RI President Elect Barry Rassin from the Bahamas has announced the Rotary theme for the 2018-19 Rotary year. 

Rassin, a member of the Rotary Club of East Nassau, New Providence, Bahamas, unveiled the theme, Be the Inspiration, to incoming district governors at Rotary’s International Assembly in San Diego. “I want you to inspire in your clubs, your Rotarians, that desire for something greater. The drive to do more, to be more, to create something that will live beyond each of us.”

Rassin stressed the power of Rotary’s new vision statement, “Together, we see a world where people unite and take action to create lasting change — across the globe, in our communities, and in ourselves.” This describes the Rotary that leaders must help build, he said.

For those who would like to learn more, click here to view Barry's speech.

On Saturday 24th February, Donations in Kind (DIK) is holding an Open Day at their premises in Maribyrnong Rd, West Footscray to celebrate their move to the new warehouse.

Tea and coffee will be available thorugh the day and there will be a good old sausage sizzle lunch.

The operating cost of maintaining the warehouse is high so one of their aims is to seek financial support from clubs by buying a bay of racks.

Click here to see a flyer of the Open Day.

The date for the Werribee Rotary Annual Golf Day is Friday 2nd March.

The Golf Day committee is already hard at work to ensure it will be another successful event.

• Hole-in-One observers
• Hole-in-One spruiker
• Drink cart drivers
• Helpers for the putting hole
• Someone to install sponsor signs at each hole

At our Christmas Dinner in December, the new Board for 2018-19 was announced. The only person missing from the line-up was the President-elect for 2019-20 was Brian Ahmed. His absence raised a few eyebrows considering we were dining in his fine establishment. But we all agreed it was a great announcement.

Brian joined our club on 20th June 2006 and, in between his busy egg/chicken and restaurant businesses and his role as President of the Victorian Farmers Federation, he has been an active and effective member of our club. 

Click here if you would like to know a bit more about Brian's life to date.

We wish Brian much success as the leader of our club.

The competition to guess the number of pencils in the box has closed and the winner has been announced. Congratulations to Christine Conley whose entry was the closest to the actual number of 1828 pencils. Christine has won a $150 voucher to ShadowFax Winery.

Second closest was Rahul McPherson who works for Tino Ballan. He wins a ticket for two people to the Werribee Cinemas. Special thanks to Roly Wade for donating both prizes. And thanks to everyone who had a go at the guessing game. For the statistically minded, the lowest entry was 345 and the highest entry was 7582. The average was about 3000 which just goes to show that it was deceptively challenging or that some people just had no idea. 

We were successful in raising $190. The funds will be deposited into our club account.

The pencils will now be donated to Donations in Kind to be distributed to school children in Pacific-rim countries.

The ultimate prize for any golfer is to score a hole-in-one. Some have been playing for 50 years and not been able to achieve nirvana. Then there are others who have only just started their golfing journey and they get lucky. Such is the case with Phil Purdy.

The scene for this miracle event was the 3rd hole at the Altona Lakes course last Friday - Phil obviously wasn't very busy or he left it all to Barb. He hit the ball off the tee hoping for it to go in the general direction of the green 123 metres away. He looked up. Not only did the ball land on the green but it bounced a couple of times and then, low and behold, it rolled straight in the hole. Phil went wild with excitement. He raised his hand ready for a high-5 but then realised he was playing by himself and there was absolutely no-one else on the course to witness or share in this euphoric moment.

We can only assume that Phil did actually score the ace because he practices the 4-way test in everything he says and does. But he also occasionally admits to practising the 5th test - "Will I get caught?".

Unfortunately, the excitement was short lived. With tears of joy still in his eyes, he teed up on the next hole and proceeded to hit the same ball into the lake! Talk about going from chocolates to boiled lollies. Don't worry Phil. Your fellow golfers are all envious of your once-in-a-lifetime achievement.

• Guests at our last meeting were:
  • Joumana Oueirdat
  • Lesley Wilson
  • Brian Savage

• After his bout of cellulitis in Queensland, Geoff Smith is back home and on the slow road to recovery. Keep the leg up Joffa.
• Have you registered for the District Conference yet?  If you're planning to go but haven't registered, please click here to go to the Conference website.