The 27th Meeting of this Rotary year and our 5018th all time Club meeting, in our one hundred and third year. Rosemary Nixon AM was MC and opened the meeting.
The reflection (included later in this Bulletin) was capably delivered by Past President Peter Dakin.
President Chris informed the meeting that long time member Rodney Smith has had almost a month in hospital with influenza and pneumonia. He’s currently in respite care and hating it. Please speak with Jo for more information.
He reminded us of the 2024 Angus Mitchell Oration is in a fortnight Wednesday 21 February at Sofitel’s Level 1 Latrobe Room at which we will hear from The Hon Arthur Sinodinos AO, Partner and Chairman of The Asia Group, former Ambassador to the US 2020-23, former Liberal Party politician. Seats are limited and there has been much outside interest with close to 100 already booked. Please book quickly avoid missing out. Places are filling fast.
Finally, and before drawing the weekly Community Welfare Fundraising raffle, President Chris reminded us that the Evening team has a organised Club picnic, planned at the Rotary Melbourne Peace Park Domain Road South Yarra, on Wednesday 14 February, at which we expect that the Peace Bells will be installed permanently later this year. BYO Picnic and seating, there are plenty of options nearby for snacks and drinks for those coming from work. Stephen Rando will be bringing some world famous royal Rando sandwiches & homemade Limoncello!
Past President Adrian will conduct an informal tour of the Rotarians featured on the commemorative plaques in the park. Please join us for a drink and a catchup. More details in this Bulletin.
The meeting featured two stunning addresses. The first “mini address” was delivered by past Club Member (2005-2009), Professor Dr. Harald Schmidt, Royce Abbey awardee of our club and currently visiting Melbourne with his wife, Beate, and his son, Tim, as part of a sentimental journey. Harald is a German medical doctor and pharmacist who headed the Department of Pharmacology at Monash University and now works in big data and clinical research at Maastricht University, Netherlands. We recommend you spend a productive 12 minutes viewing the recording of his address in which he explains the move away from defining conditions in silos and by their symptoms, to understanding the root cause of non-communicable diseases and their impact on multiple parts of our body- "the end of medicine as we know it” by clicking here.
Chair of the day, Stephen Rando then introduced Criminal Psychologist, Tim Watson-Munro who gave a compelling address about his 45-year career journey, assessing more than 30,000 individual alleged offenders including some of Australia’s and the UK’s most notorious criminals. His career was highly successful, and he changed the approach to prevention through educative initiatives directed towards vulnerable young people, but he encountered challenges along the way caused by career burn-out. Tim’s story has messages and lessons for us all. You can view it by clicking here
The meeting closed with members, led by District 9800 Governor Elect Michael Lapina in singing the National Anthem.
To view the recording of the full Meeting Click here
