Pamela was born in Wairoa, but due to her father’s occupation, spent her early years moving to different places, each time across the Cook Strait.Pamela and her family have had an exciting life before Bridge, being intrepid sailors. It is ten years now since they arrived back in NZ from their circumnavigation with their family on their yacht Essence. Their children were 5 and 7 years old when they left NZ and 12 and 14 when they sailed back into our waters. Their adventures were many and it certainly was a different, wonderful and simple way of life, having few possessions and clothes to match. They all had a slightly wild look about them when friends and family welcomed them home.Her introduction to Bridge came when her husband's Aunty Helen thrust a flyer into her hand about a year after her family arrived at the Mount, saying "'this is for you". She looked at the lessons on offer and went along, loving it from the first night.

Brian was born in Hamilton and has lived in Ohaupo all his life. He was educated at Ohaupo Primary school and then went on to Mighty Melville High School.He had always enjoyed playing cards though no other members of his family play Bridge. About seven years ago a friend, John Hickey, explained the basics of the game and he was hooked. John then introduced him to the Waikato club where he now plays the Acol system.Brian has a wide variety of other interests including watching Test Cricket and playing tennis and table tennis in his spare time, when he is not relaxing. He enjoys travelling and earlier this year with his wife Dianne, he enjoyed a trip to Malaysia and Singapore along with other members of his family.This is the first time Brian has represented the region, we hope it will be the first of many.Good luck Brian, we are all rooting for you!

.. and not because we're in need of more help in the Waikato Bays region. Read on ..

Wearing her Bridge-It Jane hat (not NZB Board member hat) Jane Stearns is encouraging all clubs to give their members this introduction to the Nesting Pairs course:

The Rotorua site is seeking to update the personal information of its members. This is both topical and typical for clubs at this time of year as they prepare to print their 2018 programme books. There is a quite brilliant feature in Compass that not many people have tried though it's been there for a while. In the Club database under the EMail Options tab there is a function to email or print for all members a personal dump of just what data is held on them by Compass. This seems a pretty good way of getting everything squeaky-clean at any time.