Members are encouraged to attend Thursday lunch meetings whenever they can. They are an opportunity for fellowship, to hear interesting speakers, and to catch up with our Club activities.
Remember that if you are unable to join our lunch meetings in person, we can still provide a Zoom option. Please contact President Fiona for details of the link to use.
Meal Orders - Update April 2023
The café has noted that many of our Rotary members and guests are now ordering on arrival. This makes it difficult for them to manage staffing levels and keep up the level of service for us, as well as their other guests.
As a club, we appreciate the use of the venue facilities free of charge.
To maintain this it is appreciated if you would please remember to pre-order your food and drink from the lunch menu ahead of time!
Did you hear the one about the three Rotary Club members, all a little hard of hearing, standing by the bowling green in the park. One remarked to the other "Windy isn't it?" "No" the second man replied, "its Thursday". The third man nodded in agreement: "So am I. Lets have a cup of tea". Luckily Harriet Moir, guest entertainer at our Changeover Dinner had a better supply of jokes and anecdotes (even if some of our audience weren't sure whether to laugh or be offended). N.B. for future reference, never sit in the front row at a comedy show
This departure from more traditional changeovers perhaps indicates that President Katie may do things a little "differently" this year
A Vote of Thanks to Fiona was proposed by President-elect Anna; an outline of achievements during the past year was presented by Fiona, who received some pretty flowers; the Presidential chain of office was passed from Fiona to Katie; a brief outline of plans for the coming 12 months was delivered by Katie (with a promise of more to come this Thursday!); and amongst all this, dinner was served and enjoyed: Warm bread rolls and butter, baked ham with apple sauce and gravy, green peas and roast vegetables followed by chocolate brownie and cream! Just like Christmas!!
Fiona's year 2022-23
It’s been a privilege serving as club president these last 12 months!
You are a caring, considerate and highly committed group of Rotarians, and I’ve greatly appreciated all the support and guidance you’ve provided to me.
In Fact, attending group meetings , getting to know you and working together on projects has made my year a super enjoyable and busy, experience – one that that I’ve learnt from and one that I'm glad I’ve had.
At last years’ changeover we had the “imagine rotary’ theme – I haven’t just imagined Rotary this year, I’ve lived it like never before!
Since we’ve gradually been able to do more since the lockdowns, we’ve made the most of opportunities this year, it’s been great. Highlights of course include
The Centennial dinner, omg – it was epic. Thanks to all of you for sharing and enjoying this even made especially memorable with Craig’s book launch, Jonathan’s magic and the incredible sense of pride we have in our Club that was shared by current and former members and friends of the club alike. Imagine having a table of ‘ladies’ of former members wives there who were able to celebrate with us and reflect on the important place Rotary had in their lives .
Art Incognito – a fantastic new form of fundraiser for us - thanks to the courageous team who dared to do this, it was amazing how Rotary could engage with the art community and public to make this event a great success. We’ve enjoyed lots of other little special fundraising activities, like modelling for Chatford or making breakfast for 100 or so construction workers, to watching the spectacle of hundreds of precious taonga little blue penguins returning from sea to land in the evening. It’s all be a blast.
Rotary Park – a long term project in the making! We’ve got some money - 10K funding already, we’ve got help from the Otago Mountain Bike club, we’ve got DCC consent and neighbourhood support, we’ve got support from five other clubs, what more could you want? It’s a very exciting project that’ll take us out into the next 100 years of this club!
We’ve seen installation of a new bike pump at West Harbour, and one to go into Port soon too, we’ve We missed trees for families at West Harbour on Mothers Day, but we commemorated all the many hundreds of trees planted at West Harbour for this event with a bronze plaque. We’re hoping to plant at RP next time!
We’ve collected for the Hospice, and spread dirt for them too, . We’ve volunteered to support the Food banks, Cancer research, St John’s and any many more.
We’ve had incredibly high quality and engaging speakers every week – I couldn’t have been luckier to precide over such enjoyable lunch meetings!
One of my aspirations when starting out last year was to maintain the sense of ‘good vibe’ that we have as Rotary Dunedin members- our meetings, our outings, our service projects and all that we do contribute to this. I had the notion of incremental improvement, Kaizen quality theory – but with the 100 years of history and accomplishments that make this club what it is-m well structured, well organised, busy and active – I’ve realised there isn’t that much more to improve on, except to keep taking on as many opportunities to serve and enhance the community as we can–so we’ve had a busy year, from fundraising to fellowship and celebration to community service.
In this centennial year, I’d like to thank the early instigators for the centennial year – Gordon and Rick for their vision of Rotary Park, John Drummond for his foresight as president several years ago to create the book to record our last 25 years. To Craig Radford and Claire for their tireless work to research and write this centennial club history book, as katie says’ a rollicking good read’.
To all of you who have helped ‘imagine rotary’ this year gone, and supported your groups, served on committees or just turned up to help ‘ make it all happen’, I sincerely thank you,
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to be the club president this year. I’m looking forward to continuing to work alongside all of you in our upcoming events and ventures. We do great work, we are a successful club, yes we need more members, but we value who we are and why we’re here.
Katie, I know you will also have a ‘rollicking good year’ as our 2023-24 Rotary Dunedin ‘el presidente’, good luck and all the best.
RI President Gordon R. 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 realize these values.
Why Have a Bulletin?
I can think of several reasons (there are no doubt plenty of others so feel free to respond!)
*It keeps in touch with members who are on Leave of Absence, are too busy to attend weekly meetings, or simply missed a week due to the dreaded Covid.
*It informs members of one committee/group what other committees/groups are planning/have achieved.
*It currently is sent to 32 "subscribers" (non club members) who wish to be kept up to date with our activities; and is linked from our website. www.dunedinrotary.org.nz/Bulletins (for those who may stumble across it via Google or other search engines).
So firstly may I extend a big THANK YOU to all who have assisted me with the production of the Bulletin this past year: Speaker Hosts, Directors, Project Leaders, and Individuals who have provided reports and photographs!!
Did you hear the one about the three Rotary Club members, all a little hard of hearing, standing by the bowling green in the park. One remarked to the other "Windy isn't it?" "No" the second man replied, "its Thursday". The third man nodded in agreement: "So am I. Lets have a cup of tea". Luckily Harriet Moir, guest entertainer at our Changeover Dinner had a better supply of jokes and anecdotes (even if some of our audience weren't sure whether to laugh or be offended). N.B. for future reference, never sit in the front row at a comedy show
A Vote of Thanks to Fiona was proposed by President-elect Anna; an outline of achievements during the past year was presented by Fiona, who received some pretty flowers; the Presidential chain of office was passed from Fiona to Katie; a brief outline of plans for the coming 12 months was delivered by Katie (with a promise of more to come this Thursday!); and amongst all this, dinner was served and enjoyed: Warm bread rolls and butter, baked ham with apple sauce and gravy, green peas and roast vegetables followed by chocolate brownie and cream! Just like Christmas!!
RI President Gordon R. 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 realize these values.