Meeting:  chair, Ingrid; music, Jerome; grace Flight Corporal Sharia Labayan (Filipino version)

 

Attendance/Guests:  36 including Rotary District 5370 Governor Linda Robertson (Rotary Club of Edmonton Northeast); Donna Nichol , Assistant District Governor (Rotary Club of Edmonton Northeast); Amarta Nielsen, Rotary Club of Edmonton Northeast; Anthony Lazaruk; Jeff Fixoen; Flight Corporal Sharia Labayan of Royal Canadian Air Cadet Squadron 395 displaying the Canadian Legion Medal of Excellence presented by the Norwood Legion and the Silver Duke of Edinburgh Award (first in her Filipino family to play the bagpipes); piper Alan Balch; Doug Campbell, Rotary Club of St. Albert

 

Belize:  Duane reported on a wonderful trip to Placentia and Seine Bite with David Gibbens and Brian.  In one week they set up bleacher benches between the soccer field/basket ball court; set up 2 beach benches; installed a window in the school library; repaired a door in a school.  They met Darcy, a visiting high school teacher who donated soccer shoes for the scholarship students that our club funds school tuition for.  He wants to start an Interact Club for these students.  Duane delivered cheques to fund the scholarships and to replenish the hardship fund which has been used recently to provide food for the poorer students.  Apparently some MacEwan University students will be going down to work with the scholarship students next year.  Finally Duane, Brian, David presented the funds to assist the Rotary Club of Placentia's Santas Helpers project which were gratefully received (so much so that Santa and his elves stopped their car on the road out of Placentia early the last morning to make sure they knew of the appreciation).

Flags of the Rotary World:  Ingrid thanked Lorne for his dedication in setting up the many flags representing the Rotary  member countries (including the Edmonton Eskimo banner).

 

60 years for Rotary Club of Edmonton West:  Ingrid presented Doug MacDougall with a Rotary pin showing 56 years being the number of years that Doug has been a member of our club.  Rudy Mangold was to receive a pin for 58 years but he was unable to attend.  Duane gave a presentation mentioning some of the projects/programs that Doug was instrumental in getting started (Fort Edmonton Park, Grandview Extended Care Centre resident visitation).  Doug talked about some of the most important projects such as the golf tournament that involves all our members and raises funds to enable our club to perform many donation projects.  He talked about the Macauly rink and Adventure in Energy where our club brought students from across Canada, for many years, to teach them about Alberta and energy.  These students were billeted with Rotary club members in a similar fashion as when we would billet the annual Rotary International Exchange Students from countries such as South Africa and Australia.

 

 

 

 

50/50:  Bill Buckham and Al Holmes did not match cards.

 

Guest Speaker:  Jerome introduced District Governor Linda Robertson who brought greetings from Rotary District 5370 (she visits all 61 clubs in that district during her year as governor) and from Rotary International in her role as representative for Rotary International President Gary C K Huang of Taiwan.  Gary's theme for his year as our international president is Light Up Rotary.  Gary follow Confucius and the theme comes from one of Confucius' sayings "Better to Light a Single Candle Than to Sit and Curse the Darkness".  Rotarians each bring a bright light to the World of Rotary.

 

Linda used our Belize program as an example of the big picture of Rotary.  She mentioned some of our other international projects like Water in Cambodia and Eyesight in Guatemala as well.  She then talked about polio with the start, in 1985, to eradicate polio in the Philippines by Rotary International which, in 1988, graduated to eliminate polio from the whole world.  A major fund raiser in 1988-1989 for then Rotary District 536 was the creation and sale of Rotary cookbooks which raised $1 million.  Rotary partnered with World Health Organization and Government of Canada was the first national government to join the fight.  Hundreds of thousands of polio cases per year occurred when we started the fight.  Now, there are only 279 in 2014 to end of October of which 249 occurred in Pakistan.  The other 2 endemic countries are Afghanistan and Nigeria.  Linda met the District Governor for Pakistan/Afghanistan at the District Governor training school in San Diego last January.  Since the polio virus is still alive and only a airplane flight away, it is important that all children in Canada and the rest of the world receive the polio vaccination.  Linda presented the Rotary Club of Edmonton West with a Rotary International certificate as a recognition of the club's donation of $1,500 to PolioPlus in the year 2013/2014.

 

Linda was thanked by Darrel Ripley.