Club News - the Gossip Page

PRESS RELEASE "Aid to Pakistan"  The Club has provided funding for 15 Water Survival  Boxes to be deployed in Pakistan to aid in the flood relief effort.  This is a combination of money from our Charity Account and individual donations from members.  The boxes not only provide clean water for a famiily of 4, they contain various survival aids to help those who have lost everything in the floods.

CLICK HERE for full story.

The annual Golden Age Fair took place today at Ascot Race Course, and we were there manning our stand and looking out for potential new members among the 500+ visitors.  Our stand featured our new display board and a video of Rotary Internationa activities.  It was manned by a rota of members organised by Community & Vocational chair, Tony.  President Beverley was on duty for an hour before lunch. 

Several visitors expressed an interest in Rotary, and we will follow these up over the next few weeks.

Moya reports - The Musical Quiz held at the Day Centre on Sunday was a very happy and fun evening and attended by about 60 people. The first half of the evening David Jones played tunes on his keyboard and the winner of that was Barbara Skinner. In the second half Tony Love played recordings and that was won by Dellyn Jones. The Ploughmans Supper done by Sonja Bowyer and Edith Hunter was enjoyed by everyone.

Tonight we welcomed District Governor Laurie Cunningham to our Club for his "Official Visit".  DG Laurie spoke of many things, including Focus on the Crocus, the Polio situation in India and Nigeria, Interact Clubs, Ambassadorial Scholars, the Group Study Exchange to Argentina and the rules for the Presidential Citation.  He advised us that RIBI President Jim Moulson will be visiting the District in the second week of September, and a programme will be published shortly.

During the evening he presented the Club with the RI President Ray Klinginsmith's year theme pennant "Building Communities Bridging Continents" (see photo).

President Beverley was let out on his own last week to be a guest at the Inner Wheel Garden Party "Ascot Alfresco", held in Edith's garden in Cheapside.  Actually a number of Rotarians were keeping a watchful eye on him, as they had volunteered to help the ladies set up the garden,  to marshall the car parking and to serve the wine.

CLICK HERE for more pictures (in the Inner Wheel website)

Out with the old - in with the new. Rotary years are 6 months out of phase with the rest of the world - no matter, tonight we celebrated the achievements of outgoing President Colin's year, and welcomed incoming President Beverley into office.  As a change in format, we held the handover dinner at our meeting base, Mill Ride Golf Club, and enjoyed Pimms on the Terrace followed by a buffet main course.

The Club was awarded a Presidential Citation for the year 2009-10, presented  by Assistant District Governor Moya Harvey.  President Colin presented flowers to his wife, Hilary, and to Pam Coopey, retiring President of Ascot Inner Wheel.  Chris Valentine, Pam's sucessor, greeted President Beverley on behalf of Inner Wheel. President Beverley in turn welcomed Bob Linnell as President-Elect, and promised to find the right collar for the next meeting!

President Colin, accompanied by Community & Vocational Committee Chairmen Keith (2009-10) and Tony (2010-11) went to see how our donation to a local lady with disabilities had been used to provide her with a mobility scooter.  Sian, who lives in Sunningdale, told the visiting Rotarians how the scooter was enabling her to get out and about with much greater ease and freedom.

FRANCE - and a party of intrepid Ascot Rotarians set off to visit our twin club, RC St. Nazaire, in Bayeux.

CLICK HERE for photos by David Mear

CLICK HERE for photos by Geoff Cook

A busy but enjoyable evening tonight.  Firstly we were pleased to induct another new member, Alan Rawlinson,  into the Rotary Club of Ascot.  We were then delighted to welcome four Rotarians from RC Heathrow Airport, which finally closed its doors and handed back its Charter on Monday, who have decided to transfer to RC Ascot.  Rtn John Baker, a Founder Member of RC Heathrow, was accompanied by his colleagues Vic Catania, Alan Harvey and Godfrey Skinner.  CLICK HERE FOR PICTURES

And as if all that were not enough, we were then treated to an excellent presentation by Hugh Granger on the subject of "The Inventive Genius of Barnes Wallis".

You know its summer when we hit the Garden Party season, and today we enjoyed comfortable weather - not too hot, but no rain - and good food in Nigel & Cynthia's garden.  About 70 Rotarians and guests turned up, and a good time was had by all.  Food was provided once again by Linda's Kitchen, and our Club Service Committee erected and dismantled the gazebos.

