PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE

The Group 11 Inter-city Meeting was indeed a resounding success. Attended by almost 100 Rotarians, Anns and guests, it was an evening of great fellowship at the Grand Dorsett Ballroom. Our District Governor, Leslie Salehuddin and the First Lady Ziela graced the occasion. The presence of the District Governor Elect Lim Kok Beng, the District Governor Nominee Dr Raveendra, the Chairman of the Council of Past Governors Dato’ Perumal and the PDGs added to the glamour of Rotary leaders past, present and future. The purpose of this Inter-city Meeting was to provide the opportunity for the 5 Rotary Clubs within Group 11 to interact and meet in a relaxing atmosphere. I must first thank AG Farouk Nurish for initiating this meeting and the Presidents of the 5 Clubs: President Santhirasegaran of Pantai Valley, President Elizabeth Yam of Kelana Jaya, President June Lai of Sungei Way and PP Sanggaran of Port Klang representing President Patrick Ang. The speaker, Mr Paul Jambunathan who spoke on How to handle strange behaviour, was indeed hilarious in his remarks about certain human behaviour. It was a lively presentation and informative as well. I must also thank our Rotarians from the RCPJ, particularly Rtn Margaret Soo, VP Jack Lim, PP Rupert Goldman and PP Balram Menon for their kind assistance in organizing this successful meeting.

The Family Outing over the weekend on Cameron Highlands was indeed great for more than 30 Rotarians, Anns and their children. It was also a good time to get to know the children who are part of our Rotary family. Thank you, Rotarians and Anns for taking them along. We really enjoyed the trip and the fellowship. Thank you again PP Albert Yong for seeing to the details and arrangement. The resort has a lot to offer in terms of places of interest and the cool weather. The PJ Close was held on a Saturday morning. Though meant to be fellowship golf for 16 years of history, it was really unfortunate that there was a dispute with regard to the enforcement or non-enforcement to the winter rule of play.

As the President of the Club, I strongly urge the parties concerned to be magnanimous to the decision made by the golf convenor. We competed in the PJ Close in a spirit of goodwill and harmony. There was no malicious intent on anyone to take advantage of any situation. The only setback was that the winter rule was not communicated to every golfer before the start of the game. Goodwill, I strongly believe, should take precedence to any shortcoming in this fellowship golf. The PJ Close is associated with a limited number of Rotarians in the Club. This time round, the number was fewer – only 11, making a quarter of the membership or 25%. So I again urge the parties concerned not to allow this unfortunate incident fester through the whole membership. We need to have good rapport with each other and not allow pockets of resentment within the Club. Please let the matter rest. And think hard for the good of the Club and I thank you for doing so. 

The Rotary International District 3300 Bowling Fellowship Get-together will be scheduled on 22nd November 2009 at 12 noon. It will be held at the Sunway Megabowl (Sunway Pyramid). We need a team of 4 bowlers. I have requested Rtn Ryan Ho to take charge of this activity. Please get in touch with him to bowl for charity.

All our projects are now moving fast. We should be launching at least two of them in January. Thank you for your support. Let us commit ourselves to our community.

Rotary has more than a hundred years of experience in organizing events and projects to serve its members and the community. There are hundreds of resources in the form of booklets, brochures, articles and modules on how to plan and implement projects in Rotary. Every In-Coming President of Rotary Clubs who attend all the training sessions organized by the District Governor Elect would have the module  “Project Planning and Implementation” presented at one of the training events.

Every project, event, seminar, conference, workshop, installation, etc. is a Rotary project that requires planning to ensure its successful implementation.

US General (Rtd) Colin Power wrote and I quote, “There is no secret to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work and learning from failure.” Former RI President Frank Devlyn told his Governors at the International Assembly in 2000, “The sure path to success is to plan, plan and plan.”

Every activity we undertake in our club is a project and it needs planning before it is implemented. I was particularly disappointed with the Intercity Meeting among the Group 11 clubs last Thursday. I do not know what planning took place amongst the five Presidents at their Group Meeting. But it appeared to me that most of the planning was taking place through the email. It is more apparent that night that the Assistant Governor was running the Intercity Meeting. Many of the prior arrangements were changed on the night itself.  It was very clearly agreed that I was the SAA for the meeting. However, I was told there is no need for an SAA for the night and there will be no introduction of guests and visiting Rotarians.

