In our “3 good things” exercise this morning, we had a "Thank You" message from Lex MacGregor-Hay who was sponsored by our Club members through our sargent's session collection (Sunshine Trust), to attend the 10-day Youth Development program on board Spirit of New Zealand. Our support enabled a worthy young person to attend who would otherwise not have been able to, due to their financial circumstances. Please take a look at the card in "Stories" below to learn more.
Greg Walker also shared a poignant story (which was like 2 good things) with us about his and Penny's40th anniversary dinner surprise in Hawaii where a stranger picked up their expensive dinner bill, as a random act of kindness and in memory of the 58 people who were killed in a mass shooting in Las Vegas 1 year ago.
While terrible things do happen in this world, there are also good things that we shouldn't forget and which we should try to practice more often in our daily lives- such as being kind to one another.
James Hook was our 5 minute speaker this morning and shared with us a video and commentary depicting his experience with Habitat for Humanity where he joined a group of volunteers to build foundations for a lower caste community in Nepal. It was a life changing experience which I'm sure James would be glad to share more - just ask!
Our speaker this morning Victoria Lessing- Co-Director of MergeNZ, is the embodiment of positivity and kindness in her approach to helping make Deaf Culture acceptable by enabling deaf people to enjoy and participate in our communities.
Victoria was born and bred in Europe and was deaf from birth. She shared with us (through her voice interpreter - Debbie) about her personal story of having attended a deaf school in Eastern Europe with 300 students and her surprise to see when she came to New Zealand how there were only 15 students in a Deaf School in New Zealand.
Victoria shared how this discrepancy could have been caused by the ban of sign language in New Zealand for 100 years. There was a strong "medical view" of deafness in New Zealand where technology was forced upon parents of deaf children and "deafness" was viewed as a "illness" that needs to be cured. However, later they found that technology doesn't always work and sometimes hinders deaf people's development by isolating them. Victoria suggested a solution that rather than force people to be "hard of hearing" that it's ok to embrace "Deaf Culture" and that sign language should be normalised as any other language (such as Te Reo) as a way for deaf people to communicate and to live fulfilling lives. With her co-Director Jaime Brown, Victoria is trying to help our communities through promotion, development and service.
Finally, Laura Sinclair extended a surprise Thank You gift to Hilary Prior for her efforts in continuing to make Challenge Camp a successful experience for all involved.
Next week our Rotary exchange student Laura Sinclair (pictured above) will share her recent experiences of Challenge Camp as special 5 minute speaker.
Please come to next week's meeting where our Champions will be sharing highlights from the past year. There will also be a Q&A session so please bring your questions with you. Mal McLennan is our first 5 minute speaker and will talk with us about "Flying Rotarians." It will be a good session, so please come out and support our Champions and be involved. There are 3 more meetings left in this Rotary year. In June we will only meet on the 11th and 18th. No meeting on Queen's birthday or 25 June.
This morning we shared a moment of silence to acknowledge Tony & Maggie Gardner's deep sadness as they farewell their beloved daughter Amanda. We send them kind thoughts, love, and strength as they work through this difficult time of grief.
A memorial service will be held at 3pm Tuesday 21st May at All Saints Chapel, Purewa, 100-1-2 St. Johns Road, Meadowbank. In lieu of flowers, donations please to Lifeline (95 Great South Road, Greenlane) or Youthline (13 Maidstone Street, Grey Lynn).
Wow! What a conference. We laughed, we cried and were inspired after hearing some great speakers share their personal stories of self-reflection and courage to step out of their comfort zone to achieve great things - both in the community and within themselves as leaders. Our team of Downtowners had a fantastic time getting to meet other Rotarians from around our District during the cocktails and networking sessions. We also learned about the various projects ranging from dictionaries for schools, water guttering and storage systems in Africa, fundraisers, and also a pitch from the current year's Rotary Youth Exchange Students for more host families to help support the program. The day and a half conference was also very effective in sharing best practices and ideas such as Dr. Tom Mulholland's KYND software app which helps individuals measure they overall wellbeing (https://www.kyndwellness.com). John Boscawen also introduced Gill & I to the Former Chair of the International Committee from Suva (and current Club President) who shared with us a local perspective of how the SPBD Microfinancing Program in Fiji is taking off and changing lives. More info in a separate story coming soon.
(John, Gill & President John Bainbridge from Suva Rotary, Lucy)
We also enjoyed a glamorous gala dinner while being entertained by a live band and fancy footwork on the dance floor.
Come experience the fun, fellowship and inspiration at next year's District Conference hosted by the Rotary Club of Auckland East. It will be held mid May 2020 at the University of Auckland OGGB Business School. More information on early registrations to come out shortly.
On the 14th May, I had the pleasure of introducing our newest Club member - Weilian Du.
Weilian was born and raised in an eastern coastal city in China about 2 hours away from Shanghai by high speed train. She is the youngest of 2 siblings and all her family are residing in China. Weilian has a Bachelor of Management degree from University of Ningbo majoring in Logistics Management. At the age of 22, Weilian traveled outside of China for the first time to Serbia where she was the first Chinese student at the University of Novi Sad, gaining a perfect GPA in Logistics Management. Her time in Serbia infused her with enthusiasm to learn more about the world and inspired her to jump on a plane in July 2017 to New Zealand where she enrolled as a Masters of Commerce Student specialising in Information Systems. Just last week after a competitive interview process, Weilian received an offer from KPMG to join the Lighthouse team (Data Analytics Center of Excellence) in Auckland. She will start her new role at KPMG in February 2020.
In addition to studying, Weilian likes hiking, nature and of course traveling. Several weeks ago, Weilian was part of a team of 3 students from UoA who were selected as the finalists in a worldwide competition (SDG Challenge held by mSchools at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona). Weilian and her team represented New Zealand as one of the 6 finalist teams from 6 different countries (US, Chile, Spain, Ecuador, and New Zealand) with their virtual reality software product which helps individuals with autism to improve their social skills. Given her interest in helping people with autism and the University of Auckland Child and Adolescent Mental Health (CAMH) team's need of computing/web/marketing skills, Weilian will join our Rotary team supporting CAMH led by Champion Graham Hendry and also continue her support of City Mission under the leadership of Champion James Langton. I will be her mentor/buddy over the next 6 months. Please join me in making her feel welcome.
Trees for Survival is an environmental education programme which involves young people growing and planting native trees to restore natural habitats by helping landowners revegetate erosion prone land, improve stream flow and water quality and increase biodiversity. The Trees for Survival programme creates community partnerships by engaging schools, their community, local businesses and Councils all working together to restore our natural heritage.
Come out for one of our Tree Planting days at the following schools listed below:
Trees For Survival 2019 Planting Dates
Fri 17 May - Kings School
Mon 20 May - Meadowbank Primary School
Thur 20 Jun - Remuera Intermediate School
Tues 6 Aug - Ponsonby Primary School
(in 2020) - Freemans Bay Primary School
For further details see: http://www.tfsnz.org.nz/ or contact Champion Kenneth Winstone (kfwinstone@gmail.com)
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