Dear Fellow Members,

Despite all the financial anguish taking place, our Society remains very active and we all seem able to continue to enjoy some excellent bottles of wine with excellent food.

1. Forthcoming events

To help cheer you up in these difficult times, your Committee has developed an active programme of events in the coming months:-

31st October 2008 - La Espana Night @ The American Club - This event is currently sold out. Thank you for your great support.

15th November 2008 - Pinot Fantasy Nite at the Chiara Restaurant at The Pier @ Robertson. Details were circulated to members a couple of days ago and vacancies are fast disappearing. Do make your reservation early if you wish to attend this wonderful event that is put together by your Cellar Master.

20th November 2008 - Lunch with David Powell: owner and winemaker of Torbreck wines. A unique chance to meet this icon of the Australian wine industry. Details to be released soon.

27th November 2008 - A Fun Night at New Pulau Ubin Seafood Restaurant - A 10 course seafood dinner with a B-Y-O-B theme for wines. A new experiment for the Society as we have not done anything on this scale before. This is an opportunity for you to let your hair down & forget your worries, whilst enjoying good food, good wines and the best of company!! Price of the dinner will be modest and details to be circulated soon.

13th December 2008 - The President's Dinner @ Grand Hyatt Hotel. Always a highlight of the year, the plans for this dinner are being finalised. Note the date in your diary and don’t miss this iconic event.

The New Year will open with an event in early January and be followed by a Bin End's Night in late February. Plans are being drawn to try and make the Bin End’s event more interesting and different from previous Bin End’s event, so keep a lookout for it in due course.

28th March 2009 – Our Next AGM date, followed by the AGM Dinner - again, mark this date in your diary.

2. Wine Tour of South Africa (Jan 23rd - Jan 30th 2009)

Everything is well under way and 12 members have signed up for the tour, which now costs only around S$3150, owing to the recent decline in the value of the Rand.
This price includes virtually everything, including gourmet meals, except for the air-fare. Mike Gray is now co-ordinating the tour. Anyone who would like to receive more details, please e-mail me at livecds@starhub.net.sg

3. Wine Offers for Members

Sueann has been working with several wine importers to bring some special offers on their wines to our members. Till present, we have brought to you three special deals and offers that are made specially for you as members of the Society. We are continuing in our efforts to bring to you more of such special deals and offers. You will be receiving details of the same once it is made available to the Society.

4. Society Web-site

Your Committee recently reviewed the Society's web-site and felt that it certainly needs some up-dating and revamping. However, some members have queried whether it is necessary for the Society to maintain a site to begin with - with its attendant maintenance costs.

We would welcome your views on whether you think we should have a site or not, and if we should, what facilities should it offer to members. Please e-mail our President at ctchen@acieslaw.com

5. Re-join the I.W.F.S. in London?

Members will recall that, some two - three years ago, the Society resigned from the London Society after a series of disagreements that both sides were not able to be resolve. You would also be aware that the IWFS London representative has approached us enquiring whether our Society would like to re-affiliate with the London body. A special session was arranged for them to address the members during our last AGM with a clear decision and mandate from the members to the Committee at the end of it that the members are “open” to the idea and the Committee is to explore this issue.

We must report that since then till now, nothing noticeable has changed over at the IWFS London side. To the best of our knowledge, the IWFS London is still unable to offer anything new to us to entice our consideration to re-join the IWFS in London, other than those “intangible” benefits that were presented to the members during the last AGM. Their representative is currently in contact with us and they have invited us to state our terms for re-joining but we have not done so, as your Committee feels that this is not a matter that can be decided by the Committee alone without serious consultation with all members. As aptly put by Dr. David Jen, “…On such an important issue such as this … rejoining a society to which everyone has to again make yearly contributions - I think a referendum is essential, and not just be left to the Committee to decide alone.”

General consensus seems to be that we have done well, in fact, very well on our own efforts after leaving them. Do we really want to rejoin the IWFS London or is there really such a need? We would welcome your views on this important matter, and if enough members feel that formal discussions should take place, then your Committee will be pleased to negotiate with their representatives on your behalf. At this stage, it should be said, little seems to have been done by the International organisation to address the problems that led to our withdrawing from the London based body in the very first place.

We need your response to this issue. Please direct all views and comments to our President at ctchen@acieslaw.com on whether this Committee should now pursue the negotiation with the IWFS London representative OR should this Committee just drop the subject altogether as we are happy the way we are now and there is no incentive for us to re-join the international movement.


That is all for now. We look forward to seeing as many of you as possible at the wide range of functions that we have lined up for the next few weeks.

And meanwhile, all the very best to each and everyone of you -

Graham Hayward
Vice President,
IWFS of Singapore