PERTH ROTARY - PRESIDENTS UPDATE - 9th JULY 2019
Fellow Rotarians and friends of Perth Rotary,
We had a very busy meeting last Friday with a great variety of information coming from our members and of course from our guest speaker: Robert Taylor, CEO of Western Australian Indigenous Tourism Council.
Our meeting started with a surprise from the Vatican! Our Very Revd Dr John Shepherd, had sent me his report from his days at the Vatican, being the Archbishop of Canterbury’s representative to the Pope. He had also tailored a special Grace to our meeting which we all found very thoughtful and entertaining.
Before the programme for the day, our District Governor and Past President Graham Peden installed the Home of District Governor banner to our Club and we gave a report on the District Governors’ Changeover Night.
Our guest speaker, Robert Taylor was introduced by Ashley Whitworth and he presented in a very interesting way the activities of WAITOC and why it is considered the peak representative for Aboriginal tours and experiences in Western Australia. The Aboriginal Tourism Development Program (ATDP) which had been developed to help grow Aboriginal tourism in Western Australia started in 2014 and finished in June 2019 having completed a financial investment of $800,000 per year for 4 years under the objective of working with 17-20 Aboriginal Tourism businesses in the Kimberley and the broader Southern regions to support the growth of sustainable Aboriginal tourism experiences.
Also, Rob travelled us through the rich imagery and music of his video to rare experiences: the Aboriginal safaris, the cultural tours, the heritage cruises and more, before receiving our thanks from our Past President Dr. Ken Michael on behalf of the Club. To have a complete view of the WAITOC tour programmes visit: https://www.waitoc.com/culture-experiences/tours-experiences/all-members
Our meeting continued with our new session “Meet the Members” (M+M) under which we have one member every week unfolding his/her personality and profile by answering to 3 questions. Nitin Vashist, our Vocational Service Director spoke to us about his background, his vision for Perth Rotary Vocational Service and about the 3 things that he would like to change in the world.
We would like to see all our members speaking about themselves in our next meetings, so if you would like to be the next one, please contact either me directly or Kirstin at the Rotary Office: info@rotaryperth.org.au
Past President John Garland followed with a very important report about his recent trip to the Rotary Club of Melbourne. He discussed about Rotary Club of Melbourne and Perth Rotary collaborating with other clubs on the eradication of domestic family violence on the planet within the State, interstate and overseas. He presented all the areas of opportunity around this endeavour, especially in view of the Rotary International Conference in Melbourne in 2023.
Past President Wesley Sim, presented his new duties under his new role of the Assistant District Governor for the Rotary Clubs: Beaufort, Karrinyup, Osborne Park and Scarborough. He also gave us a very good report about Chiara’s (our past inbound Youth Exchange Student’s) farewell which lasted more than 3 days in farewell parties, dinners at restaurants, Rotary gatherings and finally at the airport!
Kelly Gibson, our Youth Director spoke about the importance of having host families available for our incoming Youth Exchange students. The experience for the host families is great, especially if they have teenage children. This intercultural exchange can transform the typical daily routine of a family to a new experience! Cooking together, listening to stories from a different part of the world, introducing a young person to the Australian culture and values, showing their new guest to their friends and neighbours and most importantly watching them growing their leadership skills and maturity more and more, month after month.
At this stage we welcome the expression of interest from members and friends who would like to host Laura either for a short period of time or longer. Laura is our new incoming Youth Exchange Student from Brazil who is expected to arrive soon.
Our Friday meetings from now on will include more reports from the activities of our Club through a mix of different areas of service. We hope that this will provide you with a better idea about the Club’s progress in various projects.
If you find any of these weekly updates and project reports interesting, feel free to contact the person who presented and to ask him/her about the specific project. Also, you are welcome to join one of our many project committees and to feel the power that changes people’s lives: the power of Rotary!
Yours in Perth Rotary,
Vangelis Katsaitis
Perth Rotary President 2019-2020