President Joan took the reins at precisely 12:15. In her preliminary comments, she advised that John Edgell’s mother had passed away. She had expressed condolences on behalf of the club and a condolence card was circulated at the meeting.
Joan advised our Mexico project is complete and would be formally completed in a visit next month by the Royal Oak club (our partner club on the project). Pictures will be on our website. Joan also advised as we approach End Polio Day in Rotary’s calendar, that this year for the first time there were no new reported cases of polio in India. New cooperative efforts were also underway between India, Afghanistan and Pakistan to take further steps together to eradicate polio. The end is in sight!
A rousing, bifurcated version of O Canada was commenced with the request to “Tom” whereupon Tom C leapt into song and Tom L leapt on the piano (almost at the same time). All ended well!!
Announcements:
A special presentation was conducted by Heather and Leslie. They acknowledged the incredible support provided for the Merrython by Jenny and Janet from the rec centre. A bouquet of flowers was presented to each with thanks from the club for supporting a very successful event. Heather also led a discussion on the fluctuating lunch crowd and the difficulties it was creating for the kitchen staff planning. As a trial, a request was made to all members to let Lynne Murray know each week if you are planning to attend or not and whether you are planning to bring guests. Heather will follow up this request by an e-mail to everyone in the club.
Peter reminded people that tickets were on sale for the Spring Concert. Everyone please consider buying tickets and inviting friends, colleagues and family. We now have some sponsors and are looking for more. Sponsorship levels range from $100 to $750+. The concert is March 24th at 2:30 p.m. at St. Mary’s the Virgin Church on Elgin Road (off Oak Bay Ave.). Tickets are $25 ($22.50 for seniors and students). Tickets are available from David Sills, Bob Schelle, Heather, Pablo and Peter. We need help from everyone to sell out. For people interested in sponsoring, please contact anyone on the team above.
Irvin from the Saanich club advised people that his club was conducting a flower sale on April 4th. You can order flowers from their club; they are $17.00 and will be delivered anywhere in Greater Victoria.
Guests and Visiting Rotarians: Peter misplaced his list of visitors so apologizes for the oversight of missing our visitor from Australia and Barry Mutter’s guest (and others I may have missed!).
Celebrations Master (aka Fines Maestro):
Jack Petrie led a spirited assault on the wallets of everyone present! Starting off with, “What special day is it today?” No one had the right answer (start of Mardi Gras!) so everyone dipped in for a dollar! He then proceeded to nail people for talking; Renate for missing being a greeter; and Joan for her hats. Audaciously, he enrolled everyone into the fining game by creating the role of “Fines Master Squealer” – a fining free-for-all ensued – Dallas for showing off her tanned legs, Tom L because Jack makes him feel good, Jim F telling a Newfie story about tees, balls and the things the folks from Ford think about, and so it went for enthusiastically wresting cash from the crowd! Tav won the draw and offered to buy everyone a drink (no maybe that was just wishful thinking!)
Guest Speaker: David Westler introduced our guest speaker, Nancy Gilbert.
Nancy is a water and sanitation expert and project management for a Rotary WASRAG (Water and Sanitation Rotary Action Group). She has been involved in several projects around the world. She is also a member of the West shore Rotary club. Nancy advised us that one of the primary objectives of WASRAG is to reduce the # of people who do not have access to clean water and sanitation by > 50% by 2015. They are on track for achieving the clean water objective. They are woefully behind on the sanitation objective. Nancy advised that projects often fail after 5 years. People don’t have the ongoing money, training, or a strategy for sustainability for many of the sanitation projects. Rivers in remote areas are often the highway, the water source, the food source, bathing and hygiene source and the sewage receiver. One in four people in the world do not have access to suitable sanitation. Big challenges for projects include: a) no system for learning model practices; b) don’t know what each other are doing; c) no system for sharing learning. Rotary’s response is a game plan called “Start With Water” to build sustainable projects. Elements include: a) establish a WASRAG team in each region (including ours); b) develop PPP’s (Program, Planning and Performance teams); c) develop alternative funding sources to augment the foundation; d) create an interactive website for sharing best practices, finding project status and results, communicate between projects.
Nancy gave us several examples of initiatives working, particularly on the Niger Delta.
People can join the Wasrag for this region for $25 and can contact Nancy at nancy.gilbert@wasrag.org
Neil Madsen thanked Nancy and pointed out that in Victoria we can’t be smug about water. “We have a first world supply of water and third world sanitation system dumping into the straits!” A Rotary mug was presented to enjoy our clean water supply.
Jim F and Joan finished with a rotary moment, a YouTube of street musicians, who have polio, singing and playing a moving song of the sadness, disruption and pain of having polio. [Note from Tricia: Not sure if this is the same YouTube video, but I found it online and thought it definitely worth watching. Peter's notes said the video was from Nigeria, but these performers are a group of street musicians who are paraplegic polio victims living in and around the grounds of Kinshasa Zoo, in the Democratic Republic of Congo.]
Meeting closed with Tom L leading God Save the Queen at precisely 1:30
No comments:
Post a Comment