FISH & CHIP JUMPERS

When Sue Mees, President of Rotary Browns Bay, visited her family in Guernsey for Christmas, her suitcase and that of her husband Paul (also a member of Rotary Browns Bay), did not contain the usual winter holiday gear.  That’s because Sue had 140 tiny jumpers, many with matching beanies,  to deliver to her friend Dr Susan Wilson of the Tumaini Fund, which provides support to the Kagera district in Nigeria.  

Fortunately, all of Sue and Paul’s winter clothes had been left behind in Guernsey after their last trip.  This was when Sue first met Dr Susan, who told her of the Fish and Chip babies in Africa.  These are the ‘AIDS babies’ who are sent home after birth, wrapped in newspaper.  Women in Guernsey have been knitting baby jumpers for some time, and Sue brought the pattern back to New Zealand with her.  

This project has captured the hearts of the Rotary community and local women from Probus, the 60s Up group, Rotarians and their family members are knitting with enthusiasm.  There are already another 150 jumpers ready to go.  Dr Wilson packs up crates and sends them to Nigeria in containers.  Her charity assists the whole community by providing clean drinking water, medical care and essential supplies.  She visits the country frequently to work amongst the people.

To find out more about this amazing charity, go to http://www.tumainifund.org.uk/contact/

Tarzan sighted at Sama Sama Rainbow School

Chris Kernot who was mistaken for Tarzan is spreading top soil while club Treasurer Mark McKenzie and President Roly Mortimer complete the plumbing

The Rotary Club of Port Vila held a working bee at the Sama Sama Rainbow School at Ernas, Vanuatu. “Sama sama” means happiness and rainbows signify a bright and colourful new beginning, hence the name for the school. The school was founded in 2009 by Ruth Carlot who is the Headmistress and it is situated on her family’s land. The school has 55 pupils from ages 3 to 10 plus another student aged 13. 

 

Before Cyclone Pam on March 13, the school had two teachers to assist Ruth, but because of the hardship caused by the cyclone, parents have not been able to pay school fees as before, so the teachers have had to be put off until funding can be secured again. If they are not teaching, the teachers become home gardeners working full-time to grow enough vegetables to be able to feed themselves and their family. The cyclone has destroyed all of the local gardens and stripped all the fruit trees, so subsistence farming is very desperate. Papaya, bananas and coconuts which are usually abundant are still scarce, as are most other staple produce the ni-Vanuatu rely on for their existence.

 

The school which has been constructed to a very high standard was built by Ruth’s son, who is a professional builder, and her husband. Students have also helped decorate the classrooms. A group of Rotarians from Victoria, Australia, travelled to Vanuatu to play cricket in an over 60’s competition in June and tiled one of the school rooms, painted desks and did lots of improvements while they were here.  Rotary Club of Warragul Chairman of Avenues of Service, Sally Jones, was among them and she followed up offering more assistance for the school. The next goal is to tile another classroom and to provide some resources, such as a projector and library books. Currently all the resources of the school reside on just two shelves 2.4 metres long in the headmistress’ office.

 

While enjoying Rotary Club of Port Vila’s lunchtime meeting, Sally’s crew challenged Rotarian Morgan Brag to raise a team for next year’s Over 60’s Cricket Tournament. Morgan quickly put up his money with a bet that he could do it and he was very enthusiastic, but now he has to find enough members who will admit to being over 60 and capable of batting and bowling. Our French club members describe cricket as, “that game where you don’t do anything,” so he could rope some of them in if any of them are over 60.   

 

The Port Vila Rotary club, under the guidance of Rotarian Bruce Larkin, undertook to install toilets and washing facilities for the school. Rotary concentrates on projects concerned with either health, education or water and sanitation issues, and this project included all three.  The plumbing design was put together by Rotarian Steve Roberts of South Pacific Plumbing.

 

On the last weekend in September, the club worked on the finishing touches: members covered the septic tank with topsoil to hide it and make the area safe for children to play; completed the upstream sewerage vent; and did minor repairs to toilets and shower. A small team of enthusiastic Rotarians assembled accompanied by Sarah Kernot. Chris Kernot was quick to take off his shirt to display his rippling muscles and get into it, so shovels and dirt were flying everywhere. He looked like Tarzan in action!  

 

It was a good end result; the job got done with all the usual Rotary working bee good humour and banter.

Rotary responds to need for hospital beds

Minister Sharma on the bed having his pulse taken
by AG Malini and Committee Rep Bob Niranjan

Members of Rotary in Fiji are providing urgently needed relief to the patients and staff of Fiji’s many medical facilities.

As a community-based organization made up of business and professional leaders in clubs across Fiji, Rotary now extends it’s already impressive partnership with the Ministry of Health.  

