Last week's Proceedings -

29th November, 2006

President Paul started the meeting on time and introduced the only visiting Rotarian from Rotary Club of Vancouver Chinatown. He is our previous member PP Henry Fetigan.

There was no birthday boy for the day.

President Paul made the following announcements:

  1. Nomination of the District Governor for year 2008/2009 is now opened.
  2. The District Rotary Centenary Challenge Cup will be held on 16th December 2006 in Shatin Racecourse.
  3. The Vocation Visit to CLP Castle Peak Power Station in Tuen Mun will be on 9th December 2006. Deadline for enrolment was 19th November 2006.
  4. Uncle Peter Hall Golf Tournament will be held on 15th December 2006 in Fanling.

If any members interested in joining these events, please ask for more information from President Paul or Secretary Andy.

Then the acting Sergeant-at–arm PDG Uncle Peter reported a total collection of $500 for the Red-box donation. PP John Kwok and PP Henry (our visiting Rotarian) each contributed $100 more and topped it up to $700.

The highlight of the meeting was the talk by our speaker Ms. I-Ping Soong.+

Ms. Soong is a Singaporean and is a Teaching Fellow, holding the post of Director of Legal Research and Writing, Department of Law, University of Hong Kong.

She has been working in Slaughter & May and Allen & Overy in Hong Kong before joining the University of Hong Kong.

She is the Hon. Secretary of the Lo Wu Saddle Club which is a non-profit organization providing horse riding facilities to members and the public.

Lo Wu Saddle Club was the British Army Camp before at Ho Sheung Heung, Sheung Shui next to the border between Hong Kong and The Mainland. It was original built to house British Army mules, which ware used as pack animals for forays into hills and along the border as well as for drills and formal parade.

In 1994, as the British Army began to withdraw from Hong Kong, the camp was decided to be closed down. A group of keen horse lovers determined to maintain a part of the history and negotiated a lease on the Lo Wu Camp and took over the administration of what is now known as Lo Wu Saddle Club.

The club is essentially a public riding school; membership is very low and you do not need to be a member to ride. (Members get a discount only).

The club has 30 horses and 12 ponies. Most of the horses are retired race horses from the Hong Kong Jockey Club but some are owned by the Club and are imported.

The club has always prided itself in providing quality horse instruction and on its standard of horsemanship. It also provided community service to many NGO and underprivileged groups and disabled. It has organized over 600 free community service visits in 8 years.

Now the club is facing a big challenge due to the expansion of the Lo Wu Correction Centre adjacent to the club.

The Government terminated their lease and took back the site for building a bigger prison. Through the effort of I-Ping and some keen members, the club eventually got a smaller piece of land further down the existing site to build a new club.

Due to the shortage of fund, the Hong Kong Jockey Club has agreed to give them an interest free loan of slightly over $10 million for this new project. However, they are still facing a problem due to the fact that they are required to vacate the site and handed it back to the government in April next year. However, the new project is still yet approved by the Building Department and the Fire Services Department. The dispute is mainly due to the government insisting on asking for the provision of sprinkler system to the stable even though it is designed for open air. There was no sprinkler system to the existing stables in Hong Kong Jockey Club.

The abnormal requirement would delay the project further and add cost to the project for which the club cannot afford.

If the dispute cannot be resolved, there may be a chance that the existing horses and ponies might have to be shot before the 2008 Equestrian Olympics. This is the most undesirable thing to be happened and Ms Soong asked if any members could offer any help to solve this problem.

After the talk, there were many questions and suggestions raised by our members to Ms Soong.  Rtn Eric Chin then thanked our speaker for giving such an informative and lively talk.

President Paul closed the meeting at 2:05 pm by proposing a toast to RI coupled with the RC of Vancouver Chinatown.

END

Rotary Information

2006 Jakarta Rotary Institute
Zones 4B, 6B & 7B

The 2006 Jakarta Rotary Institute will be held from 29th November to 3rd December 2006 in Jakarta, Indonesia. The Convener will be RI Director Noraseth Pathmanand and the Institute Chairman, PDG Mark K.Y. Wong.

