President Peter welcomed all members and guest Beau Villaneuva to the meeting.
Toast
Chris Switzer gave a toast to the Rotary Club of Kowloon North.
Announcements
Sally O’Neill reported another successful Rotary Bridge Day on 23 August. There were lots of raffle prizes donated by various club members, 3 prizes of which were won by Rotarians! To date $3,920 was raised with the final amount to be calculated shortly. Sally thanked the club members, their partners and friends who were involved in making the day such a success, particularly those who made the delicious slices. (See Sally’s report elsewhere in the Bulletin.)
Luke Keighery spoke about the ShelterBox award the club received from RI – the Emerald Supporters Award. To date our club has donated over $60k to ShelterBox which has enabled the purchase of 61 Shelterboxes.
Luke also reminded members of the upcoming Nusa Tengarra Donor Tour from 15-22 November. The cost of the trip is about $2k-2.5k, and so far one person is interested in going. Please let Luke know ASAP if you would like to take part in this trip.
Barry Anderson spoke about the International Committee’s Timor Leste project and the global grant for US$24k as well as a contribution from Rotary Club of Roseville Chase. See the President’s Message below for more details.
Kim Wilkins announced the next bookstall will be held on 15 September at the Plaza. Also, the Plaza is running an event for Indigenous Literacy Day and is looking for donations of children’s books. Please check to see if you have any books you can donate for this event and bring them to next week’s meeting.
Garth Carter announced that 29 November has been set for the Mock Interviews at WGHS. This year there are 160 girls involved and therefore 16 or 17 volunteers are needed. Please see Garth if you would like to help out with these interviews.
Eleanor Chevor needs knitters! Woollen “jumpers” are being used to save the lives of fairy penguins which come ashore covered in oil. They are put on these penguins to protect them until they are able to have the oil washed off their feathers. If you are a knitter, Eleanor can give you the pattern to knit up some of these coverings. Please contact Eleanor for more details.
Rob Coote spoke about the joint project with Wellington RC to take 744 children from Wellington and its surrounds to Dubbo Zoo for the day. You can read the details of the project in the emails he sent to all members on 26 & 28 August. Rob is looking for club members interested in travelling to Wellington and attending the Zoo with the children and the parents and teachers involved, and in running the barbecue lunches for the children on the day. The dates for the Zoo visits are Sept 11, 18 & 25; Oct 16, 23 & 30; and Nov 2.
Congratulations to Fay!
Fay Petrou was recognised as a Paul Harris Fellow by Rotary International for her personal contribution and tangible and significant commitment to Rotary and its ideals. Valda Andrews presented Fay with her award and she was duly congratulated.
President's Message
30 August was the 20th anniversary of the vote for Independence by the citizens of Timor Leste. A month later Australia led a UN force to help support Timor Leste to create a peaceful future. Our Club has been active over those 20 years with wonderful and successful projects to help this extremely poor and devastated country.
Today Timor Leste has made marvellous progress although poverty remains high and huge unemployment still impacts severely. In an ABC radio interview with Jose Ramos Horta last week he spoke of their progress noting in 1999 they had 19 doctors. Today, after huge effort, they have over a thousand doctors. They also have electricity covering 80% of the country and have hospitals and clinics in all regions. In 2018, after a major campaign, they had no reported cases of Malaria after centuries of devastation by this horrific infection.
Our projects have included sending a container load of school equipment to Dili, the building of a teacher training centre in Same about 120 km, or over 3 hrs, from Dili on still poor roads. We have also completed a water pipeline and tank project in Letefoho, 70 km (over 2 hrs) from Dili.
On Tuesday I was able to announce that we are about to commence another water and sanitation project for Timor Leste. This time it is for the village of Ermera, a small settlement about 60 km (2 hrs) from Dili. The project will also include water supply to a school of 920 students, the dormitories and a new toilet block in the marketplace. The Foundation of Rotary International has awarded us a Global Grant of US$24,000 to do the work. We will contribute another US$12,000 and we have been helped by the generous support of Roseville Chase Rotary Club and some of our fellow members.