• In 2012 and 2013 Rotary in Australia sent many beds to Fiji that were gratefully accepted and distributed around the hospitals and health centers.  

Early in 2014 a request was received from Minister Neil Sharma for more beds. This time his desire was to be able to receive enough to send beds not only to hospitals and health centers but out through the remote islands and interior to nursing stations.

On Tuesday 15 July 2014 the first of 330 beds and mattresses from Australia that will be distributed from the Valelevu Health Centre to 5 hospitals across Fiji.  Although most of these beds are for general ward use, there are other specialist types such as orthopedic, cardiac and baby cots.  

“Rotary in Fiji is helping as only it does best; connecting people and sharing resources for the benefit of those most in need. Rotarians give their time and money voluntarily to serve our community” said Malini Raghwan, Assistant District Governor for Suva. “We have seen the new hospitals and extensions and renovations and know how important it is to get nice beds for the patients” said Rick Eyre, Assistant District Governor for the West.

 

For more information:   Bob Niranjan +679 9992300 or bob@niranjans.com

Local school resources have second life in Samoa

School children in Upolo unload their chairs

Books are essential school resource that we often take for granted in New Zealand. For our Pacific neighbours in Samoa, this is not the case. The Rotary Club of Stortford Lodge in Hastings, NZ has been working closely with the Rotary Club of Apia, Samoa to boost literacy in kindergartens and schools.

“When this project started in 2009, most primary schools on Upolu Island had no books, just chalk and blackboards.  In most of the schools that had a few books, they deemed these to be too ‘precious’ for the students to handle, so books were only handed out as teachers’ resources,” says Louise Main, Literacy Chairperson in the Rotary Club of Apia.

With a population of approximately 134,400 Upolu Island is set to distribute the 6000 books gathered from Hawkes Bay schools by the Rotary Club of Stortford Lodge, and with financial assistance from local companies, Mr Apple and Emmerson’s Transport, shipped them to Apia. The books had already been sorted by local Hastings school teachers, which made the task easier for Apia Rotary.

315 desks, 634 chairs and other school furniture such as teachers’ desks, shelves, white boards and tables were also sent in the container to Upolu Island. Many schools lost a great deal of their basic furniture and resources during Cyclone Evan in December 2012.

“This is a great example of what Rotary can do as a collective. These resources, which our schools have finished with, would have gone to waste. All it takes is good communication and coordination to collect and redistribute them. These international networks are one of the many benefits of Rotary in the community. The impact of effectively building literacy in underdeveloped nations is enormous,” said Stortford Lodge then President Phil Baudinet.

For the Apia Rotary Club on its own, it would have taken years to accumulate these resources. But, partnered with other Rotary Clubs around NZ, the goal has been achieved much quicker, which will only serve to benefit the children of Upolu.

This was the second container of books and desks sent by the Stortford Lodge Rotary to Samoa and the NZ club has already started collecting for their next shipment.

Rotary Sponsored Trip to Sister City

The Wanganui Rotary Club recently sent five students from different Secondary Schools to spend 11 days in Nagaizumi, our sister city in Japan.

They were chaperoned by Rotarian Lei Graham.  Rotarian Dot McKinnon and Lei selected students recommended by the local schools.

The students selected had limited opportunities to travel outside of New Zealand.

Our itinerary was a collaborative effort between the Nagaizumi Rotary Club in conjunction with the town hall and Education Superintendent.

We spent a day at different schools who invited us to either address the whole school or do a presentation to different classes. We spoke about N.Z. and taught some students how to do a Maori greeting, waiata and games. In return we observed them in a classroom situation, participated in activities they had organised and enjoyed the school lunches provided.

It was great to see how conscientious they were in terms of conservation and using recycling methods to reduce rubbish.

We were treated like celebrities. An aspect that will remain in our memories is the fact that they couldn’t do enough for us. Our host families were extremely generous and some took us to places that they had never visited before e.g. going to Tokyo, visiting the Sky Tree, and Venetian Glass complex.

Students were invited to visit again and the invitation for reciprocation was extended to the host families.

Everyone who had input into the program evaluated the experience. The feedback will be invaluable for exchanges in the future. This visit has strengthened the ties between the two cities.

The students can’t say enough about how life changing the experience was and all stated “The memory will last a life time.”

Any Rotary Club wanting to arrange a student exchange program should contact the Rotary Club in Nagaizumi.

Kerikeri Rotary Club makes a difference at Viseisei Sai Health Centre

Thanks to the efforts of seven Rotary clubs and the Rotary Foundation, a $NZ24,000 solar power system will now generate electricity for the Viseisei Sai Health Centre Trust in Viseisei Village, Lautoka, Fiji. The Medical Centre is located at a Rotahome village between Nadi and Lautoka. It is a registered charitable trust and aims to give free health care to the 15000 people in the surrounding area.

