Coolamon Rotary News Bulletin #44

Coolamon Rotary News Bulletin #44

SEOUL RICON 2016 SPECIAL EDITION

JUNE IS ROTARY’S

FELLOWSHIP MONTH

This week we feature the Beers Rotarians Enjoy Worldwide Fellowship.  Seen at Seoul last week.

Beers Fellowship Launched at Sydney 2014

Beers Fellowship Web Site.

MEETING MONDAY JUNE 6th.  2016

We had a very good role up for a Club Assembly last night 17 members present.

It was our last assembly for President Wayne Lewis’s year and it was a raucous occasion with some business being conducted.  Many jokes were told some good some not so good.

In the upcoming retirement of John Glassford as Foundation Director the members nominated Alex Thompson as Foundation Director 2016-2017 and the Board will ratify Alex’s nomination on Wednesday night.  Alex will become the youngest Director of our club in memory.

Grahame Miles reported on Bingo and Dave McKinley on Moo Poo and also requested absence of leave as Dave is going to the Outback for some R&R.

The raffle was won by Henk and Ted conducted another amusing sometimes hilarious fines session.

There will be no meeting on Monday 13th June as it is the Queen’s Birthday holiday weekend.

John Glassford called for members to form the 2019 DISCON working committee in conjunction with the RC of Griffith.

Reminder that Bingo is on this Thursday.

We need names for our change over dinner please advise Henk Hulsman or Ian Jennings.

Diary Reminders

Wednesday June 8th Last Board Meeting for 2015-2016.

Thursday June 9th BINGO: Henk Hulsman (Capt), Trevor Parkes, Ted Hutcheon, Dick Jennings.

Monday 13th June NO Meeting Queen’s Birthday

Monday 20th June LAST Meeting for 2015-2016

Saturday June 25th D9700 Change Over in Orange Hotel Conobolas.

*Monday June 27th Change Over Dinner at Coolamon. 

*Partners and Guests Night.

Apologies for Monday meetings call Ian Jennings on 0428 492 157  BY FRIDAY 12.00 pm.

ON THE LIGHTER SIDE

This week here is the Korean interpretation of how to boil an egg in a microwave.  Seen in the breakfast room of my hotel in Seoul click on the images for a larger picture:

My hotel, The Hotel Icon Anguk, Seoul.  Hard to find but a quarter of the cost of the official hotels.

It was FUN!  Especially the shower in a basin.

HOTEL ICON WEB SITE.

REPORT FROM JOHN GLASSFORD COOLAMON & RAGES DELEGATE TO SEOUL RICON 2016

Be a Gift to the World – Mahātria Rā, Spiritualist

This is one of the sessions that I missed however you and I can watch him here.

Happiness is the way I saw the whole convention and my first visit to Seoul.

The best part for me was meeting every day Koreans on the metro every day.  Finding small eating places with wonderful food.  The Koreans’ happy faces, no policemen with guns, only one baton.  The efficient and super clean metro trains, zero graffiti.  So many happy memories that reminds me what the Object Rotary is all about, friendship through acquaintance!

I do not have enough space here ot convey all of my memories however here are some photos in thumb nail format.

PRESIDENT K.R. RAVINDRAN “RAVI”

RI President K.R. Ravindran closed the convention in Korea on Wednesday, 1 June, with a poignant story about his mother’s fight to survive polio at age 30.

When Ravindran was 11 years old in his native Sri Lanka, his mother awoke one day feeling weak and short of breath. Sitting down to rest, she found herself unable to move. The polio virus had quickly invaded her nervous system, resulting in paralysis.

She was placed in an iron lung at the hospital to enable her to breathe, and was told that her chances of walking, or even surviving without a ventilator, were slim. But most Sri Lankan hospitals were not equipped with ventilators in 1963.

Ravindran’s grandfather, a Rotary member, hosted a club committee meeting in his living room the evening after his daughter was rushed to the hospital. Rather than simply offer consolation, his fellow members went to work, using their business acumen and professional connections to find a ventilator.

One of the members was a bank manager who called a government minister to facilitate a quick international transfer of funds. Another member, a manager at Swiss Air, arranged to have a ventilator flown in. The next day, it arrived at the hospital.

FULL STORY HERE.

