Meeting Weekly on a Tuesday at 12:00

Hotel Nikko, Mason Street, San Francisco 94102

The first Rotary Club in the world was established in Chicago in 1905 to strengthen business relationships through the provision of service to the community.

The Rotary Club of San Francisco was founded in 1908 as part of the effort to rebuild after the Great Earthquake and Fire of 1906, the Club is the second oldest Rotary Club in the World and is affectionately known as “Club #2”.

As an organisation of local business, professional, and civic leaders, the Club offers unique opportunities to give and grow through strong relationships built by providing humanitarian service, encouraging high ethical standards in all vocations, and helping to build goodwill and peace in the world.

Club members range in age from 35 to 95, and represent many different professions from financial managers to florists, from management consultants to mattress manufacturers, and from non-profit managers to nurses.

From its earliest days, the Rotary Club of San Francisco has been a powerful force for innovation within the Rotary World, proving that Rotary was a widely attractive and scalable idea, and launching the next four Rotary Clubs in the USA (Oakland, Seattle, Los Angeles, New York) and one of the first Rotary Club overseas (Dublin, Ireland).

The list of club activities is extensive, and well worth a read:

They assemble hundreds of shiny new bicycles for the annual Bike Build and give them to third and fourth graders from local elementary schools along with helmets, locks … and safety instruction is provided by the San Francisco Police Department.

The Club works with St. Joseph’s Family Center in San Francisco’s South of Market neighbourhood to help families overcome the chronic problems that cause homelessness and aid re-entry into self-sufficiency. 

The Club, alongside the Aquarium of the Bay, helps teach 3D printing to students with visual impairments. The students create small scale models of animals with braille signage, which are then offered to Aquarium guests from the blind and visually-impaired community. The Aquarium of the Bay is a corporate member of the Rotary Club of San Francisco.

Diaper bags are stuffed with items that all new mothers need, and are provided as gifts at baby showers for homeless expectant mothers as they graduate from the Homeless Prenatal Program’s prenatal and parenting classes.

Members spend time helping prepare and serve an annual festive Thanksgiving luncheon to the participants (adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities) and staff of The Arc San Francisco. 

Food for the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank is packaged so it can be distributed to a variety of populations in and around San Francisco.

The Club underwrites dance classes at the Smuin Center for Dance for elementary and middle school students in the Potrero Hill community. These classes increase self-confidence, build collaborative and individual learning skills, and improve the health of participants.

Dinners are provided to families whose children are being treated at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital as part of Family House’s effort to provide physical comfort and emotional support to these families, free from financial concerns.

There is more, we could all learn a lot … and they have fun.

 

Meeting 1st & 3rd Wednesday at 12:30

Rutland Arms Hotel, he Square, Bakewell, Derbyshire

Greetings proposed by one of our members as his wife was visiting Bakewell for the “Bakewell Wool Gathering” with some like minded knitting friends (Stitch & Bitch).  He felt it seemed fitting to send Bakewell RC our best wishes.

Rotary Bakewell’s work focuses on 4 main areas:

Youth
Careers interviewing, debating competitions, leadership & citizenship development, ‘KidsOut’, Young Citizen & Youth awards.

Community
Supporting local charitable organisations and good causes, ‘Sailability’ and supporting local traditions, such as wells dressing and brass bands.

International
Working with other Rotary clubs to fund worthwhile international projects, funding efficient and effective international charities, responding to local floods, earthquakes, and other natural disasters and, most recently, Ukraine

Foundation
Rotary Internationals own charity. Rotary Bakewell contributes to this and supports such priorities as polio eradication and promoting peace. Rotary foundation also provides grants to find sustainable solutions to such challenges as a literacy, poverty, malnutrition and climate change.

So far this calendar year, the club has run a Charity duck race on the River Wye, opened Rotary Bakewell Repair Café, and held a Quiz night, and organised a free concert: “Brass in the Park”.

