A report received recently from Jack Kadaoui, our outbound student currently in Germany …. I’d have to say the past few months since my last report have probably been the best of my exchange. I’ll start on the 3rd of July with the start of Schützenfest. Schützenfest means shooting festival and is held in almost every town in North/Central Germany. It is held every year as a festival for all the shooting clubs in the surrounding area to meet. Hannover holds the biggest in all of Germany with a little over 300 clubs ranging from near 500 year old clubs to as recent as 10 years old. These days it’s more of a festival with rides and stands but it still has its traditional dress and music and naturally a lot of beer. The festival goes for 10 days and on the first Sunday there is the parade of all the clubs from the city center to the fest. The parade goes for a little over 2 hours with all the clubs and many different organizations participating. It is a very interesting and fun parade with many bands and a lot of floats giving out things such as sweets and the Germans’ two favourite things, fresh baked bread and beer. Every night at 11 there was fireworks and music all night and day. It was like this non-stop for 10 days with thousands of people going every day and night. I was there for the first 3 days and the last 2 and I’d have to say it is the best thing I’ve done in Germany. Directly after the festival all of the summer Inbounds began to head home, but I didn’t have time to get sentimental as I had the best three weeks of my life ahead of me in the form of Europa Tour. And the best three weeks they were. 9 countries, 15 cities, 44 exchange students, 1 bus and all in 21 days. For me it was a dream come true to finally travel Europe and to make it even more amazing was that it was with 43 of the best people I’ve ever met. We went from being total strangers to family after the 21 days. It’s the magic of exchange. During the three weeks experienced so much from pizza In Venice to a theme park in Vienna and almost everything in between. I have to thank Rotary back home and in Germany again for the amazing experience I was given. Words truly do not begin to describe how amazing my trip was and I can’t wait to get home and share my stories in person. Yours truly … Jack Kadaoui 😉
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Club Meeting 26 August 2015
Guest Speakers, Anne and Chiquita are Co-Managers of Murray Gardens Retirement Village, joining the village in September 2012. They have a wonderful bond, being first cousins, and are enjoying working together as a team. Anne has worked in the retirement village industry for approximately 18 years, and previously managed another Retire Australia village, Riverina Gums Retirement Village. Anne loves driving through the impressive entrance of Murray Gardens and admiring the beautiful gardens. Sharing stories with the wonderful residents and working with Chiquita are Anne’s favourite parts of working at Murray Gardens Retirement Village. In her spare time, Anne enjoys being a Nana to her grandchildren and gardening. Chiquita is new to the retirement village industry, but has vast experience in the aged care industry. A fond memory for Chiquita was the welcoming morning tea at Murray Gardens Retirement Village, meeting the residents and standing up with her cousin Anne as Co-Managers. Chiquita enjoys making a difference in the residents’ lives, sharing their stories and life experiences. Her favourite part of the village is the kitchen: “Murray Gardens food and hospitality service is very special and most delicious!” In her spare time Chiquita loves spending time with her grandchildren, reading and swimming.
Club Meeting 05 August 2015
Guest Speaker, Stephen Fuller … Regional Manager (Kiewa) OCTEC Limited … Alb/Wod. Son of Albury Hume member Graham,Steve has worked in Disability Employment Services for the last five and a half years, in both the Not-for-Profit and Private Sector, managing teams from Broadford to Parkes and East Gippsland and Latrobe Valley. He currently manages a team in the Kiewa Employment Services Area for OCTEC Limited,which covers offices in Albury, Wodonga, Beechworth and Corryong. Raised on the border, Steve has an in depth understanding of the needs of clients who need to overcome barriers to gain ongoing employment in this region and the services that are available to them. With an increase of people who are looking to work with diagnosed medical conditions, the Disability Employment Services field is an increasingly complex and challenging world.
Club Meeting 29 July 2015
Guest Speaker, Bill Williams with Vicki Gray and Stuart Baker who
accepted a cheque … proceeds from Solstice catering in July
Guest Speaker and Albury North Rotarian, Bill Williams, grew up near Barham the son of a rice growing, soldier settler family. His career has included high school teaching, career counselling, banking and organisation design consulting. He worked extensively in Vietnam with Swinburne University between 1997 and 2002. Bill and his wife, Heni, now live at Table Top. They are establishing a not for profit organisation – Giveller (meaning travellers who give) – aimed at assisting Hill Tribes in the north of Vietnam to access basic education. The first Giveller expedition to Vietnam will depart in September this yea,r for “Rotarians and friends”, who will look at and support the work of several Vietnamese charity organisations including a Buddhist Monastery Orphanage and “Only Rice is Not Enough”, a charity working to increase the amount of protein in the diet of poor hill tribe children.
President’s Message 05 August 2015
Rod and Maree put on a lovely BBQ lunch on Sunday for Jules and her host families. Rod also invited Lorraine Greenwood, the District Youth Exchange person responsible for the exchange students who come from Western Europe – France, Spain and Italy. As a host parent I am finding that not only do we have a wonderful opportunity to have an exchange student live with us, we also meet and get to know the other host families who in the case of Jules, come from outside our club.I did feel for the intrepid members on footy gates on Saturday (and I had particularly strong feelings of gratitude to Dave G. for filling in for me!). Thanks for doing the job, and it is good that come rain or shine, we still get paid for the job, unlike the BBQs. On the subject of BBQs, thanks to Dan for alerting Rod to the fact that there was going to be a BBQ at Spotlight handing out free sausages on Saturday, which led to a wise decision not to do our scheduled Harvey Norman BBQ. As it was Rod tells me there were in fact two free BBQs there on Saturday! This month is membership month, so perhaps it is a good chance to bring along a guest to one of our meetings and introduce them to Rotary. In fact, this week Jules is talking to us about her home, country and first experiences of Australia, which will be great to hear, and to a newcomer will be a demonstration of a really wonderful Rotary program.