Find out how Rotary members are improving the lives of mothers and children in Nigeria and Pakistan. http://on.rotary.org/1QXrPQj

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon joined us at the Rotary Convention and shared that “Rotary’s Polio Plus has helped to avert massive suffering. Some 16 million people who otherwise would have been paralyzed by polio can walk now. Around a million and a half children are alive today thanks to Polio Plus. I thank you for such a great contribution.”

District 9700 Web Site

ROTARY INFORMATION

This week we concentrate on the Rotary International Convention Seoul 2016.

Here is a summary of the event from PP Ron  Ron Nethercutt RC of Mabalacat, The Philippines and  D 3790 Information Chair & Fellowship Director.  Ron is also Past Chair of ROTI and a great friend.  (Rotarians On The Internet Fellowship).  You can down load the report below in pdf, this was published in the Korea Joongang daily newspaper.

This is a very good report and worth reading.

RICON 16

Members of Rotary and Rotaract, wearing traditional Korean attire, get ready for the Walk for Peace in Seoul Plaza on Saturday, 28 May. Photo Credit: S.J. Cho

Korean Pop Icon PSY set the hall on fire with his electrifying performance. His internationally acclaimed ‘Gangnam Style’ had the audience up and dancing, and ended up with some amazing performers from around the world BUT that is a  story for another time.

RAGES NEWS

This week we look at the RAGES booth at the Seoul Rotary International Convention 2016.

Our booth was just behind but hidden by the RI Resource centre.  We were located with all the other Action Groups.

I attended the Action Groups Chair meeting run by Marion Bunch.

We had plenty of material for our RAGES booth and did not run out of forms or cards.  I had my lap top with a power point presentation on loop at all times.

If I may make a comment; we in the Action Groups area had one or two unmanned booths.  We were located behind the RI area right at the back end of the massive hall.  We experienced a very low visitor rate.  No Korean no Japanese Rotarians stopped at our booth and only a few I am told stopped at the other Action Groups.

My observations indicated that the Koreans and Japanese only came for one day and the opening ceremony.  I maybe wrong but I do not think so.  However the visitors that came to our end where genuine and most sought us out.  So quality v quantity in Seoul.  The RI staff also wrote to a couple of the Action Group booths to say that they must stay until closing time and not leave early.  Fair enough.

I have no complaints even though I missed every plenary as I wanted to be at the RAGES booth.  My sincere thanks to PDG Barbara Shayeb-Helou for all the help on our booth which gave me time to go do some souvenir shopping and have a break.

Our break out session was very well attended and our Moderator PRIVP Anne L. Matthews did a very professional job and thanks so much Anne for being there.  On the panel was Moderator Anne with PDG Barbara Shayeb-Helou and PE RIBI Eve Conway.  Plenty of genuine questions from the floor and we finished on time and in time to get to the closing ceremony.  That was something special for another day.

The organising committee are to be congratulated.

The RAGES booth before the opening all ready to go!

The RAGES shirt with Tears of the Rhino got a lot of attention!

Above Rotaractor Oyumaa Davaajav from the Rotaract Club of Nairamdal Mongolia.  Oyumaa wants to save the remaining 22 Mazaalai bears from extinction in her country Mongolia.  Oyumaa also made us aware of the plight of the White Tiger in Mongolia.

Nairamdal Rotaract Club Facebook Page

Mazaalai – this simple mongolian world means Gobi Bear who inhabits in the Gobi desert of Mongolia. No other place on the entire Earth is home for this rare specie of Bear. Its scientific name is Ursus Arctos Gobiensis. It’s listed in the Red Book of Mongolia with a status of VERY RARE. They were found in the Desert of Aj Bogdo of West Altai mountain ranges in early 1920s. Mazaalai is near extinction & globally threatened bear.

The last 22 members of this brown bear subspecies (known in Mongolian as mazaalai) live near three oases in the Gobi Desert, where the golden-coloured animals subsist on a mostly vegetarian diet of hardy desert roots and other plants.

But rising temperatures appear to have already started reducing the available water in the Gobi, making those plants harder to find and threatening the future of the bear.

 

RAGES WEB SITE       JOIN RAGES HERE.

ONLY IN AFRICA KOREA

FOOTNOTE