The next Society event is on Wednesday 30th March, when John Ffooks, a solicitor who has worked with many companies and NGOs while based in Antananarivo, will talk on 'Investing in Madagascar – the 101 reasons'. The meeting will be at the new, slightly later time of 6.30 for 7pm, and will include our usual Malagasy food
and free bar.
In June we will have the AGM on Wednesday 15th with a talk on the 'Railways of Madagascar' by Donald Wilson, a former Commercial Director of Kent and Sussex Railways, and then a special event on Sunday 26th June to commemorate Independence Day in Madagascar and the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Society. The event will run from 4pm until 10.30pm at the Irish Cultural Centre in Hammersmith and will feature live entertainment, a DJ, a raffle, an auction, Malagasy food and a free bar. Tickets at just £25 will be on sale soon. We would appreciate having some volunteers to assist in running the event and if you can help, please contact Chris Brown on 07886 095415 or via browncs2001@yahoo.co.uk.
At our last meeting on Wednesday 12th January Douglas Garrod gave an interesting talk on the field trip he led in 2006 to Madagascar for the Gemmological Association of Great Britain, where he is Senior Education Executive.
Our website at www.anglo-malagasysociety.co.uk has a summary of the talks given for those unable to attend, together with much other useful information. This includes directions to the venue for our meetings, which is the Upper Vestry Hall of St George’s Church, Bloomsbury, London WC1A 2HR, close to Holborn, Tottenham Court Road and the British Museum. The website homepage also includes the latest posts from the Society's Twitter profile (username @AngloMalagasy) and has a link to the new Facebook page that we have set up.
The next newsletter will be published in June 2011. Please send any material for inclusion as well as any changes in your contact details to the editor Julian Cooke, whose e-mail address is juliancooke@yahoo.co.uk. We do still plan to publish in the near future an update on the work of charities and NGOs working in Madagascar; please let us know if you have anything that you would like to be included.
Click here to download the complete newsletter.