Many thanks to all who helped to make the day a success.

Tonight we were pleased to induct the newest member into the Rotary Club of Ascot, when Nigel Fisher joined our Club.  Nigel is pictured receiving his membership welcome pack from President Colin.

Later we held our Club Assembly, with Assistant District Governor David Morris in attendance.  We were also delighted to welcome visiting Rotarians from RC Heathrow Airport who are in the process of transferring to RC Ascot.

A party of Rotarians, partners and friends embarked on a trip to the Cotswolds today. 

At our weekly meeting tonight we welcomed Karen Capel of the "Christopher's Smile" charity, one of the beneficiaries from our golf day and President Colin's preferred charity for the year. On behalf of the Club, President Colin presented a cheque for £2,800 to the charity.

Also tonight we welcomed back Richard Poad, chairman of the Maidenhead Heritage Centre, who gave a fascinating presentation about the 75 year history of the White Waltham airfield.

Moya reports: - Today President Colin Corio and members welcomed the Mayor of the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead Councillor Jessie Grey to our meeting. He brought along his robes of office and the Mace. He gave a very interesting talk on the history of the position of Mayor, about the Castle and the Guildhall in Windsor.

Anthony reports: - After the racing the group returned for tea and cake at Sunningdale. The Scholars and their driver, had a frustrating delay in exiting the course car park, but with dinner delayed for a few minutes, all eventually arrived at Mill Ride Golf Club. After dinner Scholars, Sarah Yun and Tom Anderson, gave excellent talks on their backgrounds and their journey towards becoming Ambassadorial Scholars. A Club Pennant was presented by Tom to President Colin from R.C. Portage, Michigan. Colin promised to forward one from Ascot in return, when the Secretary is home from holiday!

Anthony reports: - 5 Rotarians (and a couple of wives) accompanied 3 Ambassadorial Scholars and their driver Ken Elphick (R.C. Haddenham) and his wife Judy, to the races at Ascot. Premier Admission tickets had again been generously provided for the Scholars by John Blake of Ascot Race Course. A great afternoon’s racing was enjoyed in splendid sunshine, no-one winning or losing too much, so a very satisfactory result.

CLICK HERE for more pictures

Moya reports: - The Race night held on Saturday 24th April 2010 at Carnation Hall was a good evening of fun and fellowship. We all enjoyed the Chicken/Fish and Chip Supper. Thanks to Norman for doing the Tote and to President Colin and Mike Lustig for manning the bar and setting up the hall. At the end of the evening the hall was cleared with everyone mucking in to help.

IPP David with Eileen, and Secretary Ian with Chris spent the weekend in sunny Bournemouth attending the RIBI Conference.  As usual at such events there was a fascinating mix of top quality speakers on subjects such as the Jaipur Limb project, surviving polio, the Starfish project and a particularly thought-provoking talk by the founder of "The Big Issue".

On Saturday the Young Citizen awards were presented by Konnie Huq and broadcast live on the BBC News channel.

 Entertainment included Paul Daniels on the Saturday evening, and Alistair MCGowan rounding off the Sunday plenary.

Moya reports: - Photograph at the Inner Wheel /Rotary Skittles Match held on Friday. Rotary won. The trophy was presented to President Colin Corio by Inner Wheel President Pam. It was a very happy and enjoyable evening.

That's the way to do it! Our AGM held this evening was doubtless helped on its way by the promise of a whisky-tasting session to follow, conducted by our own Rtn Norman Smith.  Despite his rather English surname, Norman is a Scot, and an expert on Scotch Whisky.  We learnt how whisky was distilled, and the different approaches to infusion with peat smoke which imparts the peaty flavour to some whiskys.

At last we were introduced to the bottles and sampled the range of different flavours that this drink can carry.  CLICK HERE for AGM Minutes (log in first)

A packed house at the British Legion Hall in Cranbourne enjoyed an evening of "big band" music put together by Rotarian David Jones and performed by his newly promulgated 10 piece "Swing Era" band, with vocalist  Jan Curd.  This was music we all knew (even if only by listening to our parent's collection of 78s) including Glen Miller, Harry James and Count Basie amongst many others.  The format, as in previous events, was "bring-your-own indoor picnic and drinks" - a very enjoyable evening.

