President's message
I begin the message last two weeks with the challenge news that many families have, several schools have identified as a Tier 1 close contact of a person with confirmed coronavirus (COVID-19) and those schools have been asked to remain close due to the current outbreak. These may have been exposed on the 3rd and 4th of August at several schools (public and independent schools in Melbourne suburbs) including my son’s school. The good news all the students and their families and their close contacts that identified schools were all got tested and isolated immediately. However, view families were positive, and the authorities Department offered those families better accommodations and hotel quarantine options with the support they needed which was well managed. The rest schools’ communities that got tested their results came back negative are now in isolated for 14 days period. As my son, and I are included those who are tested and our result tested was negative, had told us to remain in isolation for 14 days period.
On the 29th of July, we had a personal meeting with all our members and 4 potential members which we theoretically planned to meet with them for late lunch and organize to induct them, but it didn’t happen due to the current COVID-19 restrictions and outbreaks. Hopeful we will do that when the time is right, and we get COVID-19 restrictions free.
We also had Kammy who is one of our new members who presented an outstanding presentation which was based on her life experience. It was a great presentation, and I can give that 10/10. Thank you for sharing us for your all-life experience.
Last week, we had our board members online via zoom meeting, after all our usual procedures, we had discussed so many things which we agreed to do this year
Susan Robb and Judy Page are two of our awesome members who represent our club at RIMERN -The Rotary Inner Melbourne Emergency Relief Network (RIMERN) is a community service supplying donated furniture and household goods to those in need located in Inner Melbourne. RIMERN is now seeking volunteers to join them. It will be great to come and support people experiencing financial insecurity as they settle into their homes. A small amount of your time, on a volunteer basis, will go a long way to assist those most in need. If you are interested, you can contact to Susan or Judy at lsrobb@netspace.net.au and judypage3@gmail.com
Our club embraces diversity and has a good mix of women and men members. We are flexible and open to change. We value the opinion and contributions of all our members and our community of friends and supporters.
If you would like to attend one of our meetings or require any additional information about our club, please contact us by email at info@rotarynorthmelbourne.org.au
Neville's message
Club Bank Transfer is now done. Our Rotary club has now finished with the ANZ Bank and now have our account all up and running with the Bendigo Bank, Strathmore branch
The National Virtual MUNA is on this Saturday 14th August 2021. We have organized on behalf of the district for 3 teams to be entered and with the low number of entries, we will be about a third of the whole field. It will be held on Zoom for the participants and live-streamed on the D9705 MUNA Facebook page -https://www.facebook.com/D9705NationalMuna/ The event commences at 9.00 am and will all be carried out on one day.
With regard to meetings, we know that tomorrow's had to be zoom but had re-scheduled our speaker Shawn Cosgrove to next week but now with the lockdown extension we will need to re-schedule again so we will keep you in touch with that.
Over the last week, I have worked with our Rimern reps, Judy Page and Susan Robb to get the volunteer forms sorted out as well as the flyer that Kammy prepared. Anyone that considers that they can make a regular commitment to Volunteer at Rimern whether it be once a week or once a fortnight or even once a month should contact Judy or Susan and they will give you the form to fill in.
Olympics Wrap
Well, it's all over now though still with the Paralympics to look forward to. It really was great viewing for Australians. Our members had a particular connection with Jemima Montag in the 20Km walk after she spoke to our members last December. What a great race she had finishing 6th overall As you can see from this screenshot for a moment at the 12km mark she was actually leading the race.
Finishing 6th with 17 gold medals really was amazing with 9 of them coming from the swimmer. Of all the hundreds of athletes that competed from all over the world only 7 of them won 4 or more medals. 3 of them were Australian swimmers (all female). Only 2 won more than 4. One was Caleb Dressel from the USA on 5 and the other was Emma McKeon with 7.
As we have members born in Africa we should also acknowledge how well they did. Especially, Kenya's Eliod Kipchoge who has stamped himself as the greatest marathon runner ever with his amazing back-to-back win. Those that watched the race will also have seen that both the runners that came 2nd and 3rd were born in Somalia. As well another Australian athlete that spoke at our club in 2019 was Peter Bol and he was born in South Sudan and was the 1st Australian to make the 800m final since 1968. He ran a great race finishing 4th. As well Kate Cambell that won 3 medals for Australia was born in Malawi.
Lastly, though he didn't make it to these games the best British distance runner ever is Mo Farah who won back to back gold in the 5,000m and 10,000m and was Somalian born. He is now Sir Mo Farah.
Please join us and hopefully a few members from the Southbank RC for our meeting tomorrow on Zoom.
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82136035080?pwd=SVluYzFRQVYvM3RodjVlNm9EUENNdz09
Meeting ID: 821 3603 5080
Passcode: 195311
