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PRESIDENTS
MESSAGE
The last few weeks have seen most of our outbound
youth exchange students arrive back into Australia. It has also
seen the outbound students departing for many different countries
of the world.
This weekend the exchange students are all going to
Mungalli Falls for the long weekend hosted by Sunrise rotary club.
Our new President elect for 2005/2006 is Cheryl Williams, so we
all congratulate her on her upcoming year.
This week we will be circulating a form for members
to complete with names of businesses or people for the Club to contact
for money for the Rotary Centenary 2005 the dialysis transport
for patients to travel to and from the hospital.
Brooke Baskin is going to address our club
in the next few weeks telling of her experiences on her exchange
for the last twelve months. Brooke was hosted by our club, and I
am sure it will be very interesting some of her experiences.
Our guest speaker this week is our own Steve Baker,
this is your life, Steve.
In February we have the Paul Harris Dinner.
This is a combined dinner at Brothers Leagues club for the clubs
of the district. It will be a different format this year, so keep
that in mind.
President Robyn
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Rotary 4-Way Test
1.
Is it the TRUTH?
2. Is it FAIR to all concerned?
3. Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?
4. Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?
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Proud
of their Work.
Reporter: Emma Pedler
Abridged from ABC Online
May 2002
Remember that, "Back in the 'good old
days' people worked HARD". Back-breaking, head-grinding, sweat-inducing,
working-like-a-dog work.
Recently the Rotary Club of Port Lincoln,
held a Pride of Workmanship Dinner, to honour 12 'hard' workers,
who 'Do it once, Do it well' and help to 'Build a better Australia'.
'Pride of Workmanship' was launched as a Rotary project at the District
9680 (then 268) Assembly, in June 1975.
The aim was to encourage a much-needed
pride in personal performance in the workplace, and to help create
a national attitude for the benefit of our country. Over 600 Rotary
Clubs in Australia, New Zealand, the South Pacific, Malaysia, Canada
and the United States have adopted the program.
The Keynote speaker of the evening
was Landscape Photographer, Stavros Pippos, who's book 'Shades of
Ochre' sold out in just three months. Mr Pippos, spoke about lifting
the bar higher, technology versus the people who drive them, and
doing it once and doing it well.
Field Reporter Emma Pedler, asked award
winner, Julie Low of Liz Penfold MP's office in Port Lincoln, 'What
it was like to have people recognise that you've been working hard'.
Julie answered, "Well its lovely,
because sometimes you wonder whether its all worth it. But I must
admit that I love working where I work, I think we've got a great
team, we all work hard, and we all pull together. And I think that
makes it a lot easier to go that extra mile". Julie didn't know
that she had been nominated, but discovered that she had won an
award after someone asked her to make a speech on behalf of the
Pride of Workmanship Award winners. "I must say I'm very flattered,
because I think all of us work hard, and I think there really was
some wonderful nominations tonight.
And a number of people out there I
know, who work equally hard and haven't been nominated, so please
everyone get together and nominate your employees".
Deborah Henderson won her second Pride
of Workmanship Award during the evening. Her first was awarded to
her for her teaching efforts, and the second for her administrative
role at the school. Emma Pedler asked her what it felt like to be
congratulated for her hard work. Deborah answered, "It's really
quite an honour actually. I was nominated by a boss who's only been
at the school since the beginning of last year, so I suppose in
a short time, that recognition was there. It was a bit of an honour.
I suppose it was a bit of a shock. There were other people that
were worthy, I mean you're only as good as the team that supports
you".
President of the Port Lincoln Rotary
Club, Chris Stone spoke about the awards, "We've been doing it for
12 years now. We've started the program, to try and bring out a
bit of the excellence of the people we've got working in Port Lincoln,
and we've certainly achieved that".
President Chris Stone, also spoke about
one of the award winners, Margaret Bain from Regal Chickens, who
had worked for 17 years, taken two days sick leave, and one-week
holidays. "It's just an unbelievable achievement, as are all of
the recipients. It’s by no means all of the people that we have
applying for the certificates of achievement. But it’s just a selection
of those that have achieved something over and above what the normal
worker does. People who have just done that little bit extra, to
give they're boss something in return.”
