Club Bulletin 08Oct2018

The Next Meetings

Rosie May Foundation
Jenny and Dan Murray

Monday 8th October

No Meeting - After Garage Sale

Monday 15th October

Soprano Georgia Burley

and visit from
DG Susan Wakefield

Monday 22nd October

PARTNERS NIGHT

Melbourne Cup Night

Monday 5th November

- PARTNERS NIGHT -

Come dressed up

Duty Roster

If you are unable to be at the meeting please contact the person doing your role the following week/s, arrange a swap and advise Keith, so he can amend his records.
Also, to avoid being rostered on, please notify Keith of any upcoming known absences (eg holidays) from meetings in the next twelve months.

Inside This Issue

President's Report

Night Report

Humour

Club Calendar

Upcoming Events

13th-14th October Garage Sale ALL HANDS

18th November End of Year Lunch - Muirfield Golf Club

30th November Ronald McDonald House - meal from the heart

6th December Anglicare BBQ

Entrance Club Theatre Night

This years’ theatre fundraising performance, a classic comedy by Woy Woy Little Theatre sponsored by The Entrance Rotary Club (Clive Denmark’s club) is Saturday 20th October.

- BOOKINGS CLOSED -

Grease

Celebrating 40 years of the iconic movie, Grease is still the Word as Berowra Musical Society brings the classic story to the stage. With songs like Summer Nights, Greased Lightning, We Go Together and more, a cast of 40 promises a great night of song, dance, comedy and love.
If you wish to attend on Friday 26th October please email Max and make your payment Concession (senior) $28.00 pp and adult $33.00 pp into the club’s General Account and identify your payment with your Surname and "Grease".

To secure seats we need to book by Friday 12th October.

Tarzan

We have the opportunity to see the NSW premiere of Tarzan the Musical presented by Sydney Youth Musical Theatre at Hornsby RSL Club on Friday 23 November at 7:30pm. Tarzan features heart-pumping music by rock legend, Phil Collins.

Washed up on the shores of West Africa, an infant boy is taken in and raised by gorillas who name him Tarzan. Apart from striving for acceptance from his ape father, Tarzan's life is mostly monkey business until a human expedition treks into his tribe's territory, and he encounters creatures like himself for the first time.

Tarzan struggles to navigate a jungle, thick with emotion, as he discovers his animal upbringing clashing with his human instincts.

If you wish to attend on Friday 23rd November please email Max, make your payment ($32.00-Senior or $37.00-Adult) into the club’s General Account and identify your payment with your Surname and "Tarzan".

- To secure seats you need to book now, no later than Friday 19th October. -

Bidjigal Walk - Tuesday 13th November

We have been invited to join our Rotary Friends in the West Pennant & District Probus Club for this combined activity to be led by Brian Powyer:

Time: 9.45am for 10.00am start
Meet: Heidi Place West Pennant Hills – Entrance to Bidjigal Reserve
Duration: Approx. 2 hours,
Level of fitness: Reasonable, difficult if support (walkers) is needed
Path: Relatively flat, some undulations, very accessible, bush styled track
Lunch: To be discussed – perhaps outside Reserve
Wear: sturdy shoes, hat, layered clothing, sunscreen
Bring: Bottle of water,
Parking 1: In carpark/street at bottom end of Heidi Place
Includes Aboriginal caves and waterfall (may not be flowing)

If you would like to participate please advise Max via email to enable him to compile an attendance list.

October is Economic and Community Development Month

Rotary members help Indian weavers achieve better wages and working conditions.

Nearly 1.4 billion employed people live on less than $1.25 a day. Our members promote economic and community development and reduce poverty in underserved communities through training, well-paying jobs, and access to financial management institutions. Projects range from providing people with equipment to vocational training. Our members work to strengthen local entrepreneurs and community leaders, particularly women, in impoverished communities.
Join Rotary and help grow local economies around the world.
Give now to promote economic growth in communities.

Wanted - New Members

If you know of someone who would benefit from Rotary, or, from whom Rotary would benefit if they were a member, then contact Tony C.

Click here for a PDF copy of the form to the right, and send or give it to Tony C.

Significant Club Fundraising Events during the year

The Book Sale March 2018

As the result of a lot of hard work the April Book Sale was a great success, especially from the organisers Andrew Little Max Henderson, Neville Hansen and Clive Denmark. Funds raised were circa $15,000. Well done.

2018 Trivia Night

The Club held a very successful trivia night on Saturday 25 August 2018 at the Cherrybrook Community Centre, raising near $6,250 towards the charities we support.