On Saturday 23rd September the Rotary Club of Bakewell were very pleased to welcome Bakewell Mayor, Alyson Hill, to open the inaugural Repair Café at the Bakewell Methodist Church.

The event was a was well supported with many items brought in that in most cases, were successfully repaired, thereby saving items that might otherwise have been sent to landfill.

Local Rotarians were out in force to support the event, which was supported by donations from the local Aldi, the Better Derbyshire Dales Fund and from the people who had repairs undertaken.

Meeting Weekly on a Thursday at 19:00

Intercontinental Hotel, 181 Zheltoksan Street, Almaty, Kazakhstan

This week I have taken my inspiration from Richard Osman’s House of Games and Tina’s favourite (not) round: Where is Kazakhstan?

This week, we are heading to the Rotary Club of Almaty, somewhere in Kazakhstan.

I don’t know how many members there are, but looking at the photographs, it seems like there might be quite lot of them … and I can see that there is a local Rotaract club, and they have a sister club in New Delhi.

Over the years, the club has planned and delivered a constant stream of socially beneficial projects aimed at helping needy Almaty residents and schools, hospitals and orphanages across the Almaty Region. 

In 2019, the club successfully completed a project to help the Eldani Charitable Foundation by donating five programable sewing machines to a production workshop in a local rehabilitation centre.

In 2020, they identified a problem at the Talgar Central Regional Hospital and managed to raise enough money to donate a fully kitted out ambulance.

The club is also involved in many international projects, joining forces with clubs from other countries to bring sustainable projects to life around the world. 

And of course, every year they hold a series of events to raise awareness and funds in support of the international effort to eradicate Polio.

Greetings to the Rotary Club of Almaty, in Kazakhstan.

Meeting Weekly on a Thursday at 7:00pm

The Hawes Inn, 7 Newhalls Road, West Lothian

The Rotary Club of Queensferry has many similar projects to us but one interesting difference is that they have linked up with their district Council and identify small plots of land that can be enhanced with a bit of labour or a seat or planters.

Why have I chosen this club?

Well, they have nurtured a member since 1984 and he is the reason that I have chosen this club.

I want you to imagine a mountain. At the foot are more than 35,000 Rotary and Rotaract Clubs with over 1.2 million Rotarians. Some very famous members include Orville Wright, John F. Kennedy, Walt Disney, Neil Armstrong and Winston Churchill to name just a few. Then a little way up we have all these clubs put into districts, some are very large (whole countries) and some like ours are three counties Herts, Beds and Bucks, and each District has a Governor. For most of the world that is the structure until you get to the very top. Here we are slightly different as we have an extra level – RIBI so over our District Governors we have an RIBI President. Gordon was RIBI President in 2004-5. 

Gordon McInally (a dentist) has been President of his club, then district Governor of District 1320 before becoming vice president and then president of Rotary International in Great Britain and Ireland. He has also served Rotary International as a director and as member or chair of several committees. Now this Rotary year Gordon has been appointed to the very the top position and is Rotary International President.

Gordon is a delightful, modest man and a true humanitarian and his motto for this year is – 

Create Hope in the World

Gordon McInally calls for Rotary to create hope in the world by working for peace and mental wellbeing. He urges members to engage in tough conversations and earn the trust that’s necessary to realise these values.

Meeting Weekly on a Thursday at 7:00pm

Calle Palacio 126, Cusco

The Club was formed just over twelve years ago.

The kick-off meeting was on the 24^th June, 2010 when the founding members met and agreed on the club name.  On August 24, 2010, the new Machupicchu club met with the Rotary authorities at the Hotel Britania, and after complying with all the regulatory requirements, the club began its life on August 26, and received its Charter from the hands of RI President Ray Klinginsmith on his official visit to Peru.

The club is involved with projects that help meet the needs of the community and the president talks about campaigns to support disabled children, a collection of donations for the fight against cancer, and the provision of blankets for the helpless elderly.

