AWC Going Dutch March April 2021

Virtual General Meetings
by Melissa Rider
March General Meeting
It’s time for potty
talk! Most of us
do not give much
thought to the centerpiece
of our bathrooms,
but the toilet
is an unexpected
paradox. On the one
hand, it is a modern
miracle: a ubiquitous
fixture in a vast sanitation
system that has
helped add decades
to human lifespan by reducing disease. On
the other hand, the toilet is also a tragic
failure: less than half of the world’s population
can access a toilet that safely manages
body waste, including many in the US. And
it is inefficient, squandering clean water as
well as the nutrients, energy, and information
contained in the waste we flush away.
While we see radical technological change
in almost every other aspect of our lives, we
remain stuck in a sanitation status quo—in
part because the topic of toilets is taboo.
Fortunately, there’s hope—from a growing
army of scientists, engineers, philanthropists,
entrepreneurs, and activists who are overcoming
their aversions and focusing their
formidable skills on making toilets accessible
and healthier for all. Science journalist
Chelsea Wald, a Club Member since 2016,
has spent years plunging into the topic of
the toilet for her book,
PIPE DREAMS: The
Urgent Global Quest
to Transform the
Toilet, forthcoming
on April 6 from Avid
Reader Press/Simon
and Schuster (available
for preorder from
your favorite bookseller).
Chelsea will
talk about the process
of research and
10 GOING DUTCH
Welcome New Members!
Diane Dream
Arlene Houk
writing her book, as well as what she has
learned. This will be followed by a lively
discussion, to which you are invited to bring
your own toilet stories and most pressing
questions about this most necessary infrastructure.
Thursday, March 11
Via Google Meet
10 a.m. Social Time
10:15 a.m. Club Business
10:30 a.m. Guest Speaker
April General Meeting: VOTE!
This marks the anniversary of our first ever
AWC Virtual General Meeting. It’s unfortunate
that we still must meet virtually, but
the Board is thankful that the technology
of video conference calls to the layperson
has been able to keep our social and philanthropic
club active this past year during the
trials and tribulations of the various coronavirus
restrictions imposed throughout 2020
and now into 2021.
Voting for your Board is one of the key responsibilities
of being a Member of our
AWC. The Board oversees all aspects of
the Club with the help of committees and
volunteers. With guidance by the Chair,
Celeste Brown, the Nominating Committee
Members – Laurie Martecchini, Una
Mulvihill, Sarah Partridge, Minal Rajan,
Jo van Kalveen, and Peggy van Luyn –
have worked hard to put together a Slate of
Officers for the 2021-22 Club Year. A big
thank you goes out to all of them for their
time and commitment.
In addition to voting on the Slate of Officers,
there will be a vote on the modification
of the Membership Dues categories for
Students and Nonresident Affiliates. These
changes to the By-Laws under Article 1:
Membership, Section C: Dues are points #8
and #9. Student Memberships (#8) will now
have the added age qualification of being 25
years old or younger. The requirement to be
studying full-time in the Netherlands with
a valid ID remains the same. Nonresident
Affiliate Memberships (#9) will decrease in
cost to € 15.
Two hundred and thirty-nine years ago,
on April 19, 1782, the United Provinces
recognized the independence of the
United States of America. On October 8 of that
same year, the US and the United Provinces
signed the Treaty of Amity and Commerce,
the longest standing treaty to which the US
is a party. The Dutch then loaned us money
to sustain the American Revolution.
Who we are and what we have become is
rooted in our Dutch heritage. John Adams, our
second President and first ambassador to the
Netherlands lived in The Hague. In fact, the
very first embassy building our country ever
owned was located at Fluwelen Burgwal 18 in
a house he purchased and said was “suitable
for a Hotel Des Etats-Unis”―an American
Embassy. Now it is the site of a city parking
garage!
Our sixth President, John Quincy Adams,
and his brother, Charles Francis, attended
Leiden University. Presidents Martin Van
Buren, Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin
Delano Roosevelt directly trace their ancestry
to the Provinces of Gelderland and Zeeland.
Resolutions may only be adopted if a quorum
of at least 15% of the Membership is
present or validly represented at the meeting.
If you cannot join the meeting virtually,
then you can vote by email by contacting
our Parliamentarian, Georgia Regnault,
at parliamentarian@awcthehague.org before
the meeting.
After voting, there will be a FAWCO update
on their March Virtual General Meeting as
well as their 2020 – 2022 Target Project:
S.A.F.E. (Safe Alternatives to FGM
Elimination). A fun fundraising event for
the Target Project at this meeting is in the
planning stages as we go to print, so stay
tuned via Facebook and eNews for more
information. Please RSVP via our online
AWC Calendar or Wild Apricot App by
April 7.
Thursday, April 8
via Google Meet
10 a.m. Social Time
10:10 a.m. Voting
10:20 a.m. FAWCO Update
10:30 a.m. Fundraising Fun
Dutch-American Friendship Day
by Roberta Enschede
Other Americans who have shaped and
continue to shape our country also have roots
in this nation: Walt Whitman, poet; Herman
Melville, author; Thomas Alva Edison, inventor;
Humphrey Bogart, Henry, Jane and
Peter Fonda, actors; Bruce Springsteen,
singer and poet; Walter Cronkite, news commentator;
Eleanor Roosevelt, human rights
activist; and General (ret) David Petraeus,
to name a few.
To honor the contributions of the Dutch
nation, a resolution declaring April 19th
Dutch-American Friendship Day was passed
by the House and Senate on the occasion
of the Bicentennial of Dutch-American
Relations in 1982.
Each year, OAR ~ Overseas Americans
Remember commemorates Dutch-American
Friendship Day. If it is possible this April, it
will happen once more.
We encourage our fellow Americans to
reach out to your Dutch neighbors and friends
to create your very own Dutch-American
Friendship Day.
MARCH/APRIL 2021 11