The Garage Sale

We have just had our best and most successful Garage Sale on the weekend of 7&8 October raising a record gross - north of $35k.

Excellent Project Management and a large number of dedicated volunteers, some putting in hours of effort, in the weeks before the weekend contributed to this result.

Barbecues

The club runs fund raising barbecues throughout the year, mainly at Bunnings (both Dural and Thornleigh) Here are Barry, Tony, Nick and David hard at work. at Thornleigh..

Meetings

Monday 6:30pm for 7:00pm - Springfield House - 245 New Line Road, Dural 2158

Apologies

If you are unable to attend or are bringing a guest (even if they are your partner) you must notify Carol.
Phone 8850 6515 or email [email protected] before 11am on the day of the meeting.

If you are expected and do not show you will be required to pay for the meal.

President's Report 24th September 2018

President Colin welcomed 29 members and guests tonight which is an improvement on past week now that the travellers are starting to return home. We welcomed opthalmologist Dr. Noni Lewis. We also welcomed Ajay Dua, a past Rotarian from Delhi who has been in Australia for eight years and now looking for a new club to join.
A lot of people to thank tonight.

Andrew, Keith and Rosemary who joined me at Pennant Hills Public School to cook 700 sausages for the children who were doing a Walkathon to raise money for Drought Relief.
to all who turned out on Sunday to put up the Awning at the Fire Station and receive our first donations at the Fire station, although goods have been quietly coming in for some time and are discretely stored at various homes. To those who set up the hall and the church today. Washing of the bric-a-brac where necessary is underway under the guidance of Glenda. Thank you to those assisting Glenda.
Rosemary and Jaswant who ran the Mums & Co storytime event for young children at the Cherrybrook Community Centre. Child attendance was low. Unfortunately it did not get the traction that Mirvac was anticipating. However, they are still keen on exploring this further. As it was a free event, there are no guaranteed numbers but perhaps timing it with school holidays will get greater numbers. We sold a few books and added $56 to the Coonabarabran Drought Relief Fund.

Anna’s cows.
Anna has provided an update on where our cows Pam, Gwen, and Jill are in Vietnam.

Pam
Mr Se has a disease that affects his bones and joints, making it very difficult to work. He perseveres when the pain isn’t that bad and goes to earn some money. His wife is from an ethnic minority tribe. She has no job and stays at home to do housework and look after her husband's mother who is 88 years old. They have two children, one in year 6 and the other in preschool.

Gwen
Meet Mrs Vien. Her husband died from agent orange complications in 2011. His mother needs care and Mrs Vien still takes care of her 88 year old mother in law. She has 6 children, all extremely smart. She believes in education and has taken out loans to support her children’s education and future.
Truong Thi Anh Ngoc, born in 1994, graduated from the University of Agriculture and Forestry-Ho Chi Minh City but could not get a job, so nowadays works at a restaurant in Da Nang.
Truong Thi Anh Nga, born in 1996, graduated from high school.
Truong Thi Anh Nguyet, born in 1998, is currently attending second year at Quang Nam Medical College.
Truong Quoc Hau, born in 2001, is a good student, preparing to enter grade 12.
Cheung Quoc Duc, born in 2003, is a good student, preparing to enter grade 10.
Truong Thi My Hanh, born in 2007, is a good student, preparing to enter grade 6.

Jill
Meet Mr Hao and his wife Mrs Huong. This is both their second marriage and between them, have 5 children they are trying to support. The children are between 11 years old and 2 months of age. Mr Hao works as hard as he can to support them all – a great responsibility and testament to his character to take on another man’s children in this community.
‘Jill’ the cow was purchased with funds from Rotary Club of West Pennant Hills and Cherrybrook. Many thanks for your donation.

No meeting next Monday so until we meet here again on Monday October 8th to hear from Don and Jenny Murray about the Rosie May Foundation (which is another potential international project). In the mean time have a great week and lots of garage sale fun.

President Colin

Night Report 24th September

Opening: Sgt Rosemary opened the meeting and welcomed our guest speaker Dr Noni Lewis, and AJ Dua, a previous Rotarian from India, who is a visitor at tonight’s meeting.
President’s Report
President Colin Sharpe thanked all in attendance tonight. His full report is contained in this bulletin.
Director’s Reports
Jaswant (Community Service)
Jaswant reported that the club, by way of Colin, Keith, Andrew and Rosemary, assisted West Pennant Hills Public School last Friday 21/09/2018 by cooking their BBQ as part of their annual Walkathon.
Peter (International)
Peter showed the second powerpoint instalment of the potential International Project which involves partnering with the NTA and providing aid to East Indonesia in the form of water capture/storage/quality. Peter will visit East Timor from 24/10-10/11/2018 to investigate this project further. Refer to full report in the bulletin.
Colin McGowan (Welfare)
Colin asked the club to hold the following members/partners in their thoughts:

Barry Freeman – who’s mother passed away late last week (card circulated for signature);
Brian Furrer – recovering in hospital (hopefully for discharge later this week);
Margaret Evans – currently an inpatient at the SAN (please visit if possible).