The Rotary Club of Machupicchu supports friendship, camaraderie and the exchange of ideas between members that enrich both the club and the Rotary family.

There is an active Facebook site at https://www.facebook.com/crotarymachupicchu and there are pictures on the Facebook page of club members posing for a group photo outside Taunton Railway Station … but no explanation!

Meeting Weekly on a Monday at 7:00pm

The White Hart Hotel, St John Street, Salisbury

Wilton Rotary Club has been serving the local, national and international communities for over 40 years.

The club promotes and supports a range of local activities and events including cycle rides, the Wilton Wake-Up, which is a clasic car meet held at Wilton House, a “Walk for Wards” fundraising event in support of Wilton’s Hospitals, and an annual Mammoth Car Boot event.

The club also operates a local business partner scheme with the aim of fostering relations with local businesses that are willing to be publicly associated with the charitable community service activities supported by the club.

The annual Mammoth Car Boot Sale, established in 1983, has for many years been one of the largest of its kind in Southern England. The event is held on August Bank Holiday Monday by kind permission of the Earl of Pembroke in the beautiful grounds of the Wilton House Estate.

The 2022 Sale attracted over 4,500 buyers and the Sellers Area covered over 300 pitches.

Meeting Weekly on a Wednesday at 18:00

Cashmere Club, 50 Colombo Street, Christchurch

We have just seen the Artemis capsule return from its voyage to the dark side of the moon, and we know that the Voyager spacecraft launched in the 1970s is now quite a long way from Earth. I thought it would be nice to send greetings to the furthest place that I could visit that wasn’t on another planet. I looked near and far, we,, mostly far, and I settled on Christchurch in New Zealand, which is about 11,773 miles from somewhere in Hertfordshire.

So, greetings this week go to the Rotary Club of Christchurch South, or is it the Christchurch South Rotary Club, which is one of 31 Rotary Clubs in the upper South Island of New Zealand.

The club, as you might expect, is involved in a variety of activities, some are fund raising, some are based around the community and some are social. 

Earlier this year, the members all came together to carry out some maintenance work on the John Taylor Walkway. 

The John Taylor Walkway was originally constructed in 2005 across the Halswell Quarry Park and is the only project in the club’s 65 year history to be named after one of its members. 

Along with three Park Rangers and some heavy-duty gardening tools, they managed to clear the are and cut down the overgrowth. Much was accomplished during the exercise and and the work ended with a barbeque … and a biography of John Taylor’s life.

On a different note, though still loosly linked to horticulture, the club has recently completed its Annual Chicken Manure Fund Raise, where forward thinking club members raise cash through the sale of the stuff that chickens leave behind.

Sadly, it was all sold out by the 27^th of August, but if anyone is interested, there is always next year.  

Meeting Weekly on a Thursday at 14:00

Hotel Madeira Centro, Calle Esperanto, Benidorm

Rotary Clubs are relatively new to Spain as General Franco considered the organisation to be enemies of the regime, along with Freemasonry and Communism.  He died in 1975, marking the end of one of Europe’s longest dictatorships, and the beginning of Rotary in Spain.  The Rotary Club of Benidorm was established in 1994 and currently has a membership of 44, although it would appear that they are all men.

They did, however, publish a Facebook post on the 8^th March in support of International Women’s Day.

As you might expect, the club has been supporting the global End Polio Now campaign.

Closer to home, the club works hard on behalf of the local community, and last year donated 10,000€ to provide 400 sets of supplies to schools in and around Benidorm.

Support for Covid saw collaborations with the Red Cross to deliver food, and the provision of protective masks to Social Associations and the Benidorm Police.

Recently, the club has been providing essential supplies for shipment to Ukraine, collecting and shipping 7,000 nappies and 1,000 jars of baby food.   

In 2021, the Rotary Club of Benidorm received a Rotary Citation for the work that the members had done throughout the year.  

Rotary Club of Benidorm