President Doug and PDG Nancy’s bell got the meeting going at 5:45 PM. This was followed by a video of O Canada sung in Urdu at Markham City Hall in 2015 in the presence of the Consul General of Pakistan and other dignitaries – in recognition of the 68th National Day of Pakistan. The anthem was conducted by illustrious Pakistani music director Sohail Rana (who is also the recipient of the United Nations “Messenger of Peace” award).
The thought of the week came from Ghandi “The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.”
SARGE
Sarge Mike introduced two guests – Rotarian Nancy Cosway from the Rotary Club of Winnipeg and our guest speaker Howard Koks.
ROTARY MOMENTS
The District 5550 Evening Talk Show on February 4th was “zoom-bombed” by several hackers who had found the particulars of the Zoom meeting posted on a Twitter account. The district has advised that henceforth security for Zoom meetings will have to be “tightened up” by using random meeting numbers and random passwords. A second level of security will be the use of the Zoom waiting room, where President Doug will allow entry to persons he recognizes. This will take place for the Feb 22nd meeting and be given a trial run (with new meeting particulars to be sent out) for the lobster dinner committee meeting scheduled for this Thursday.
At the last Board meeting Jack has advised that a large ($1200) food order has been delivered to Westgrove School.
The Rotary Club of Ottawa will be holding a virtual “Rotary Adventures in Citizenship” this year. Glenn and Iain will be canvassing the three high schools in our area for candidates interested in participating.
DG Gailmarie has advised that the parents of a female Czech student currently attending Balmoral Hall and living in the dorm there is seeking a Rotary host family for her next and final year as a Balmoral Hall student. Her mother is a Rotarian in Prague. PDG Jim reminded members that hosting a foreign exchange student without the structure of the Rotary Student Exchange program behind it could be risky. DGE Dan Sutton followed up on the request to see if anyone was interested in hosting this student. If you are, let President Doug know.
The Assiniboine Forest Enhancement Committee (and its marketing committee) is continuing its work towards its set goals.
Nancy Cosway mentioned the idea of having Rotary clubs in Winnipeg getting together to prepare an article about what Rotary is and does for publication in the Winnipeg Free Press.
For the two dogs living with Catherine and Paul, 2020 was a good year.
For their humans, it started off with a holiday on Phu Quoc Island off the coast of Vietnam at the end of December 2019 and included a New Years Eve party, followed by a Vietnam Imperial History tour from south to north, learning about the Vietnam war history, Vietnam culture and visiting many beautiful locations. They returned to Canada before the travel restrictions were imposed.
In February, a visit to a snow maze and some tobogganing and a sleigh ride was one of the few family times that were enjoyed before the pandemic arrived.
In March, COVID took over Catherine’s work life as a physician who looks after patients with compromised immune systems. On March 16th she worked at her last traditional medical clinic. Most of her work has been done virtually since then – about 40% of the time from home.
In May, June and July she and Paul stayed at home and the dogs really liked that!
In August, there was finally some family time again at a cottage at Sioux Narrows.
In the fall, Catherine got into running – races done virtually – as well as doing yoga and exercises with weights.
For Catherine’s birthday on October 17th, her mother-in-law gave her a couple of beautiful needle art works of their dogs. On October 31st Halloween was allowed in Headingley and Paul enjoyed dressing up for the event.
In December, the American Society of Hematology held a virtual meeting and Catherine was amazed at how effectively it mimicked the live meeting.
The pandemic has increased Catherine’s appreciation of personal family and home time as well as the ability to leverage technology to allow for flexibility in how work gets done. She has received both shots of COVID19 vaccine.
At the next club meeting (to be held February 22nd) Nancy Hansen will do the Rotarian Show & Tell. In following meetings, President Doug has asked members to make presentations (travelogues) on where they would like to visit once travel restrictions due to COVID-19 are removed.
HOWARD KOKS, Executive Director of The Dream Factory
The Dream Factory is a Manitoba-based charity that has been around since 1983 and used to be called the Rainbow Society. They have done more than 800 dreams now. Who do they do the dreams for? Kids with life-threatening illnesses. A nurse has told Howard that years ago a child with cancer had a 20% chance of surviving, but now that has been increased to 80%. He is impressed with the resiliency and enthusiasm of children. They all come to The Dream Factory as referrals. He suggested that if one wanted to refer a child with a life-threatening illness to them, speak to the family first – they have to give the okay for the referral. Traditionally, prior to the pandemic, 70% of the dreams involved a trip and 45% of the trips were to Disneyland, where they are typically taken to Disney’s “Give Kids the World”. This is a non-trips are to Disney. All the families stay at the Give Kids the World Village, a non-profit resort near Disneyland for children with critical illnesses and their families that provides accommodations and access to donated theme park tickets. Families that faced the darkness of the child’s life-threatening illness recall the brightness of the week they spent at Give Kids the World. Because some parents have to be at the hospital with their child 24 hours a day for months on end, sometimes needing to quit a job to take 12 hour shifts at the hospital. The Dream Factory also offers Family Funds up to $2,500 to help out parents under financial duress. Trips to Italy, Australia, Philippines, Egypt (e.g. to meet their grandparents) have been covered, but dreams to purchase computers or games have also been covered. With the pandemic, fundraising has been adversely affected and 15 dreams have had to be cancelled, and more local dreams are being done. The number of staff at The Dream Factory who raise funds and do “dreams with the families has been reduced from 6 to 4.
Typical fundraising (prior to the pandemic) has included a big Gala Dinner (raises more than $650,000), a golf tournament ($150,000), and general donations ($700,000), from which event overheads are then subtracted. They also pick up some deals and have some bequests as reserves The Dream Factory never says no to qualified kids. The highest number of Dreams fulfilled in a year has been 38.
President Doug thanked Harold for his presentation.
Sergeant Mike asked if there were any “Happy Bucks”.
HAPPY BUCKS
Chuck was babysitting his granddaughter Kinley earlier today. She decided that it would be fun to walk around the block with walkie-talkies – Kinley headed north and Chuck headed south and they met on the other side of the block. It was fun chatting away to each other as they walked apart and then back together – but it was also COLD (-32°C)!!!
Lloyd was happy that his daughter received her second COVID vaccine shot, with no ill effects.
Lorraine reported that Glenda Werbowski was happy to learn that the hairdressers are back and she would soon get her hair cut. She’s quite lonely right now due to pandemic restrictions.
PDG Ed was happy that he got his hair cut very recently.
BIRTHDAYS
Lorraine announced, since we will not be meeting next Monday, that her husband PDG Jim will be celebrating a birthday on February 17th.
Darvin presented a $5 bill for his birthday on February 11th – being a year older brings him closer to being eligible for his COVID vaccination.
PDG Ed will be celebrating his birthday on February 16th.
Nancy Hansen celebrated her birthday on February 7th and her husband Peter will be a year older on February 14th.
Glenn announced that he has a birthday on February 16th, same day as Ed.
NEXT MEETING – February 22, 2021
There will be no meeting next Monday due to the Louis Riel Day on Monday, February 15th. On February 22nd Nancy Hansen will be our Rotarian Show & Tell speaker, and our guest speaker will be Owen Stanley, a member of the Rotary International Fellowship that PDG Ed met through that organization. Owen will talk about his preparations for a 2000 mile hike that he will be undertaking starting March 15th as a fundraiser for Polio Plus.