Max (Social)
Max reported on upcoming theatre parties including:

Woy Woy Little Theatre sponsored by The Entrance Rotary Club (Clive Denmark’s club) on Saturday 20th October;
Berowra Musical Society’s production of Grease on 26 October ;
SYMT production of Tarzan on 23 November 2018 at Hornsby RSL.

Refer to full listings in the bulletin
Max also advised that a Social Committee meeting will take place after the Garage Sale.
Bill (Bunnings BBQs)
Bill reminded members that we have picked up an additional BBQ this Monday 1 October 2018 at Bunnings Dural. The roster is - am shift: Tony, Rosemary, John and Peter (setup only); swing shift: Janelle; pm shift: Bill, Kerry, Keith and Peter.

Neville (Garage Sale)
Neville advised that set up of the halls and awning had gone well today and on the weekend, as too, have initial donations been very strong. He outlined activities for this week and encouraged members to be available as much as possible for sorting and collecting in the weeks leading up to the Sale, as well as assisting in spreading the word of the Garage Sale to friends/neighbours/colleagues etc. He also reminded people to sign on and off duty over the Garage Sale weekend, and to park off site so as to allow patrons easy access to parking. Tony Coote also advised, as a word of warning, that Council Parking Inspectors were out and about today and are aggressive in booking people illegally parked on the grass areas surrounding the RFS and Guide Hall – so be warned!! Please refer further to Neville’s full report in the bulletin.

RYEP Student
In the absence of Larissa, who is off sick tonight, Bob Davison, her new host parent, reported that she attended a Surf Awareness session on Saturday at North Narrabeen. She had a farewell dinner with the Loves on Saturday night, then changed host families, from the Love’s to the Davison’s on Sunday. Larissa only has this week at school before commencing two weeks holiday on Friday. So if any club member would like to take her out in the holidays (or any other time) please make contact with her.

Guest Speaker
Colin McGowan welcomed and introduced our guest speaker, Dr Noni Lewis, Consultant Ophthalmologist and Ophthalmic Surgeon at RNSH and Central Sydney, who specialises in corneal, cataract and refractive surgery. Dr Lewis exploded common eye myths (no, carrots will not guarantee 20/20 vision!!) and discussed and gave advice on common ophthalmic diseases such as macular degeneration, cataracts and glaucoma.

Sergeant at Arm’s
Rosemary and Neville ran a Garage Sale Quiz to make sure all club members were up to speed with activities taking place here; it seems some members have homework this week to make sure they’re ready for next week’s quiz – otherwise they’ll be forking out yet more money to the Sarg!!
Heads & Tails won by: our visitor AJ
Raffle won by: Jim Simpson

Janelle
Night Reporter

Night Photos

Peter Stanton's Proposed International Project

"The International presentations Peter Stanton presented over last two meetings are attached for your perusal.
1. Australian Council for International Development, interviews President and Chief Executive Officer of NTA East Indonesia Aid, Dr Colin Barlow.
We learn from the perspective of one of our smaller members how they embrace sustainable development broadly with their partners and the communities within West Timor and Flores.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=h2_136w_ZUI&feature=share

2. Rotary Small Grants project- a Rotary Belconnen (and Lane Cove) and NTA association partnership.”
Click the link below to download the presentation:

rotary_small_grants__east_indonesia__powerpoint_v3.pptx
File Size:	7862 kb
File Type:	pptx

Download File

The Latest Report from Mikaela, our Exchange Student in Denmark

Mikaela's latest report of 18 Sep 2018 begins "The third chapter; once upon a wishing bracelet

