour of being the first female president of the club…how awesome is that? With the support of the outgoing President, as well a good executive, I worked hard to ensure the success of the club. In 2008/2009 I planned and organized the clubs 60^th anniversary celebration with the assistance of other club members. I think I burned myself out because I did not delegate well. The event was very successful.

The newest twist/turn on my journey is being part of the Bubbies and Zaidas Blogging Group through the Jewish Community Centre…it has not been what I expected it, in fact, it is better in many ways. I have met wonderful people. I have been mentoring a woman pertaining to the use of a lap top and writing a blog. I have had the pleasure to meet some students at the Jewish Academy. My first day at the Jewish Academy was a fun. I connected with a lovely student named Lauren…to sum the day up; she helped to make it perfect. The facilitator, Mariette, is astounding.

As I am typing up some of my life’s experiences, I am thinking….hmmm I guess Mom’s do not experience these “types” of twists and turns that have challenged me. It was not meant for me to be a Mom. Well, now that I am settled down to a degree, maybe someday, somehow, I will have the pleasure and experience of having children in my life…maybe in some way I could be a mentor.

Life is what a person makes it…Life is great…All the bumps in my journey have helped me to become a stronger person and also have helped me to learn who I am as compared to who “others” what me to be.

Dreams take many turns...sometimes what is not planned,  fulfills one's life in unexpected adventures.

Marriage is a lot like the Weather

By Bruce Eekma

I’m no expert on Marriages but, after fifty plus years, believe it is a lot like the weather, one day it is hot the next cold. When we first get married we treat each other like Kings and Queens and there are many warm days. However this does not last because after celebrating a couple months of honeymoon, the storms start coming, first little ones mostly rain however after a couple months the fun begins. Don't get me wrong sometimes a good storm is just what the doctor ordered because we get to make up and every marriage need a little rain every now and then to keep things fresh. 

If you are anything like me, I got married to have kids, so got my wife pregnant after three months of marriage. Ones the kids arrive us males are not Kings anymore and we become number two. If we wanted a little sunshine in our marriage we have to help around the house. Gone were the night out with the boys, because we have to babysit, and gone are the extra little treats we use to get when we got home from work. No sir if we are not careful we can have more rain than sunshine and everything starts to droop if you know what I mean. However there is hope, because if a man is smart enough, he will purchase an umbrella to protect his partner and does special extra little things for her, then maybe the sun will start to come out again and the birds will start to sing.

After a couple of years  marriage we feel we can predict a storm or even start a small one, including prepare ourselves for the onslaught, but most of the time they come out of nowhere. Most storm happen around the festive holidays when there are a lot of parties. At these parties there are lots of people in the same boat as us that are looking for a little sunshine. After a couple drinks everything looks better and we start to feel like Kings and Queens again and get that feeling that we have been shortchanged in the weather department. These parties are full of people that agree with us and promise sunshine and happiness everday. However let me tell you don’t start to looking for a little warming, for you will run into a thunderstorm , because when you get home your better half will see right trough you and see it on your face and she will get the trued out of you because you’re a poor liar.

We have a Mayor, in one of the biggest cities in Canada, who also looked for a little sunshine but he ended up with a tornado and is going to spend the rest of next year repairing his life. Maybe it will never be repaired and he will be permanently condemned. Let me suggest to all of you that when you go to these parties make sure you have an umbrella to protect you from getting soaked and maybe some rubber booths to keep your feet clean because sooner or later it is going to storm. 

You don’t have to worry about me anymore because after fifty years of marriage my wife still picks up a treat for me every now and then and I have just completed a book about her life. At my age I don’t go to many parties and now she needs me to help with the great-grandchildren who bring all the sunshine we need so yes we have been blessed.         

Gratitude: How to Recieve.

By Bob Peterson

Amalia's lovely story of Westjet kindness reminded me of blessings I received a few weeks ago.  Friends from Vancouver Island had visited me over the holiday and their daughter, Teresa, at some point in our conversation had heard me tell my friends about difficulties I have with my computer and a recently purchased Ipad. I can now remember Theresa saying "my husband Tom can help you and I'll have him contact you".