In carrying out our projects we do not just send money but have overseen all phases of the projects and our members have visited Timor Leste. Those members include Ian Burnet & Tony Clifford to Same, Barry Anderson & Denis Fernandez to Letefoho and Barry, Liz Grey & Luke Keighery to Ermera, to scope and plan the projects and monitor progress.
Life in Timor Leste is slowly improving with international support and its own efforts. Our Club is also making a difference and Timor Leste is on a path to a much brighter future.
Peter Antaw
Guest Speaker - Garth Carter
Garth Carter gave a presentation on how club members can access through the web on the club's Cloud Drive all of the photographs of the various club activities over the past few years. He has sent an email to all members with details of his presentation and the link to access the photos which is https://tinyurl.com/ClubPhotographs . Click on the link or if that doesn't work, copy and paste the link into your browser.
Thank you to Garth for adding this facility to access the club's archive of photographs.
Rotary Bridge Day
The Club’s third annual Bridge Day was held on Friday 23 August and was a great success, with 19 tables of bridge players and a net profit of $4,062 made. This means just over $2,000 to each of the beneficiary charities for the day - Rotarians Against Malaria - PNG, and Rural Aid’s Buy a Bale.
The event was held at Northbridge Golf Club, and the service was excellent. Our bridge playing guests loved the venue and the sandwich lunch provided. Mayor Gail Giles-Gidney officially opened the event and told everyone what wonderful projects the Club has been, and is, involved in together with details of where the funds raised are spent. Then two of our Rotarians, Susan Law and Barry Anderson, spoke about the charities of the day, prompting our guests to buy even more raffle tickets. We are very grateful for the many prizes donated to the Raffle by generous Rotarians.
Thank you to the 10 Rotarians who volunteered their help on the day and the ladies who made the delicious cakes and slices for our guests’ lunch. Finally, thanks to Fay and her friend Filanphie who ran the Gift table, showing off Filanphie’s talents as an artist and cook of beautiful chocolates and fudges and to Amy Brittain for donating her homemade jams and bath salts.
Sally O’Neill
DID YOU KNOW
Do you know how our extensive club history originated? In 2000, Don Landers was in hospital for what he initially thought would be 8 days. Unfortunately he contracted golden staph and remained there for 30 days, followed by a further 6 weeks at home with daily visits from the District Nurse. At the time he had been appointed the Club Archivist and had all the copies of the club bulletins and all the old Board minute books. In order to keep occupied, Don trawled through all those documents gathering together the information and summarising what the club had done in each year since it was chartered. He has continued to do this every year since, making it into what is now a treasured and extensive 35 year history of our club. Whilst some other Rotary clubs have club histories on their website, none is as comprehensive as the one we have on ours.
When you enter this church it may be possible that you hear “the call of God”. However, it is unlikely the He will call you on your mobile. Thank you for turning off your phones. If you want to talk to God, enter, choose a quiet place and talk to Him. If you want to see Him, send Him a text while driving.
The Northbridge Rotary Club held its Changeover Dinner recently at the Gunners Barracks in Mosman. The Presidential chains of office were handed over to Peter Antaw who will serve as President for the next 4 months. This is an unusual year where the presidential role will be shared by three people.
Peter Antaw was President of the Club in 2002-3 and, at that time, there were just 2 females amongst the 58 members. In the article below titled ‘Peter takes over’, he expressed the need for more women in the Club. This has certainly been achieved. There are now 13 female members and they were captured on film relaxing and having fun at the dinner.
Later in the evening, Paul Harris Awards were presented to Rob Coote, Kevin Tattrie and Liz Grey for their exceptional contribution to the Club over the past 3+ years.
The Rotary Club of Northbridge is one of the largest and most dynamic Clubs and new members and guests are always welcome. For more details, please contact email: secretary@northbridgerotary.com.au