For our 5th Wednesday meeting with partners we were pleased to welcome Rtn Geoff Poland of RC Reading Matins, who led the team which visited South Africa and Lesotho last October.  He was accompanied by team member Steffan Thomas, a graduate from Southampton University who has worked as the sports section manager at Uxbridge College since 2002.  Geoff and Steffan told us their experiences in South Africa, and the profound beneficial impact of the GSE experience on the careers of all the participants.

Tonight was the rescheduled date for the Charity Dinner at the Rajvoog Indian Restaurant in Sunninghill.  The event raised over £500 for the Access Bangladesh Foundation, and combined with the January dinner makes the total over  £750 towards the total that the foundation was seeking to buy a photocopier.  Restaurant owner Mogsud Khan will be travelling to Bangladesh in April and will take the money to the Foundation headquarters to present to Albert Mollah, Executive Director of the charity.

CLICK HERE for more photos by Hans Juergen.

Moya reports: "President Colin and Hilary Corio together with Moya and Alan Harvey attended the District 1090 Conference held at Eastbourne. 

"The Conference opened with a welcome from the Mayor of Eastbourne Councillor Greg Szanto."

CLICK HERE for full story

Moya reports "We had the Quiz Night last night it was a good evening enjoyed by all and the picture shows the winning team"

Tonight in the Hexagon Theatre, Reading, over 350 children in the age range 7-9  from 11 schools in the Windsor area  performed a concert in front of an audience which will include the Mayor and Mayoress of the Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead.   The show, entitled "Meet our Folks", looked in a light-hearted way at the attitudes, situations and outcomes surrounding children and their parents. 

The Rotary Clubs of Ascot & Wokingham combined to organise the concert, which was under the musical directorship of Clive Waterman.

The Youth Speaks District 1090 Final was held in Wycombe High School today. Our Club had a particular interest in this event as St Mary's School Ascot had a team in the Intermediate Section. There were four teams competing in this section and as was to be expected the standard was very high. The St Mary's team was just pipped at the post by the Royal Grammar School High Wycombe. 

When we staged the Zone Final a few weeks ago the Senior Section was won by Uxbridge College and they were again successful at the District Final. Both wining teams now go forward to the Regional Final to be held on 13 March at the Cranleigh Baptist Church, Cranleigh, GU6 8RT (1:30pm for 2:00 start).  (Report by Alan Clare)

Today is also "Thanks for Life - End Polio Now" day, with Rotary Clubs up and down the country operating collections outside over 300 Tesco stores.  At short notice our Club took on the organisation and manning of the collection at Tesco, Martins Heron, operating a rota from 9:00am to 6:00pm.  The day raised over £530 which will be our contribution to the national total.

Pictured left are President Colin, with Moya and Anthony.  Anthony coordinated the day, which was judged a great sucess.

The District Final of the Young Chef competition  hosted by the Rotary Club of Farringdon at the Farringdon Community College took place today, and President Colin went along with Moya to support our competitor, Hannah Wilson. 

Unfortunately neither  Hannah from Ascot nor Nadin Harris from Wokingham made it through to the next round but they both enjoyed taking part.

Tonight it was Ascot's turn to host the annual "5 Clubs" dinner, attended by over 60 members of the Rotary Clubs of Ascot, Bracknell, Crowthorne & Sandhurst, Easthampstead and Wokingham.  Our District Assistant Governor Robin was present and our guest speaker was Peter Caddick-Adams, who spoke on the subject of "Media in Modern Warfare".

(Apologies for the poor quality of this photo)

Tonight the Club ran the Zone Final of the "Youth Speaks" competition, with schools from Slough, Windsor, Northwood, Uxbridge and Ascot competing for a place in the District Final in March. The teams have already won a local competition to get into this zone final, and we were very pleased that an Ascot team, St. Mary's School, were sucessful tonight.  They won the Intermediate competition (pictured right receiving their trophy from President Colin), and now progress to the District Final.  Individual prize winner in this age group was Rahul Soni of Herschel Grammar School.

In the Senior competition, Uxbridge college made a clean sweep, winning the team tropy and a place in the next round, and their Speaker, Ismaila Ngum winning the individual prize.