Friday Jan 3, 2014 was a cold day, and I knew that I would have to brush the snow off my car so I could drive to my 9:45 ultra sound appointment. At breakfast my table mate Phil said he would brush the snow off the car for me. I knew that would be a real plus for me. Then when I returned to my room, a call came in from Theresa asking what I was doing that day, and when I told her, she said "Tom & I will drive you to your appointment, & we’ll wait for you and bring you back to your seniors residence, and then Tom will help you with your computer while I go and pick up food for lunch.  I was delighted, and things went as planned. 

Tom & Theresa were both a great help to me. Before leaving, Theresa said "We’ll also shovel the snow from both sides of your car so you'll be able to drive out of the parking lot easier".   They were cheerful, encouraging and just bubbling with kindness.  

As we age, our pace slows down and we require more time to complete our tasks.  When faced with our limitations it is often difficult to remember to be grateful for the support or help that often comes from the most unexpected sources. The help I received was a wonderful act of kindness, and it reminded me that there have been many times when I have just taken these things so much for granted.   Amalia's story is another example of a situation that will remind me to focus on being grateful for the many blessings I receive, to be thankful & appreciate each day the Lord gives me, and not to focus so much on my difficulties & losses.

Oh how I miss my Abacus

Bruce Eekma

I was born in the good old days, well I don't know if it was always good, but a lot simpler. I started school in 1947, two years after the second World War, outfitted with an abacus to do math plus a small slate the size of a sheet of paper including a chalk pencil, for writing things down.  We did all our math and written task, which the teacher had written on the blackboard the evening before, on our slate and when completed we would show them our completed work. At the end of the day we would just wipe of all this information, so we had a"clean slate" to start the next morning, and the only memory we had to worry about was in our head.

In the seventies I was involved in building large temperature controlled buildings where contractors would install large cabinets called computers. We were told that these large cabinets could remember more then a human and could solve math problems in a second. We were entering the paperless society and there would be less people employed for filing.

Later when I worked downtown for  AGT now TELUS, we had three floors with these large computers, and I was told they were rented out to large oil companies to store all their data. On the main floor we had what was called the Museum of the Future filled with all kinds of gadgets to be use for communication in the future and my favorite was a robot that would walk around and talked to people, the other was a display of phones where one could see the person you were talking to. In my own office I also had an computer with my own Profs id. Plus I was sent on numerous computer courses just so they could steal me away from my abacus and slate.

 

Ever since, my days with the telephone company, I have owned a computer at home and would do office work from home or Google the world. I was very impressed with this new invention because this was my window into the world. And until this last weekend everything was going great, sometimes I would make mistakes or lose something, but there was always a way to retrieve my data without much problem.

Then my week in hell started, I run Microsoft 8, and accepted the free upgrade to Microsoft 8.1. This went without a hint of problems however then it prompted me to refresh my computer to make it run better and this would not harm my files, because they would be set aside, so I gave it a try. Big Mistake because when I got my files back they were unreadable, written in some computer code, which I could not decipher. There was one file, the book that I'm in the process of rewriting, that I couldn't access because it was password protected and even though I had given it this password it still would not let me open it.

At first I panicked thinking that maybe David L Smith had given me his Melissa virus, or Bradley Manning had sent it to Wikileaks. My book A Daughter's Search for her Father has a Nazi link, this is the one I'm rewriting, so maybe some old Nazi War Criminal was afraid that I'm getting too close to the truth. All kinds of crazy thing's go through one's head and nowadays everything is possible.

I finally got in touch with someone from Microsoft who spent three hours trying to solve my problem to no avail. However he claimed that it was not Microsoft that caused the problem but an old word processor that I had used long ago. This did not make me feel any better because the Microsoft word processer had worked for a long time and now all of a sudden it is not compatible. Anyway he did find and loaded this old word processer onto my computer so I could try to repair them myself. I spent numerous hours getting more and more frustrated and finally dumped the whole mess in my garbage can. So I lost a lot of work, it put me six months behind republishing a new version of my book, but I like to thank Microsoft for helping me for three hours and for being very patiently with an old man and next time I will not try to get something that does not have all the kinks ironed out.