•         Meeting started at:  7pm on Monday, April 3rd

•         Amin: Toast to the King and Canada

•         Bob Dodds provided the Invocation.

•        Attendance was appx. 21 members, including Bob Miskelly and David Peters    from a distance. David Hoyle was welcomed as our newest members, he will be inducted in 2 weeks.

•        Fine Master/Happy Bucks:  Rae Townsend, 

• Fines: Who has his 155th Birthday coming up on April 19th……? Paul Harris 

• Happy Bucks:  lots of happy people

•        George Vincent: Rotary Minute Announcement:

- Introduction to the committees within our club, and encouraged members to participate in at least two of them.

Classification Talk by:  Martin Reist

Martin was born in Switzerland. As a young adult he did some military service and then worked in logistics in various industries in Zurich such as chocolate, food etc.

Met his wife, Nicole, in Toronto at a business conference. They lived in Zurich where they raised three boys.

At age 47 Martin decided to be an entrepreneur and moved with his family to Oakville where he started his own successful business. Found balancing work life and family life challenging as an entrepreneur. Martin is empathetic of the many newcomers to Canada regarding the many challenges they face.

Martin is approaching retirement and has developed a succession plan for his business with one of his sons.

Martin enjoys cycling with his E-Bike, has already done 50km in one day this spring.

Martin & Nicole have hosted numerous high school students from abroad who wish to study in Oakville. He spoke of the strong relationship he and Nicole have developed with the students and their parents. Students came from Switzerland and China. Martin, Nicole and their boys found hosting students very rewarding. He shared a Chinese proverb related to their experience of hosting:

“If you want happiness for an hour- take a nap

If you want happiness for a day – go fishing

If you want happiness for a year – inherit a fortune

If you want happiness for a lifetime – help someone else”

Martin mentioned he found the fireside chat that George Farrow had hosted in November very welcoming. Listening to stories of what some Rotarians had done was similar to how he and Nicole felt hosting students.

• Announcements:

Ralf mentioned the following Rotary events in Oakville:

Rotary Club of Oakville West: Oakville Awards for Business Excellence on April 26th with the Chamber of Commerce

Rotary Club of Oakville Trafalgar – Ribfest has been deferred from June to later in July. They are looking for many volunteers.

George V. shared with us the “Raffle Box” website that assists the committee in monitoring the sales of tickets for the Electric Car Lottery. We are all encouraged to promote tickets sales by forwarding the e-mail sent by Michael Conway to our contact list. Check out:  https://electriccarlottery.com/

•        Amin closed the meeting with a Toast to friends and Rotarians every where.

•         The meeting ended at 8;10pm