Forest Hill Rotary outdoor ping pong tables at Cross Lake First Nation
 

Please join me to congratulate Kaven for doing an excellent job to develop a website for our  out door pin pong table project.

 

http://www.outdoorpingpong.com/

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Guest Speaker Shermeen Beg of the Agha Khan museum gave an enthusiastic presentation on her experience as an Immigrant to Toronto. Shermeen illustrated her talk with fascinating images of Toronto and the many places she has lived, studied and worked in her peripatetic life. Born in a small village in Pakistan, Shermeen had a strong desire in her early years to learn about the world around her, especially houses and other buildings. After earning a degree in architecture in Pakistan, she travelled to Savannah, Georgia where she completed a master’s degree in architecture. She then moved to Washington DC and practised architecture in a suburban capital region firm. Shermeen still had strong family roots in Pakistan which she maintains to this day, with Karachi being a focal point. She returned to Pakistan and opened her own architectural office as well as teaching. A few years ago, she emigrated from Karachi, Pakistan to Toronto. Shermeen showed us a series of photos illustrating the similarities and the differences between Karachi and Toronto. She also gave a brief description of her present life as an architect working and teaching at the strikingly beautiful Aga Khan Museum here in Toronto. Shermeen concluded her visit to our club with an invitation to club members participate in any of the on-going programs at the museum. Shermeen was thanked by our Treasurer, Ali Kazmi, a fellow immigrant from Karachi to Toronto. 

 

 

 

 

In a happy coincidence, we were visited today by a former Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar, Paul Bosveld, who is also interested in architecture and design. Paul spoke briefly about how being an Ambassadorial Scholar changed the course of his life and career. Paul had graduated as a Mechanical Engineer from the University of Windsor and worked for a few years as an engineer in the automotive industry. When he was awarded the Ambassadorial Scholarship, he went to Italy to pursue graduate studies in  industrial design at a top school in Milan. This led to a challenging design career at Pininfarina, an Italian firm renowned for designing car bodies for clients like Ferrari as well as designing a myriad of other products. Paul then moved to Pininfarina USA and subsequently worked for other major US companies as a designer. He is now leader of a design team for Microsoft dealing with Virtual Reality products. Paul expressed his appreciation for the Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship which was the key to him broadening his horizons and pursuing his career in industrial design.

 

Dr Asmat Naebkhil of Kabul, Afghanistan and Windsor, Ontario spoke to our Club about the start-up and development of what is now the Kabul Medical University Cardiac Research Institute. Asmat is a cardiologist who studied medicine in Afghanistan and India and eventually came to Canada where he worked at Mount Sinai and St. Michael’s Hospitals in Toronto as well as in Saskatchewan and Windsor. Asmat joined the Rotary Club of Windsor where he met Jim and Dianne Moore and told them his dream of returning to Afghanistan to establish a centre to provide cardiac care which was not then available anywhere in the country. Asmat shared with us his story of his bootstraps’ efforts to bring cardiac care to Kabul. This included working with Windsor Rotarians to secure used but not obsolete equipment from hospitals in Windsor and Detroit and arrange for the equipment to be shipped to Afghanistan by the US Air Force. In Kabul, Asmat worked to obtain all the necessary permits and to arrange to use an empty former girls dormitory to set up the cardiac clinic. He began treating patients from all walks of life including the poorest of the poor. No one was charged for the medical services. At times of extreme danger in Kabul, the Canadian Embassy insisted that Asmat, a Canadian citizen, spend the nights in their secure compound rather than staying at the clinic. One day Asmat treated a senior official from the office of President Hamid Karzai. This changed the course of development of the cardiac care facility! Asmat described how he was invited to the palace for lunch with President Karzai. This led to regular lunches with the president and the provision of funding that enabled the facility to grow from one cardiologist and a few nurses operating on a shoestring budget to a well equipped institute with more than 200 staff including more than 20 cardiologists. While there are no Rotary Wheels or Maple Leaf flags on display due to security issues in Afghanistan, this is the greatest Canadian success story in the country!   Jim Moore introduced his long time friend, Asmat, and Abdollah Kafshbarghi thanked him on behalf of our Club.