Presidents Notes

President Usha's Notes

21 October 2020

Dear fellows,

Lunacy?
"Have I gone mad? I'm afraid so. You're entirely BONKERS. But I'll tell you a secret. ALL THE BEST PEOPLE ARE" said the Mad Hatter.

Well, how often we have felt the same, when we think outside the box.

Many thanks for your enthusiastic participation in our Partners Night last week to make a great Hat Day. It was a pleasure to welcome eight partners – all of them sharing in the spirit of the evening.

Guest Speaker
The icing on the cake was the presentation by Ross Mitchell the owner of Forte Catering and Events, who look after us so well. Armed with data and facts, his eloquent description of the devastation heaped on the hospitality industry by the spread of Covid19 infections, had us all profoundly emotional and contemplative. His personal experiences and great insight of the impact on the industry showed us a grim picture of the rapid disappearance of celebrations, huge loss of employment, accompanied by the folding of multiple companies. More in the bulletin.

Hats, Hats, Hats
Many thanks to all for donning their choice of designer hats, and whole heartedly joining this event to create awareness and raise some funds for Australian Rotary Health (ARH). We had owl hats, dog hats, beanies, feather hats, pink hats, purple hats, black hats, straw hats, panamas, tarbushes, bucket hats, trilbys, fedoras, akoubras and the mad hatter's hat. And I may still have missed some here.

Australian Rotary Heath (ARH)
ARH has been around for nearly 40 years now financing research in all health areas, but more towards mental health. ARH is well known to provide finance for research where no one else will tread and also support students who have not been able to find funding elsewhere. Under the umbrella banner of "lift the lid on mental illness", multiple events can be held and we chose to have a hat day to raise awareness of mental health issues.

Winners
Talking of umbrella's, Nick Hamilton-Kane and Jan Barrett were the popular choice winners of the umbrella prizes for the of best man's and woman’s hat. But who won the wooden spoon? Ahaa! here is a clue... the dog hat went missing! Tune in next week for a solution to this riddle. Winners were popular choices and not judged by panels or drawn out of a hat.

Coming Events
We have many events coming up this week. There is a polio train ride rendezvous with the district polio team at Strathfield Station on the afternoon of Friday the 23rd of October. On the following day, 24th October, many members of the club will meet at the Strathfield Town Hall to participate in the recording of a video as part of the celebrations of Christmas Carols with Strathfield Council.

Rotary Connects
Latest correspondence from RI informs us that in these difficult times, people are yearning to connect with others and find ways to give back to their communities. They see how Rotary clubs around the world are actively working to take care of each other, their neighbours, and those in need during the pandemic. Almost 19,000 visitors to Rotary.org have expressed interest in joining a Rotary club since July 2016. In this connection RI is holding a webinar "connecting with prospective members in your community". Details on how to join the webinar are provided in the bulletin.

Sick Bay
Some of our members have been spending time at Concord Hospital in the past weeks but we have good news from them. PP Peter Smith is home after a lengthy sojourn at the ICU at Concord Hospital. Luckily he believes being home is definitely better. Good news from Bradley as well, he is well on the mend. Roy's visit was a little shorter, following a minor incident at the Bunnings barbecue. We wish them a speedy return to normal health.

NBN Update
This week we move to a different topic and get an NBN update from the Community Ambassador for NBN Co, Geeth Geeganage. Geeth speaks to organisations across NSW about the rollout and scams awareness. We look forward to hearing from him and also discussing some of our queries regarding NBN.

Usha Garg
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