A Zone Institute is something like a semi convention, smaller in size and fewer attendance.

A group of more than twenty Rotary leaders headed by our District Governor Tony Wong from district 3450 will attend this Rotary Institute, including our own club member, PDG Y.K. Cheng who will be responsible to train the District Governors elect during the pre-Institute Programmes, known as “Governors-Elect Training Seminar - GETS”

Zone Institutes are important for senior Rotary leaders in the Zone concerned, since it is a forum where they receive most current updates of the Rotary International and The Rotary Foundation, and at the same time, air their concerns and comments about Rotary and the direction that it is proceeding.

The Institutes programes provide the attendees the future vision of the Rotary Foundation as well as the 2007 Council on Legislation proceedings. In this respect, our PDG Vincent To will give his remarks at this forum.

The Institute programmes include the following :

  1. Governors-elect Training Seminar
  2. District Trainers Training Seminar
  3. Regional Rotary Foundation Seminar
  4. Council On Legislation Forum

apart from the usual opening and closing ceremonies

It is our ardent desire that our District Governor, Past District Governors and other Rotary leaders will brief us on their return what they have learned from this Jakarta Institutes. Let us patiently wait for the good news.

In order to cement better fellowship among the participants, an Institute Golf Tournament will also be arranged by the Organizing Committee. Rotary golfers will be more than happy to practice their swings though in Indonesia.

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Electronic Make-up Questions

You can submit an electronic makeup for this missed meeting by answering the following questions:

1. Who was the visiting Rotarian today, and what club did he come from?

Answer:

2.Pres. Paul made four announcements, please name them.


Answer:

3. What was the SAA collection for today?

Answer:

4. Who was our guest speaker for today?

Answer:

5. What did she talk about?

Answer:

6. What was the Rotary Information on?

Answer:

7. Where and when will it be held ?

Answer:

Instruction:

Please copy these questions click the following URL John Kwok and paste it to the email and answer these questions and then click send

Jokes
Lucky Fathers

Four expectant fathers were in a Minneapolis hospital waiting room, while their wives were in labor. 

The nurse arrived and announced to the first man, "Congratulations sir, you're the father of twins.""What a coincidence!" the man said with some obvious pride. "I work for the Minnesota Twins baseball team."

The nurse returned in a little while and turned to the second man, "You, sir, are the father of triplets.""Wow, that's really an incredible coincidence " he answered. "I work for the 3M Corporation. My buddies at work will never let me live this one down."

An hour later, while the other two men were passing cigars around, the nurse came back.  This time, she turned to the 3rd man, who had been quiet in the corner.  She announced that his wife had just given birth to quadruplets.  Stunned, he barely could reply.  "Don't tell me another coincidence?" asked the nurse.  After finally regaining his composure, he said "I don't believe it, I work for the Four Seasons Hotel."

After hearing this, everybody's attention turned to the 4th guy, who had just fainted, flat out on the floor.  The nurse rushed to his side and, after some time, he slowly gained back his consciousness.  When he was finally able to speak, everyone could hear him whispering repeatedly the same phrase over and over again......"I should have never taken that job at 7-Up!"

 

Photographs of our meeting
on

29th November, 2006

Our charming speaker of the week is Ms. Soong I-Ping the Hon Secretary of Lo Wu Saddle Club, who spoke to us on "Preserving the heritage; building the future".

(L to R) PDG Uncle Peter, Ms. Soong I-Ping, Pres. Paul.

(L to R) Hon Sec. Andy, IPP Eddy, PP John IV.

(L to R) PP Stephen, Rtn Eric, Dr. Tony.

(L to R) Rtns Herman, Peter II, PP Tim, and PP Henry Fetigan (Vancouver Chinatown).

Our Group Photo of the meeting with our members, PDG Uncle Peter, Pres. Paul, guest speaker, and visiting Rotarian on 29th November, 2006.



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