AROUND TOWN - Feb. 20, 2009

Chamber invites small business owners

The Laguna Beach Chamber of Commerce is partnering with the Small Business Administration to bring a team of small business experts to the city.

The “Tiger Team” helps small business owners with developing a business plan; cash flow projections; staffing plans and inventory control.

The Tiger Team will be at the Chamber’s luncheon, 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Tuesday at Mozambique, 1740 S. Coast Hwy. The cost is $20 for members and $25 for nonmembers.

For more information, call (949) 494-1018 or visit www.lagunabeachchamber.org.

Rotary Club supports school in Afghanistan

Sadiq Tawfiq, a Laguna Beach businessman originally from Afghanistan, founded the Phoenix School in the village of Naween, Afghanistan, for girls and boys ages 4 through 15, in 2003.

The school started with an enrollment of 50 students and two teachers and has expanded to eight teachers and 300 students.

The Rotary Club of Herat and the Rotary Club of Laguna Beach, through a matching grant from Rotary International, spent more than $18,000 in furnishing the enlarged school.

Tawfiq will talk about the school project at the noon meeting Feb. 27 of the Laguna Beach Rotary Club.

The meeting takes place at the Hotel Laguna. To attend, e-mail Sue White, s.white57@cox.net.

Applicants sought for community funds

The City of Laguna Beach is now accepting applications for the Community Assistance Grant Program for fiscal year 2009/10. The program assists local non-profit or public organizations in funding new projects and/or expanding services within the community. Grant applications will be accepted until 5 p.m., Friday, Feb. 27 at the Community Services Department, 515 Forest Ave., next to City Hall. Applications are available at the Community Services Department from Monday through Friday between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m.

Iraq music, culture will come to local church

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship will present “Music and Culture of Iraq: What We Have Not Been Seeing,” led by Cameron Powers, at 10:30 a.m. Sunday and also at 7 p.m. Sunday at the church, 429 Cypress Drive.

Powers and his wife, Kristina, have been performing on the streets of Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, the West Bank and Egypt, singing and playing popular Middle Eastern music.

They have opened music schools at Iraqi refugee camps in Jordan and Syria, and are now training American musicians to travel to middle eastern countries as musical ambassadors of peace.

Afghan women topic of film to be screened Feb. 27

Fairly Frequent Friday Films returns at Neighborhood Congregational Church, 340 St. Ann’s Drive, with a screening of “View From a Grain of Sand,” a documentary film by director/producer/writer Meena Nanji, at 7 p.m. Feb. 27.

Shot in the refugee camps of the North West Frontier Province in Pakistan and Kabul, Afghanistan, the film is a journey through the past 30 years of Afghanistan’s history as lived by three Afghan women.

The film will be followed by Q-and-A with the film maker. Admissions is free.

For more information, call (949) 494-8061.