President Chris Stone said the employers
were just as proud as their award-winning employees. “They were
supported by, basically the people that work with them. They all
attended and cheered on if you like, in a sort of a quiet way, for
the (people) that received those awards. And I think that it goes
a long way to achieve that little bit of something in the workplace.It’s
great to see the bosses or the employers are proud of their workers.”
Pork
Pie Tales
There is a very old Jewish story about
a priest who meets a rabbi at a conference, and they start discussing
comparative religion, and the priest says to the rabbi, ‘Tell me,
rabbi, is it true that you’re now allowed to eat pork?’
And the rabbi said, ‘Of course, it’s
absolutely forbidden, it’s very strict, our dietary laws.’
And he said, ‘But tell me, rabbi, just
between us, I’m sure you’ve tried it, haven’t you?’ And the rabbi
said, ‘Well, it shouldn’t go out of this room, but I have tried
it.’
And then the rabbi said to the priest,
‘Tell me father, is it true that in your religion it’s forbidden
to have sex?’ And the priest said, ‘Of course, the Pope forbids
it, we have to be celibate, it’s very strictly laid down.’
And the rabbi said, ‘But tell me, just
between us, you have tried it, haven’t you?’
And the priest said, ‘Well, just between
the two of us, I have, yes.’
And the rabbi said, ‘It sure beats
pork, doesn’t it?’
Drunken
Elephants Steal State Power
Drunken Elephants Wired
Wild elephants plastered on rice beer
were killed when they brought down power lines in the Indian north
eastern state of Meghalaya a few days ago.
Four of the elephants from a herd went
on a drunken rampage last Sunday night after ripping into open casks
of beer in a remote village. “The elephants got high on rice beer,
went crazy and banged into an electric pole” a local said. “A high
tension wire fell and instantly killed the animals.”
Luckily the rest of the elephants
sensed that something was wrong and moved away from their felled
comrades. There were about twenty of them.
People in this area brew large amounts
of rice beer and the elephants have taken a liking to it. Over 7,000
elephants live in this area and the areas of natural habitation
for them has been decreasing with deforestation. They have killed
something like 180 people in the last two years and in turn about
200 of them have been killed by villagers.
Planning
For Our Future
Researchers have found that official
forecasts could well have significantly underestimated the growth
in the life expectancy of Australia’s population.
Australian National University scientist
Heather Booth and Leonie Tickle from the Macquarie University have
found that the life expectancy for women will reach 88.1 years and
for men 82.9 years by 2027. Officially the projections have been
85.4 and 81.4 years for women and men respectively. The researchers
have used advanced statistical methods to reach these new figures.
This means that the forecast elderly population will be substantially
larger, as stated in a recent issue of the Australasian Journal
on Ageing.
This has significant implications for
planning and policy development, substantially different to those
followed officially at this stage by government departments. Officially
24.4 % of the total population will be over 65 years of age in 2031,
but these new figures put the percentage at 24.9%. And nearly 4
% of the population will be over 85 compared with the official projections
of 3.1%.
Currently, those Australians over 65
comprise 12.3% and those over 85, 1.3% so its obvious that careful
planning needs to be undertaken to manage this situation. If these
new numbers are correct even more resources will need to be allocated
to cater for the elderly in years to come.
Rotary could be well advised to cast
some interest to these areas.
I
performed a funeral quite recently
It was rather embarrassing because
I did not know the deceased, he was not a member of my former congregation
And I was asking people to try and
give me a bit of information because you’ve got to say something
nice about the dead, that’s the tradition. And I kept asking people,
‘Did you know the deceased?’ and everybody said ‘Yes’.
And then I said, ‘Is there something
nice I could say about him?’ And I just kept getting these blank
looks, And I was getting rather worried because we were already
inside the gates of the cemetery, and nobody could give me any information
about the deceased I could speak about.
And I was already standing in the chapel,
ready to perform the funeral and I didn’t know what to do any more.
So I got up and I said, ‘Look, I don’t
want to be hypocritical, I did not know the deceased, but surely
there is somebody here that has something nice that can be said
about him.’
And this man got up in the second row,
and he said, ‘Yes, his brother was worse.’
Rabbi Mordy Katz
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