Acting Sergeant David O’Dwyer opened the meeting and welcomed members and guests.
David immediately moved a toast to Grandparents and the contribution they have made to our families and their sacrifices made in creating the world we enjoy today.
David welcomed President Les who advised there will be no meeting next week and that due to other commitments he will be an apology for other meetings prior to the changeover.
President Les advised that Paul Taylor is currently in hospital undergoing heart surgery. Our best wishes for his speedy recovery.
Les further announced that the Solar Installation for our Pentecost Island project is on target and on budget, Neil Jones was thanked for his part in the negotiations.
Jim Hawkins came to the lectern to announce that the charitable foundation of the Neumann Contracting Group had presented our club with a cheque for $8,500 as a contribution to our Pentecost Island project.
Past President Bruce Kuhn in his role as Assistant District Governor gave a brief report on the recent one-day District Conference. He advised that the conference had been a great success with presentations on various issues including The Rotary Youth Exchange project.
The focus of DG Andy has been on Membership.
Next year the District Conference will be at Tenterfield commencing 25th March and it is hoped to return to the 3 day format.
Silver Circle $25 won this week by Rock O’Keefe.
Sergeant David drained our limited financial resource with a punishing round of hilarious fines.
Heads and Tails won by guest speaker Celeste
Raffle won by Rock O’Keefe (he was on a roll tonight and rushed out to buy a Lotto ticket).
Guest Speaker Celeste Schubger – Rotary GC Passport Club
Celeste is a Swiss National and able to speak at least 4 languages, her family in Switzerland have been involved with Rotary since before she was born and she herself actively involved for around 10 years. At the time of her birth her Grandparents were hosting an exchange student from Brazil and she kept in touch with this person as she grew up but never met him. Finally she became an exchange student herself and was able to spend that year in Brazil and fulfilled her dream to meet her friend for the first time.
Celeste introduced us to the GC Passport Club which was founded around 3 years ago and meets monthly for a cheese and wine type evening. The club clearly focuses on the traditional tenets of Rotary and has committees covering each of these important facets of Rotary International. The club consists mainly of younger member 25 – 35, although some are a little older and at least 50% are female.
Celeste’s main responsibility is the International Committee which works closely with a producer of water filters “Social Impakt”. These filters require no external power source so are very simple to use and provide clean water for up to 10 people for 3 years at a cost of $25 per unit. Celeste’s committee work to raise funds to supply “clean water for Bali” where there exists a lack of clean water crisis.
Celeste is also involved in business networking.
The Passport Club (Passport means they can go anywhere in the world to visit other Rotary Clubs), and they are working on many worthwhile projects, renewing previously loved clothing for hardship children and cooking meals for the homeless.
The members describe themselves as “change makers’ and if Celeste is an example of their membership, they are surely achieving this target.
Celeste was an inspiring speaker and well deserving of the small memento presented to her by President Les at the conclusion of her talk.