Click here to read more

The Ballingers: From Kalgoorlie to Perth the ½ way point of our trip

Still in Kalgoorlie. The weather over the last 2 weeks has been very variable ranging from mid 20s sunny little wind, shorts weather to b..y cold 16 degrees cloudy with a bleak wind making it feel ½ that. There is often a cold wind and some one told us that WA means Windy Always. We have found the locals very friendly right from the managers of the Caravan Park offering the use of their car
when they heard that we would be stuck there. The parts for the Jeep ended up being delivered mid-morning on Tuesday. It ended up mid-afternoon Wed before it was finished.
We eventually got away much later than we had hoped. We did about 140k and stopped for the night at Menzies ready for an early get away tomorrow morning. The car seemed to go very well. We will then head over to the Coral Bay to catch up with the rest. We will go via Leinster, Mt Magnet, Geraldton, Carnarvon and meet with the others (hopefully with a day to spare), about 1500k over 4 days.
Thursday after a 6.30am start we travelled to the Ghost town at Gwalia. Interesting but we didn’t spend a lot of time there (a bit early for the museum). No fences on the land we were passing, saw no stock, no farmhouses. Stopped for lunch in a very little town called Sandstone. The lady (who owned the café) husband was a full- time gold prospector.
On to Mt. Magnet for an overnight stay. There were lots of very pretty purple wildflowers on the side of the road in amongst the low scrub, Soon the flowers were there with no scrub. Just a background of red dirt. Very pretty and as I was looking for a photogenic group the dirt changed to small rocks, not nearly as pretty, so I missed my opportunity. Its hard to stop a caravan quickly at 95kph.
Friday another early start for a 600k day. As with yesterday very little traffic on the road. For the first 2 hours only 2 cars passed us going the other way. Started to get a few sheep and goats (still no fences) but started to get some dead kangaroos with wedge tailed eagles getting a feed, a common sight. Stopped early in the morning at Pindar to see the Wreath Flowers. On a 200m section of road 10k off the beaten track were these wreath like flowers growing in lots of individual plants. We learnt that the flowers were better this year than for a long time and the farmers were going to have an all-time record harvest. By the look of the field, The fields were very green with wheat? and yellow with rape.

Monday at Coral Bay. Did a Submarine. (a boat with viewing windows below the water line), trip over the coral. The colours were not as strong as what we have seen at the Barrier Reef, but the coral wasn’t affected by man or disease. Saw many big fish swimming up to the viewing windows.
Back in Carnarvon, In the afternoon went to see a farm of one of the Rotary members, About 80 acres. Mainly lunchbox bananas (very small ones). He also grows zucchinis and asparagus. Both very labour intensive as they both must be picked every day. By the sound of his talk he wouldn’t be making money. Many of the farms around the area have shade cloth up 2m tall to stop crops like
table grapes being affected by the wind and the dust.
Tuesday went to the Space and Technology Museum which was very good. One of the exhibits was a of a life size replica of the Apollo11 Space Capsule where 3 at a time could lay back in the same position as the astronauts did and experience the sounds and vision of the take off and in orbit. Most people spend over 2 hours here. It’s on the site of what was the largest manned space flight tracking station outside the USA. All very good and it helped Carnarvon win an award for tourism in WA.
That evening we held an Auction night to raise funds for the Flying Doctor. It was held at the camp where they put on a Spud night for park residents cooking and serving over 100 very large potatoes complete with all the trimmings. At the Auction and Raffle we raised over $1000 a lot of which was from the park guests.
On the way to Carnarvon we passed 4 cyclists on the road with a a sign on their bikes that they were raising funds for Motor Neurone Disease. We ran in to them at the Museum and Invited them to the Spud night where they told us their story. A young family, originally from Holland, who took their kids out of school, sold their house and many possessions and with no real cycling experience decided to ride around Australia. They expected it to take a year and were about ½ way. They had raised about $22k so far and had worked their way up to riding about 90k per day.
Wed on to Denham at Shark Bay. It’s a World Heritage area. We are camped at an area quite high up, overlooking the Bay. Very pretty but very windy. (The average wind speed in the afternoon is nearly 40 kph). The old saying that it would blow the milk out of your tea seemed to be true. In the morning we went to Monkey Mia to see Dolphins come in to be hand fed. A bit of Drama in the Group as one of the fellows from NZ had pains in his tummy. After discussions with the local Nurse, who consulted the flying Doctor service, he was flown our that evening to a hospital in Geraldton. Subsequently diagnosed with an infection and a stone in one of his Gall Bladder ducts. We also stopped at Shell beach which was voted in the top 21 beaches in the world by National Geographic.