We are grateful to St. Georges School, Ascot, who kindly hosted tonight's competition, Master of Ceremonies and Event Coordinator Rtn Alan Clare, and the judges, Chris Majewski, Margaret Barton and Paula King.

The third leg of the Sunninghill Wheelbarrow Race Triathlon took place tonight, at a Gourmet Dinner and Auction attended by the Ascot Day Centre Benefactors, Rotarians and partners, and guests from the local area. The event took place at the Jade Fountain in Sunninghill, and the auction and raffle raised in the order of £2,000.  This means that the total monies raised for the Ascot Day Centre through the three activities comes to £7,000. 

During the evening the Wheelbarrow Race winners "Taking the St. Michael's" were presented with their trophy, now engraved.

Our Special General Meeting, delayed by the snow fall earlier this month, finally took place today.  After presentations by the candidates for the Senior Vice President post, the ballot result was in favour of Rtn Beverley Williams, pictured left receiving the SVP medal from President Colin.  The Junior Vice President ballot elected new Rtn Robert Linnell, pictured right receiving the JVP medal from President Colin.  Rtn David Marshall was re-elected Treasurer, and Rtn Ian Valentine was confirmed as Secretary, no-one else applying for the job!

Responding to the earthquake disaster in Haiti, our treasurer reports that he has sent off a Club cheque for £1,470 to cover the cost of 3 Shelterboxes, one being the box discussed at last Wednesday's meeting, the other 2 being funded by a private donation from a Club member. 

More information can be found on the Shelterbox Web Site.

Members of Ascot Rotary Club and Ascot Inner Wheel joined 20+ Rotarians from across our District at Charters School, Sunningdale, today to take part in a "hands on" Public Relations workshop "Getting Your Message Across" organised and presented by the D1090 Communications Committee (chaired by your webmaster).  Presenters included District PR Officer Judith Diment, District Web Master Liz Yardley and the Managing Editor of the London Eventing Standard, Doug Wills, with support from John McCarthy, a website expert.

Participants included District Governor Terry Kenyon and RIBI Marketing, PR & Comms chairman, Tony Bacon.

It looked like a case of "Oh no, not again!" this morning when we woke to find yet another 2 inches of snow (5 cms. for our younger members) had fallen overnight.  After a series of phone calls we decided to go ahead with our Curry Evening at the Rajvoog Indian Restaurant in Sunninghill.  However, as it seemed only a fraction of the expected numbers would be able to attend, we would have a fellowship evening and reschedule the Charity Dinner for a later date.  Nevertheless over 20 Rotarians, partners and guests did turn up, and  owner Mogsud Khan served us a very enjoyable meal.  Afterwards he told us more about the Access Bangladesh Foundation, and announced that in spite of the low numbers and our promise to return at a later date, the proceeds of the evening would still go to the Foundation.  CLICK HERE for more pictures.

The meeting discussed the Haiti earthquake situation and agreed to propose funding a Shelterbox, subject to confirmation that we have sufficient funds in hand.

Snowed in! For the first time in many years the Wednesday meeting had to be cancelled due to adverse weather conditions.  This was particularly unfortunate because it was the date for a Special General Meeting.  The SGM has now been deferred until our 20th January meeting.

Picture shows your webmaster's drive, somewhere under the white stuff in front of the lamp post.

Kicking off the New Year on a clear but frosty morning, the 14th Sunninghill Wheelbarrow Race gave competitors a chance to don fancy dress and gallop around the streets of Sunninghill, all in aid of the Ascot Day Centre.  This year , due to the stupendous efforts of the Wheelbarrow Race Committee, we had 16 teams in the race.  The fastest team, with a time of 9 minutes 42 seconds were last year's winners "Taking the St. Michael's", closely followed by "Round Table Runners" (10:46) and "The Swinley" (11:04).  The fastest ladies, with a time of  18 minutes were "Santa Mania", and the prize for best fancy dress went to "Men in Black".  The special prize for raising the most sponsorship money went to "Taking the St. Michael's" who raised £304, narrowly beating "Silver Surfers" at £301.

Afterwards spectators ajourned to La Cloche at the Carpenters to enjoy a hog roast,  the raffle was drawn, and of course the prizes were awarded.  The profit from the event so far is around £4,000 and with the Auction to be held at the Jade Fountain on 28th January, this should be enhanced to £5,000 to £6,000.

CLICK HERE for more pictures