Keisuke Kogi: My Rotary Life and Relationship Between Santa Rosa and Kagoshima
Our very special guest speaker for April 7, 2022, was Keisuke Kogi, from the Rotary Club of Kagoshima West. Mr. Kogi’s presentation was “My Rotary Life and Relationship Between Santa Rosa and Kagoshima.” Mr. Kogi has had a long and varied career in business in Kagoshima and is a founder of the Santa Rosa Kagoshima Student Exchange Program (“SRKSEP”). He is also an avid trekker who has traveled and climbed in the Himalayan Mountains, Swiss Alps, and throughout Japan.
Pictured above amongst the rest with Shauna Lorenzen, the Eakin boys and Childs twins
There are 2,287 Rotary Clubs and 88,328 Rotarians in Japan. Kagoshima is in District 2730, with 68 clubs and 2,314 members. Kagoshima is located at the southern tip of the Japanese Islands. Keisuke joined Rotary in 1967. One of his favorite Rotarian service projects was in 2005, when his club collaborated with Santa Rosa Sunrise and the Tsuruoka Rotary Club and gave 33 cows to a poor village in Nepal. Nepal is a very poor country in which children often die young and the average life expectancy is 50. The project was intended to improve children’s health by improving nutrition.
Another favorite project of his was GSE (Group Study Exchange – a discontinued program), in which he took 4 young members to the U.S., visiting Rotary Center in Evanston, Metropolis, and even attending a St. Louis Cardinals game!
Keisuke also discussed the relationship between Santa Rosa Sunrise Rotary and Kagoshima. The relationship has its roots in 1865 when 19 Japanese students traveled to England. One of the students, Kanae Nagasawa, expanded his trip to Scotland and the U.S., ending up making prize-winning wines in the Fountaingrove area of Santa Rosa. In 1983, Santa Rosan’s, Jack and Fran Harger, visited Kagoshima to discuss starting the SRKSEP program. A “sisterhood” agreement was signed between Kagoshima West and Sunrise in 1989. In the following years over 300 students have participated in SRKSEP. Santa Rosa Sunrise and Kagoshima West members have also socialized regularly over the years, and Keisuke described many gatherings between Rotarians in Santa Rosa and Kagoshima over the years. His Powerpoint photos document some of these key meetings in 1989, 2003, 2011, and 2013. Keisuke also mentioned all the hard work put in by Kagoshima members to raise over $76,000 to help Sunrise members who lost their homes during the 2017 fires.
Thank you, Keisuke for the wonderful presentation and all of your help to, and collaboration with, Sunrise Rotary over these many years. Together, we have improved the lives of so many young people from our two cities, and advanced Rotary goals around the world. Your presentation was a great reminder of how strong we can be when we work together!
