Past President Cathy opened the meeting with our Land Acknowledgement.

We played a video of the national anthem of Venezuela, where our guest speaker lives and will be visiting us from.

And then, O Canada

Chair Announcements

We are now only 11 days from the District Learning Seminar. The planning committee will meet on Wednesday to ‘dot our i’s and cross our t’s’. It promises to be a fun weekend with plenty of good learning. Every Rotarian is welcome. If you can’t be there in person consider virtual attendance. It’s only $25 for virtual attendance.

The District Conference in Neepawa is only about 8 weeks away. A short drive, and you can choose to attend the whole thing, or just one day.

The Neepawa Club is having a coat drive at the conference in support of the Neepawa Newcomers Coat Room. If you have a coat you no longer need and wish to donate you can bring it along, or if you’re not attending, send it with someone who is going.

And if you have a marine related item to add to the silent auction prize please bring it some time in April.

President David is not well so there will not be a board meeting tomorrow. We are aware that there are a few things that need to be dealt with so we’ll make it happen soon.

Cathy introduced Javier. At a meeting of another board that she is on, Cathy happened to mention Rotary. To which another member, Andreina responded "My brother is a Rotarian". Cathy asked her which club he belonged to and she answered "One in Venezuela".

Well, that was an opportunity that Cathy couldn’t let go by, so she asked if she thought he would be willing to speak to us. Andreina said she would ask.

The next day Cathy received a call on WhatsApp, and it was Javier. He was very willing to speak with us. We had planned to have his sister introduce him this evening, but her flight home from Toronto was cancelled due to poor weather.

Javier is an ENT physician, and a Rotarian. Javier told us about the current socioeconomic and political situation in Venezuela. Life is very difficult there. Educational and medical services are in decline. Speaking out can be dangerous. Javier talked about possibilities for us to help, but did not have much hope for improvement soon. His presentation was very compelling and heartrending.

Cathy thanked Javier.

This evening’s guests were Dawn Hanson, Jean Olibrice, Warren Thompson and Val from Dauphin. Our speaker joined us by zoom.

And DG Wayne sends his regrets. He is in a District Conference planning meeting this evening.

Happy Bucks

• Cathy was happy that her step granddaughter has been accepted to the University of St. Andrews, in Scotland. She was also happy to have successfully registered for the Zone Summit to be held in Cancun next September.
• Jim was happy to be Irish.
• Chuck’s granddaughter will be an ambassador at Folklorama’s Scottish pavilion.
• Peter Tonge enjoyed taking part in an accessible speaker podcast.
• Warren Thompson has almost finished drafting his DLS material. And he had a good meeting with Jeff Merry.
• Alan was happy that his operation went well, although there were some less happy moments when it happened.
• Liz (guest) has an anniversary tomorrow.

Next week

Walter Potrebka will talk to us about wildlife photography and how to get great images with as little impact as possible on your subject.

The following week we will be back to zoom. Nigel will update us on their trip through the Northwest Passage.

And April 6 is Easter Monday, so there will be no meeting.