Dear fellow members and friends of Surfers Sunrise,
Everything is easy when you are crazy about it, nothing is easy when you are lazy about it! And as we storm through to the end of the year, things are getting crazy, we got so much coming up there is no time to be lazy. As we roll into the biggest weekend on the Gold Coast calendar, V8 Superstar Chaz Mostert is coming to chat to us... CHAZ MOSTERT!!! Also this weekend we have our sausage sizzle at Southport on Sunday, for those who have snagged a spot on the programme... love ya work... it's going to be a great day (crazy aprons welcome!) For those who missed out, don't worry we also have the Gold Coast Pre-Ramble on Sunday and we need you, your family and friends to help us test this event before the real deal next year. It'll be a bucket load of laughs, check out the FB page for details, download the app... or come and see me! So this weekend, don't make it a lazy one, rather make it a crazy one!!! Happy week to you all!
Double feature this Wednesday: Rugby League legend Mat Rogers, who now is in charge of organizing he Volunteers at the upcoming Commonwealth Games, is our Guest Speaker. And Hope Island Rotary Club will join us for the occasion! Going to be a massive meeting again. See you there!
Don't you sometimes despair when you follow the petty squabbles in the media, be they of a major international scale such as the current race (to the bottom??) about who will be the next President of the USA, the deplorable state of Australian politics based on personality rather than policy or the trumped up furore by the twitterati over Bill Leak's cartoon in the Australian Newspaper, telling nothing but the truth, so help me god?
Well, let me give you a wonderful antidote: join Surfers Sunrise Rotary (or for that matter any Rotary Club) and hear and see what real people can achieve to help those less fortunate in the world, in areas where a safety net provided by the Government is not even thought of, where public health is unknown, where the youth, instead of getting an education, spends 3 hours of each day carrying dirty water from some waterhole to their shanty, so they can survive. In the recent past we had Chantal Clarke with her project in Head Hunter territory of Vanuatu. Last week we had Peter and Sharon Crean and their daughter Liz, the organizers of Beyond Water, all the way from Nairobi, Kenya. They operate not just in Kenya, but also in Ghana and Rwanda. Peter is a member of the Rotary Club of Nairobi Lavington. Their life work is to assist the local population to get clean water from a proper well. This will free their young generation from the ridiculous time waste of carrying water instead of getting an education. Clean water can also be achieved by installing guttering on their buildings so rainwater can be collected. Clean water has the obvious, but not necessarily apparent effect of a major improvement in health. Health can be improved by having proper toilet facilities (no, I don't mean the flushing type with a bidet!).
Whilst donations of materials etc can be effective, regrettably, this is not necessarily the best solution. "Getting containers is not the problem. Getting them off the wharf is: I have to have about $10,000 in my pocket..." Peter advised. So, to support their project, you are better off to go to their website www.beyondwater.org.au and make a donation. The money will be used to pay for local labour and goods sourced locally. There is stacks of additional information there about their humanitarian projects.
Program Director Jo Gorman, Sharon and Peter Crean: the toilet roll in Sharon's hand and Peter's coffee cup have a connection: you guessed it: for the cost of a cup of coffee a day, you can sponsor a major sanitary improvement in a village in Kenya.
If you are not involved in it "at the deep end", you would not be aware of the amount of work that goes into pushing through the paperwork to get approval for a major Rotary project grant... And rightly so, Rotary is one of the very few organizations where you can totally depend on your donation ending up at the coal face, not as an inducement or even a bribe. Mario Fairlie has done an incredible amount of paddling under the surface to assiduously collect signatures for the Vanuatu School project (see website and last week's bulletin) from all over. It is my understanding that we have now got the lot, and thus it is quite certain it will all proceed as planned. Below is Des La Rance's 3D rendering of his design: coming out of the container, how it is stacked up inside the container, and how it looks like when fully assembled.
Tony Bird was at the door, Andy Bell acted as Chairman on behalf of Terry O'Shea and Andy alsowas Sergeant.
We had apologies from Terry O'Shea,Chris Thurtell, Tania Laird and Ray Higgs.
President Simon Brook welcomed all members and visitor: Andy Bell's guest Rosie McIntyre (whom we understand will shortly become a member of Surfers Sunrise!☺), Karen Kolenko (RC of Hope Island), Wanda Tereba (RC of Runaway Bay) who introduced her club's newest Youth Exchange Student Elisa Pedersini, coming from the north of Italy where "our" Martina has just returned to recently)and as well as our Guest Speakers Sharon and Peter Crean and their daughter Liz.
Simon briefly alluded to the upcoming Outback Links - 18 - 24. September 2016: they are over-subscribed! So, hopefully we'll shortly find out whether the members from our club who nominated have been accepted.
Mario Fairlie confirmed that the 'Vanuatu Project' (sounds almost like a Robert Ludlum novel, doesn't it... ☺) is progressing. A committee is to be formed to organize the materials - Des La Rance to generate a list.
But then came Simon's 'Big Rotary Moment' announcement: We'll build a school on Vanuatu! See separate article above, including further details by Des La Rance and Mario Fairlie. And to kick it off: our regular visitor from Nowra, Arthur Moorhouse, presented a crisp $50.00 note.Thank you!
Wheelchair Trust Chairman Daryl Sanderson expressed a big Thank You! to our newest members Al Sirovs and Richard Smith, who assisted in a big way at The Shed, helping with the unloading and loading of containers. Some 30 wheelchairs, tables and two pallets of books are on their way to Sri Lanka.
Gerald East handed out the Money Boxes to collect your lose change for The Rotary Foundation. You'd be amazed how much your coins can add up to!
Tony Bird, who ever has heard of writing on a Slate Board these days? President Simon Brook: with all the latest gadgets, computerized diaries and so forth: guess who was late to our Board Meeting...? Mario Fairlie, how are your ribs coming along? "Improving" [for those who came in late: see last week's bulletin's Sergeant Session]Fred Hamblen says he has the Man Flu... For the benefit of visitors and guests, Des La Rance was introduced as the Pope in Waiting... Peter Morgan, how's the knee coming along? [see Mario's answer..]Jo Gorman, welcome back from the UK. So, after you had some 14,950 lamb roasts and puddings, you are now on a diet? Richard Smith, I was quite amazed at hearing you speak last week: quite funny! Very uncommon for an accountant... For example, our other accountant in the club, Doug Lipp has no humor at all... Paul Seymour, you are to be congratulated for having a daughter who is competing at the Rio Olympics. But... she is competing under the South Effriken flag!!
Double feature this Wednesday: Rugby League legend Mat Rogers, who now is in charge of organizing he Volunteers at the upcoming Commonwealth Games, is our Guest Speaker. And Hope Island Rotary Club will join us for the occasion! Going to be a massive meeting again. See you there!
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Tony Bird, who ever has heard of writing on a Slate Board these days? President Simon Brook: with all the latest gadgets, computerized diaries and so forth: guess who was late to our Board Meeting...? Mario Fairlie, how are your ribs coming along? "Improving" 
