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Members Input
Corner:
From
Lesley Bell, Family and Fellowship Director
Visit the Carlton & United
Brewery, Abbotsford
Here's
an opportunity for 50 of us (Rotarians & Friends), to participate in a
tour of the Carlton & United Brewery:
Thursday
4 December:
- Cnr Nelson
& Thompson Streets, Abbotsford / tel 9429 4995
- 9.30am
- free morning tea on arrival
- 10.00am
brewery tour commences
- interactive
displays
- product
sampling at the bar
- browse in
the gift shop (12.00 noon finish)
- special
price of $20 per person (normally $25!!)
First
in best dressed!! Email your numbers
to me now and pay up at next Wednesday's Club meeting (cash or cheques
to be made out to RC Box Hill Central).
From Malcolm Chiverton:
Big
Dreamers screening on ABC TV @ 9.30pm on Thursday 28th of
November.
PRESS RELEASE
After sold out
screenings in Florida, Montana,
Kansas, Oklahoma,
Hot Springs
and the prestigious 2007
SILVERDOCS
AFI/Discovery Channel Documentary Festival in Washington DC,
Camille Hardman’s award winning comedic documentary Big Dreamers is
screening on ABC TV @ 9.30pm on Thursday 28th of November.
Big Dreamers is a quirky and
heartfelt journey into small town Australia’s struggle to stay on
the map. The man behind the dream is Ron Hunt, respected town elder and Rotarian member whose belief in his
community led to his plan to build the World’s Biggest Gumboot in
honour of Tully’s Australian record rainfall of 7.98 metres in 1950. With the blessing of his
fellow Rotarian’s, this quixotic and determined man hired the famous
out-of-towner sculptor Bryan
Newell to build the monument, which put local artist Roger Chandler’s nose
out of joint. Not only does the cost of the boot
blow way out of hand, but the construction is endlessly delayed by....rain.
And after all the cost and hard
work, will it actually save the town from financial devastation?
Produced by John
Fink and Camille Hardman, Big Dreamers is travelling throughout the
world receiving
accolades along
the way, and is also currently screening on Qantas In-flight Entertainment.
“Easily the most
enchanting film from down-under this year, Big Dreamers is a compelling and
localized view of globalization, told with as much deadpan wit as Mark
Lewis' Cane Toads.”
- Mike Steinberg
- Director of the Webster Film Series, Webster
University, St Louis, USA
The post
production of Big Dreamers was funded by the Australian Film
Commission (AFC).
The AFC is a
government funding organization that supports and fosters new, emerging and
established Australian filmmakers.
ABC TV on
Thursday 28th of November @ 9.30pm.
2007 Award of
Excellence – Videography – The Accolade Competition
For more
information CONTACT:
Camille Hardman, camille@barkingcat.tv + 1 323 709
8840
Film
Website: www.bigdreamers.info
From
Tony Stokes:
Tony emailed
members the Bulletin covering the Charter night of the ROTARY CLUB OF
GUNGAHLIN, ACT, where our former member Steve Bell is already making an
impact. Their bulletin is a good read along with this contribution.
Sam Kekovich's speech to ‘Centre Square’, at Ricmond Oval, AFL
Grand Final Day 2008
(Article from The
Australian)
My fellow Australians,
I've been invited here to
talk to Centre Square,
in these big marquees on Punt Road Oval. And speaking of Punt Road Oval,
let me tell you something for nothing - Jack Dyer would be spinning in his
grave if he could see the place right now. Full of a bunch of Collins
Street corporate criminals, Chapel Street designer cats and Toorak poodle
rooters who have about as much interest in football as Paris Hilton has an
interest in astrophysics.
Captain Blood didn't break
every bone in his body and commit multiple acts of on-field heroism and
homicide so he could see his beloved home ground turned into an over-priced
pre-match party for chardonnay-swilling spivs and their assorted hangers-on
attending their one footy match of the year, whilst tens of thousands of
hard-working honest battlers who love the game and love their team are
denied the chance to attend the greatest game in the world.
I've had a gutful. Whilst
this bunch of Armani-wearing, Audi-driving, Prada-carrying try-hards
monopolise priceless vantage points in the MCG, millions of genuine footy
fans who have followed their teams through thick and thin have to make do
by watching the game at home or down at the local pub; whilst the Melbourne
spivocracy get to sit on their fat posteriors in a marquee and wouldn't
even know the way to the MCG without a tour guide.