The project commenced when the Rotary Club of Kerikeri chose Viseisei Medical Centre to assist with medical supplies. “By the time we got our act together they had received funding from another source and the idea of the solar power electricity was proposed” said current President Vicki Douglas. This proposal then evolved into a matching grant project involving seven clubs and taking three years to complete.

Led by the Kerikeri club, contributions were made by the Rotary Clubs of Norfolk Island, Bay of Islands, Kaikohe, Kaitaia, Waipapa and Lautoka, with a matching grant from the Rotary Foundation.

All the work was carried out at a local level, using Clay Engineering Ltd in Suva as the contractor. The system is a 4.2KW Grid Connect System The installation of the solar panels was completed in November 2012. “We were concerned when the cyclone went through Fiji, but thankfully a few fallen trees was the only damage to the immediate area and the building and solar units were unharmed. However, commissioning of the project was delayed because the Fiji Electricity Board was busy restoring power to the 30% of people who were affected by the cyclone” said Vicki.

Kerikeri Rotarian Mahmood Khan visited Fiji throughout the project’s development. Other key members were Past President John Toms and Past Assistant Governor Keith Day. “Without their tenacity, and that of our club Treasurer Jenny James, this project would have fallen flat” said Vicki.

Vicki concluded “Despite a number of funding hiccups we have learnt a great deal from this project and look forward to being involved in other international projects. That is what I love about Rotary – the ability to make a difference not only in the local community but further afield.”

Source:  RNZWCS Ltd Newsletter, April 2013. 

The world’s their oyster

Maddie with the Brazilian exchange student, Alexandra Flores,

living in the same town in Germany at the language camp

organised by District 1860 for the exchange students

who arrived in August 2012.

Two International Youth Exchange students sponsored by the Rotary Clubs of Plimmerton and Porirua Sundown in Wellington, NZ have just returned from their year overseas.

 

Madeleine White returned from Rhineland-Palatinate in Germany.  Maddie had a wonderful time enjoying the many sights of Germany and further afield around Europe whilst studying at a German secondary school.  ‘While it is great to be home, I am hoping to get back to Germany soon and travel more abroad in the future’ she says. 

 

Learning to live with other families who speak a different language can be interesting and sometimes testing, but the chance to be immersed in the language helped Maddie to develop her German. She is now fluent in both the spoken and written language, and has grown to love Germany, the culture and people there.

 

Maddie is keen to stay in touch with the new friends she has made, not only those from Germany but also the other exchange students she met from around the world and also her host families.  ‘It was a special feeling to be an ambassador for New Zealand, which is the furthest country from Germany on earth’, said Maddie.

 



Georgina (centre) with Shaylin (Canada) a
nd Renwick (America),

two other Exchange students,

 trying on kimonos at a textile store

Georgina Paskell also just returned from a year in Aichi in Japan. She spent her year living with several different host families in Nagoya, Japan whilst she attended Aichi High School, a private Buddhist school. ‘I really enjoyed making many friends, both at school and through Rotary’, said Georgina. ‘My highlights were my school trip to Hokkaido, taking part in my school festival and attending a popular fireworks festival with the other Rotary exchange students’.

‘It will be hard to find a better experience than this exchange’, she Georgina.  She wants Japan to be a part of her future. Whether she lives in New Zealand or Japan, she expects the Japanese language to be an important part of her career.

 

And one student sponsored by the Rotary Club of Plimmerton just left for her year abroad.

 

Mihi Gardiner-Parata left Wellington to make her way to Doullens (two hours north of Paris) where she’ll spend the next twelve months. The area where Mihi will be living is in the heart of the cemeteries around the Somme where so many battles took place during the First World War.

 




Mihi, centre, being farewelled by her mother,

Hekia and sister, Rakai.

At the airport, Mihi said, ‘I am very excited but haven’t thought much yet past the two days I’ll be spending in Los Angeles with the other exchange students’. Mihi’s sister, Rakai was at the airport to farewell her sister and to give her some last-minute tips. She came back to New Zealand in January 2012 after spending a year in Araraquara in Brazil.

 

-      By Wendy Betteridge, Rotary Club of Plimmerton, Wellington, NZ

Rotaract is young people active in service in the Pacific

Rotaract is a youth service programme of Rotary for young adults between 18-30 yeras of age.  They have a huge amount of fun together and very frequently make huge contributions to communities through service.  To see something of what they do go to: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Rotaract-New-Zealand-and-Pacific-District-9920/136172756464720 and especially have a look at their Tuavo Water Project.

"Seeing" made easier

The Rotary Club of Suva along with the South Port School, Australia brought smiles to many at the Fiji Society for the Blind with a donation of five Braille machines, 15 walking canes plus a cheque for then to purchase additional needs.