On to Hamelin Pool. That evening at sunset we went to see the Stromatolites. which is a living organism credited with creating the Oxygen in the atmosphere. They are dated at 3.7 billion years old. (Humans have been around for less than 200,000 years) They grow very slowly at the rate of a fraction of a millimetre a year as a 1m one could be 2-3000 years old. Here is an Ideal place to see them as the water is very salty.
Today, Saturday , we took 4 vehicles out to Steep Point (the most westerly point of Australia). It was a 300km round trip, some of which was in low range 4WD though sand hills and rocky outcrops with the tyre pressure lowered to 20 PSI. A 9 hour round trip. The Jeep did well climbing some sandhills first go, a couple of the others had trouble.
Sunday at Kalbarri which is very well known for coastal cliffs, the wildflowers and river gorges. We went out to the National Park to a place called Z Bend and Nature’s window overlooking a river gorge. Along the way (along the road side and in the walk to the lookouts) we saw many different wild flowers. This involved numerous stops. The flowers were often very small (less than 1cm) and the best photos were often close ups.
Tuesday on to Geraldton We stopped at Pink Lake. Most unusual. The colour comes from a carotenoid – producing algae . A source for B- Carotene. Saw some seagulls on the Lake. Very different. On arriving we went to see a presentation around the memorial that was constructed by local Rotary Clubs to HMS Sydney. It was sunk after a battle with the German Ship Kormoran in 1941. All 645 aboard the Sydney were lost. The Ship was only found in 2008 after the memorial had been constructed. The guide that we had really helped tell the story of why and how it was built, and all the symbolism represented there. Its apparently no 9 in the most visited attractions in Australia now. Now we have seen it and have had it explained its easy to see why.
In the evening we went to a local manufacturing Jeweller (Its been there in the same family for 5 generations) for a cocktail party with a few members of the 3 local Rotary Clubs. Some of the ladies had their rings cleaned. Helen said I was the best Rotary meeting that she had been to?? Afterward we went back to see the HMS Sydney memorial lit up at night with in eternal remembrance flame.
Another highlight, we visited the Lobster fisherman’s Cooperative to see the sorting and processing. The boats arrived while we were there one with 115 kilo and the other with over 230 a kilo. With a live weight price of $80 to $130 a Kilo that’s a good morning work. In fact, one lobster they caught was worth over $300. So they were celebrating as they were being sorted. From here they get trucked to Perth.
Thursday We went directly to MIngeneu. When we got here we took a short trip out to a place called Depot Hill (A ww11 rifle range and Army depot). We saw carpets of wildflowers in amongst the trees. All very pretty but it was extremely hot and all the flies in the area came along for the ride. One couldn’t speak for fear of getting a mouth full.
Early the next morning (Friday 21) we visited the local CBH (Combined Bulk Handling) Grain Handling depot servicing the local area. It’s also the largest inland grain handling depot in the Southern Hemisphere. We learnt the local standard of measurement was in 000tonnes.
When we got to Jurien Bay we took the opportunity to drive around Mt Lesueur National Park. Some consider it one of the highlights as it contains over 900 species of plants. We eventually found a small group of native orchids.
Saturday we went out to the Pinnacles. The desert Discovery centre was very informative. They apparently don’t know how they were formed and got there.
Now at Perth the half way point of the trip.

If anyone wants to see lots of pictures by a lot of the participants look the trip up on Facebook. eclub tagalong . Or click here

Helen's Surprise

For those not on Facebook, at a Rotary meeting last night in Perth Helen was caught by surprise when she was awarded a Paul Harris Award. This is a prestigious award given to those who have contributed significantly to the community. A very proud Helen and rightly so.
Ross

Howard and Megan in WA

From my travel notes.
At the Emerald train station, built in 1900, we see the empty cattle freight train and carriages at the platform, ready for travel to Longreach and Winton to load the Longhorn steers from the out laying Cattle Stations in Northwest Queensland and the Northern Territory.
The cattle are picked up from the Stations by road trains and delivered to the railhead. Then by train to the abattoirs in Rockhampton or Brisbane. The daytime outside temperature being around 35 degrees would be stressful for the cattle so they moved only at night time. This transport operation ceases in November and begins again in March as the summer months are to hot for the cattle.
An interesting comment from the Train crew. The Station Owners (“Cockeys”) prefer the cattle be transported by train and not by road transport because by road the cattle are more stressed and have to be given a spell, feed and watered every 24 hours. Emerald is the Gem capital of Queensland so put on your boots 👢 and come on fossicking.
Howard and Megan at Emerald, Central West Queensland.

WPH Public School Walk-a-Thon

West Pennant Hills Public School held a Walk-a-thon on Friday 21st September. Members Rosemary, Andrew, Colin S and self assisted in this event by preparing some 600 sausages.

This Week's Humour

A Joke Medley from Jim

Jim

Joke Bank content is 10 jokes.

Club Calendar

Editor's Note: If you wish to download and print the Calendar please click here.

Bulletin Editor - Bob Davison

Club Bulletin