Since most of you haven't
attended a single match this year and know nothing about football, let me
give you a few tips - Geelong wears blue, Hawthorn wears brown, and in case
you were wondering, there'll be no fashions on the field at half-time; and
no, the Lexus Centre across the road is not a prestige car dealership.
Centre Square is not only
unfair. Centre Square is not only inequitable. Centre Square is downright
un-Australian! And so are all of you! In fact, I bet you're all so
un-Australian that you all hate the Anzacs, you booed Cathy Freeman, and
you want to cull cute cuddly koalas because one of them once jumped out in front
of your Range Rover on the way to Mount Hotham.
But it's not just you who are
at fault. I also blame the AFL. Those out-of-touch, opera-loving elitists
at AFL headquarters who are responsible for this unconscionable abomination
need to take a good hard look in the mirror. That is, if they can handle
the sight of moral and spiritual bankruptcy staring back at them.
I also blame the government.
Our new Prime Minister has clearly failed his first test of leadership if
he thinks it's acceptable to allow an event like this to go ahead without a
pre-emptive strike by the SAS. The PM is doing nothing to ease the squeeze
on working families on the bottom rung of the ladder of opportunity who
just want to see their team in the Granny. But he'd better get his act together
and do something about it, or millions of angry footy fans will do it for
him. Revolutions have been started and governments have been overthrown for
lesser outrages than this. And people ask why we need capital punishment.
So cut off your silver tails,
tear up your fur coats and get fair dinkum. Our great Australian game is
the greatest game in the world - the game of the people. Not some
once-a-year marquee piss-up for an overpaid, over-dressed pack of
passionless corporate cretins who only turn up for the free chardonnay and
then spend the actual game looking about as interested and excited as a
line of Easter Island statues.
So don't bother coming across
to the MCG this afternoon, because you're not welcome. The next train out
of Melbourne leaves Richmond station in 10 minutes - so make
sure you're on it. Or, better still, under it.
Don't be un-Australian -
everyone here in Centre Square
can get stuffed! You know it makes sense.
I'm Sam Kekovich.
Rotary Stories from
around the Globe: (From RI Website)
Villagers
get bridge over troubled waters by Chris Jones 17/ 9/2008
DOZENS
of lives will be saved in a small African town thanks to a kind-hearted
donation from the Rotary Club of Middleton.
As many
as 50 people have been swept away every year in the River Nithi as the
residents of Meru, in Kenya,
attempt to cross the stretch of water to reach the town of Kajuki on the other
bank.
But
townsfolk will no longer be faced with the prospect of wading through the
dangerous river or the 30km trip to the nearest river crossing thanks to
the installation of a £21,000 foot bridge.
The
bridge, funded by £6,000 from Middleton Rotary and a further £15,000 from
Rotary International, has been installed and is helping to transform lives,
allowing children to go to school in safety for the first time and letting
residents to access vital hospital services that were previously
out-of-reach on the other side of the Nithi.
John
Brooker, who headed out to Meru for the official opening of the bridge with
fellow Rotarian Peter Hayward said: "The construction of the bridge
has dramatically improved the lives of the community on the 'wrong' side of
the river.
"After
the rains the water level rises by about two metres and it becomes very
fast flowing and dangerous. The town of Kajuki is on one side of the river with
schools, a clinic, market, police and a station. Those on the 'wrong' side
of the river in Meru either have in the past, had to make a detour of 30km
to find a safe place to cross, or alternatively they swim across the river.
Upto 50 people each year are swept away and drown."
At the
official opening of the bridge, which was attended by local dignitaries
including politicians and tribal chiefs, a group of women demonstrated how
a pregnant woman would have had to cross the river to get to the hospital
on the other side before the bridge was constructed.
John
added: "Here in Britain
we sometimes think that we do 'all the giving' and that those people in the
third world, although they are desperate for help, do 'all the taking'
"It
is only when you get an opportunity to visit the community where the
project is taking place that you can really grasp just how much time and
effort is put in by those people who are 'receiving' the help."
Members
of the Rotary Club of Middleton were given a talk on the bridge project at
their September meeting by John and Peter.
They paid special tribute to the President of the Rotary Club of Meru,
Julius Gatobu and Charter President Raphael Kithinji, who endured hours of
uncomfortable commutes between Meru and the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, to
finalise plans for the construction of the bridge.
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