The welcoming of guests and visiting Rotarians is a very important part of any Rotary meeting. The District Governor, District Governor Nominee and many other Rotarians were present at the meeting. How can we just ignore their presence! Our club is going through an active membership recruitment phase. There were at least four potential members in attendance at the meeting. What a shame we did not acknowledge their presence!  I was requested just before the start of the meeting to propose a Toast to Rotary International. We all know that a Toast to Rotary International should be accompanied with a short introduction of Rotary International. How can I be expected to prepare the introduction on the spot? No one was informed there was going to be a Loyal Toast to DYMM Sri Paduka Baginda Yang DiPertuan Agong. Otherwise the National flag would have been displayed for the toast.

The most serious error in my opinion is not to invite the District Governor to Chair the Intercity Meeting. The Assistant Governor has no standing in the presence of the District Governor. How can the Assistant Governor take precedence over the District Governor?

Clearly if a meeting had been held before the Intercity Meeting all these issues would have been discussed and a clear plan of action for the meeting adopted. With five clubs there will be differences in procedures in running the meeting based on each club’s regular arrangement. But we could have adopted a format to suit all.

Let’s hope we can learn from Gen (R) Colin Power’s advice and that is learn from the failure of this event and plan in future. This surely will be the start of many more intercity meetings our club will be taking part in future. Let’s not make the same mistake again.

The speaker for the evening was Mr Paul Jambunathan who spoke on How To Understand Strange Behaviour. He started the presentation with a very interesting definition of strange behaviour. He defines strange or abnormal behaviour as not thinking like the rest of the group. Your basic needs and wants surface when you are frustrated. Frustration exists at every level of human existence and the human perception that someone else is always better than you. It is like a lawyer wanting to be a doctor and a doctor wanting to be a lawyer. Such frustration leads to stress and all its accompanying consequences.

He explained the four basic wants and needs of all human beings:

1.      I want to live

2.      I want a feeling of importance

3.      I want someone to love me

4.      I want a little variety.

Do the four needs fit into your everyday life?

Rotary quote of the day: There was no Rotary quote of the day.

ATTENDANCE: 23/39 = 58.97%

PP Datuk Abdul Rahman is RCPJ Golf Champion

The RCPJ Closed Golf Competition for the Ong See Seng Challenge Trophy was held on Cameron Highlands on Saturday 7^th November during the RCPJ Family Outing. A total of 11 golfers took part in the competition which started at 7.00am and PP Datuk Abdul Rahman was the winner with 39 stablefort points. As we had to get up at 6 am, many of our body were still fast asleep. So how to win!

In his acceptance speech during the prize presentation that evening he expressed relief that he has finally succeeded since his first attempt in 1986. Rahman will be 71 next year, and feels he may not be able to play that well to win the competition. President Dr Eric Wong gave away the trophy. Datin Hani was present to witness the prize giving and we all can see the happiness and pride in her face. Congratulations Rahman!

RCPJ Family Outing to Cameron Highlands

After many years the club successfully organized a weekend family outing to Cameron Highland from 5-8 November 2009. A total of 15 Rotarians, 22 Spouses and Guests and 7 children took part in the outing. A very comprehensive program was prepared by the Organising Chairman, PP Albert Yong for both the golfers and non-golfers. This included a visit to the Sia Organic Vegetable Farm and the BOH Tea Plantation. Afternoon tea with scones was served on the terrace of the visitors’ center. It was also an occasion for vegetable shopping for the ladies.

All of us were housed in the Dahlia Villa which provided a wonderful opportunity for fellowship and partying. After many years it was nice once again to see the young children running around in the club. Of course there was Karaoke on both evenings after dinner and apart from the usual singers, Rianne and KO were the new talents discovered.

Thank you PP Albert for a job well done to give all of us an enjoyable weekend on Cameron Highlands.

PP Goh Seng Chuan has moved his residence to:

21, Jalan SS3/86
46400 Petaling Jaya

Olivia’s 25 points about herself

We mentioned in the last issue that we would publish the 25 points about our newest member Rtn Olivia. Sorry we have not received it yet. Maybe in the next issue.

Host for Club Public Relations Committee on Tuesday 10 November

The host was PE Yeng Kit and Fiona who served a sumptuous Korean Dinner at Seoul Korean Restaurant at the Kuchai Entrepreneurs Park.