Julie Reed was our chairperson for today’s breakfast meeting at Cilantro. Terry performed the Invocation and Toast to Rotary and Australia. Neville, Charles, and Karin joined the meeting via Zoom.
GUEST SPEAKER – Club member and Immediate Vice President Glenda Stahel
Glenda and Warren returned recently from a month’s trip to Thailand and the Philippines where Glenda caught up with Rotary clubs in both countries and visited their local projects that became known to us through her personal and other Rotary connections. Glenda delivered a very informative slide show as a travel dialogue and to illustrate the clubs’ various projects. Their trip commenced with a visit to Thailand where Glenda and Warren joined Rotary friend Alan Brown and his wife Nadia – Alan being a member of the Rotary Club of Royal Hua Hin, and participated in the club’s Fundraiser 13th Amateur Golf Classic at the Banjan Golf Club. Members may recall Alan’s visit to the club in 2023 where he presented on his club’s local projects. The golfing event raised AUD $51,186 that included silent auction and raffles. Slides illustrated the fund raising event at the Banjan Gold Club (a very beautiful and prestigious club in the province), and local life in Thailand. The club has 62 members – many being expats who help fund the club’s programs together with the assistance of other Rotary clubs. The next leg of their trip took them to the Philippines where they joined hosts Arthur Uy and his wife Kathy – members of the Rotary Club of South Davao which became a sister club of BMC during the time of the Rotary International Convention in May 2023. Club members may recall Arthur’s and Kathy’s visit to our club during the week and highlighted their club’s projects that included displays of scarves from the Weaving Centre. Kathy arranged visits to their projects – the first being a school they support that involved a 3 hour trip to a poor village in the mountains where food and other valued items were taken for distribution to students. A video was shown of students performing traditional dance in very colourful traditional costume. Next was a visit to the Weaving Centre of which they are most proud, with slides to demonstrate activities in the centre including looms that had been donated, and a water tank made available through a Save Water Save Lives project. The next visit, and the main reason for visiting South Davao, was to attend Cataract surgery being performed for members of the local indigenous community at the Medical and Dental Mission JP Laurel Elementary School– with 15 operations performed on the first day, and 15 operations on the next. BMC’s donation to the program was acknowledged during Glenda’s and Warren’s visit. South Davao is very health conscious, with No Smoking signs everywhere to promote good health, to the degree ‘smoking corners’ are set up for people to use for smoking and which have on display - illustrated public health warnings about smoking – a bit of public shaming, and to keep the smokers away from everyone else. To ‘cap’ the trip off, Glenda and Warren experienced an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.6 on the Richter scale - and unsurprising since the Philippines are within one of the most earthquake prone regions in the world. Thank you Glenda for your very informative talk – the slides illustrated the living conditions experienced by indigenous communities within SE Asia and the Philippines – countries that are not too far from our own shores. It goes without saying, it is difficult for Rotary Clubs in these countries to raise substantial funds within their own local communities, and rely on the support of other Rotary Clubs to help fund and support their projects to improve the lives of others.
ANNOUNCEMENTS – President Ron.
- Ron received a written response from Coles management who confirmed the use of the car park is shared and not for the exclusive use of Coles patrons.
- Ron distributed a ballot to club members in attendance for marking their preference for the allocation of our club’s donation to ARHF – with the options being i) Indigenous Health Scholarship, ii) Medical Centres, and iii) Medical Research
- The Rotary Clubs of Beaumaris and Sandringham are hosting a fund raising dinner on 24 February at the cost of $70 per person – funds raised will be used for Team Sports for All. Further details will be advertised on our club website.
OTHER ANNOUNCEMENTS
Birthdays and Anniversaries – were announced.
Tina Dias (ROMAC) - Helen N advises Tina (Celestina) Dias, our guest speaker of two weeks ago, has returned home to Indonesia – but not before filling a couple of travel bags with plenty of goodies to take home. Paul and Tim helped out and added to her bag with a pair of Nike shoes. Thank you Paul and Tim.
Fund raiser – Terry mentioned a fund raising event that will be held on 9/3 – more details will be advertised on the club website.
MEETING CLOSE
The meeting was closed with Create Hope in the World.
