YEP Report May 2010

My second last monthly report. I am having more and more times when I say something like oh this will be the last time I do this, I see this …. On the one hand I am starting to get so much more excited to go home but on the other hand am getting more and more sad about the fact that I will leave Australia in less than 2 months.

The time is running and I am also becoming really busy with all the things I want to do before I go and also because Iam going away to Darwin for a week. I am so excited to go there and don’t want to wait another week but if this week will be like the ones I just had they will be over before I have even realised it.

Last week I went with Lisi and her family on Saturday to the football to the Dream game. We wanted to do the long walk to the stadium but when we arrived everyone had already left. Before the game we went to their favourite restaurant and while we where sitting there and waiting for the food someone else came in the restaurant. It was the actor that plays Dumbledore in the last Harry potter movies. Lisi’s host mom asked him then if he wanted to sit with us at the table but he did’t want to .
Well we still had fun and I had a really good time that day.

On Sunday I went to the Reunion and it was really good to see and to catch up with everyone. We got a CD with all the photos and a video and had a lovely lunch all together.

On Monday I went with Flo and his school to sovereign hill and I really enjoyed this because I just enjoyed it sooo much. Everything just had a great atmosphere and it was really interesting too. Yesterday I went ice skating in Melbourne in the ice hall and although I was really scared and my legs were shacking most of the time I had so much fun and meeting a person from the tv show neighbours. Was the highlight of my day.

This coming week is my last week of school before the exams and everyone is starting their learning marathon beside me because I don’t have to write the exams because I am in Darwin. Lucky me

President’s Report June 3, 2010

Our guest speaker at the last meeting was our wonderful Youth Exchange Student, Nicola von Hobe. Nici presented a very entertaining powerpoint presentation of the YEP ‘Rock to Reef’ Safari, finishing with a song that the students  made up to the tune of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” with slightly different words. they travelled by bus from Melbourne to Adelaide, then Naracoorte and Coober Pedy. Then on to Uluru, the Olgas and KIngs Canyon, Alice Springs and the School of the Air before flying off to Cairns for the reef part of the journey.  They got rained out in ‘sunny’ Queensland, but had a wonderful time in the Whitsundays, Airlie Beach, Byron Bay and then an 11 hour trip to Sydney so they could spend a day on the harbour. What a fantastic experience. The power of the Rotary Youth Exchange program is brought home to us time and time again, when we see the development of these already high achieving students who just seem to revel in everything that they can take in of the different culture that they live in for their year as Exchange students. If you have children or grandchildren then they need to be exposed to these great students. My 8 year old and 11 yeasr old grandchildren now can’t wait to go on Youth Exchange and I have been told that I am not allowed to leave Rotary until they have done their trips. Not that I was planning to anyway!

Please make sure that you put the date of Sunday 27th June in your diary as this date is not only the very important occasion of the induction of your new President 2010-2011, but Nici’s farewell.  She departs for Germany on Sunday 4th July and I would like to say that this day is compulsory attendance for all members – not the 4th July but the 27th. Mind you if you want to come to the airport for Nici’s farewell the flight leaves at 10 am – so brekky at the airport anyone???

There is one thing that Nici would really like to do before she departs these shores and that is a trip to the Dromana Drive-In.  If there is anybody willing to endure the cold of an evening at the Drive-In, please contact Nici at my place as she is very keen to experience a night at the Drive-In and I am not willing to endure this, even for Nici unless I really have to! ( I think Laura is going to take her)

This meeting will be my last as President of your club as I will be an apology for the next meeting. I thought I was being so clever booking the flight home from Darwin on Wednesday 16th until I discovered that it leaves at 1.00am on the 17th and doesn’t get in until 7.30 am to Melbourne, so I think I will be a little bit late for the meeting.

It may also be possible that I am an apology for our next meeting as my mother passed away at 6.30 am this morning and the funeral is at 3.00pm on Thursday 3rd June at Tobin Brothers Chapel at Mount Martha. Perhaps some of you will make it to the funeral, if so I will see you there.

Best Regards

President Judy

RI President’s Report June, 2010

Message from John Kenny, RI President 2009-2010

In February, I attended the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Rotary Club of St. Paul, Minn., USA. After dinner that evening, a young lady came up to me and asked, “Of everything you have seen this year in Rotary, what has touched your heart the most?” For such a simple question, it was nearly impossible to answer – only because I have seen so much that has touched my heart so deeply and made me so proud to be a Rotarian. These past 12 months have given me the opportunity and the privilege of observing firsthand how our service touches the lives of others, and how great are the needs we address.

It is one thing to see photographs of the devastation in Haiti caused by January’s earthquake. It was another thing entirely for me to walk among the rubble, to see the collapsed buildings, to understand that the true scope of the tragedy will never be known.

In Banda Aceh, Indonesia, where Rotary has done so much to rebuild the city shattered by the 2004 tsunami, I thought I understood the scale of the disaster before my visit. But I was not prepared for the sight of a large freighter in a field 2 miles inland, swept there by the tsunami.

In China, at a Rotary-supported orphanage, I held a two-month-old girl who had been abandoned on a train. With that baby in my arms, I realized that what Rotary provided to the orphanage – food, warm clothing, a clean and safe home – was only one part of what was needed. What that child wanted most of all, in that moment, was simply to be held and to feel loved, and that touched me very much.

There is so much we can do as Rotarians that will mean so much to others. And as important as it is to give material assistance – to help in the areas of water, health and hunger, and literacy – it is equally vital that we give that help freely, with true caring for others. Because often, simply caring is what helps others most of all.

As this Rotary year and my term as RI president draw to a close, I thank you all for your service to Rotary and your support. I have been honored to serve as your president, and remind you that The Future of Rotary Is in Your Hands.

John Kenny , President, Rotary International