I do hope this week’s newsletter finds you all well and safe after our Changeover dinner evening.

 

A very big thankyou to everyone who attended our Changeover dinner last Friday (24 June 2022). It is a shame for our members who were unable to attend for varying reasons, as you missed a very entertaining and fun evening. There were over 60 people who attended, and I say thanks to all our friends from other Rotary Clubs, our sponsors, our honoured guests, including Jordan Lane (Mayor of Ryde Council) and visitors for giving us their time to make the night a success. The people I did manage to speak to, all mentioned they were having a good time.

 

Rob Wilkinson did mention that he was surprised to be honoured with the sapphire pin to the Paul Harris Fellow award. Liane Corbett also thanked us for receiving the Community Service award. As all Club members know these recognitions are not taken lightly but are given to deserving people who have demonstrated the Rotary ethos and on-going community support. This was also a wonderful and special time to induct our new members, Gary and Jonathan, into our Club.

 

A special thank you is extended to Julie and Stephen Thorp for being our District representatives and Stephen Sim for being the very entertaining emcee for the night. As Sandeep and I also mentioned, we also thanked the North Ryde RSL Club and Bendigo Bank for their generous support over many years. Several people mentioned the RSL Club provided a wonderful function room, good service, and lovely meals on the night for all to enjoy.

 

Sandeep has subsequently mentioned that we raised over $1,000 on the night through the raffle, well done to all.

 

I would like to extend a very big thank you to Sandeep, Mandy, Pam, and Bernie for helping with the planning and organizing in making the night, the success that it was. Thanks again to Mandy for all her work to record all the fun of the night, in the photos.

 

On Saturday night (25 June 2022) seven of us attended our friends from the Rotary Club of Macquarie Park’s trivia night. It would seem it was a very popular night with about 200 people in attendance.

 

We had a very relaxing and entertaining night and were a force to be reckoned with. We were in fourth position at the halfway mark. Each table was also set a task from Pope Francis (in Rome) to produce a prototype portable power supply from the materials supplied and Mandy eagerly accepted this challenge. There were some highly entertaining inventions on display! Our table also excelled and won the ‘heads and tails’ challenge, well done Rajesh.  

 

As I have previously mentioned, Garry has also put together a list of future dates of the BBQs at Bunnings store at Gladesville for you to put in your diaries please. Our next date is 27 August so let us all get together for the task and spread the workload to make it a successful day for everyone. 

 

Also, as I have previously mentioned, the next outbound Rotary student exchange is starting July next year (2023) with the first inbound students and the next outbound students will be in January next year (2023). If anyone knows of a young responsible student, they feel is worthy to be engaged with this, please let Bernie know.

 

The planning for our ‘Christmas Carols on the Common’ event in December this year (2022) is underway.  This is a joint event with our friends from Macquarie Park Rotary Club. Remember we need a full club effort to make the event a great success as it has been in previous years (COVID excluded). We want a good roll-up of volunteers to share and ease the burden on all. 

 

I would like to thank all of you, our Club members, for your love, fun times, support and help over these last 12 months to make our Club the place to be. We have had a very successful year in helping others in our community. I am very grateful for all the hard work and commitment by everyone in our Club during these challenging times.