Home Page | The Rotary Club of Pakuranga (Inc)

Auckland Anniversary

Jan 25, 2021

Pakuranga Rotary Club Meeting

Jan 25, 2021 5:30 PM – 7:30 PM

Pakuranga Sailing Club

Waitangi Day

Feb 06, 2021

Fellowship

In a world of change Rotary has also needed to change. Our club has been no exception and over the past years we have looked to adjust things such as meeting schedules and the role of committees in order to meet the new reality and in order to try to better meet the needs of current and potential members.

An unintended consequence has been a gradual reduction in the amount of socialising and fellowship. The disruption caused by Covid 19 threw into sharp focus the importance of fellowship as part of a fully functioning Rotary club and there is hopefully going to be a groundswell of support for social activities and fellowship. The notion of arranging club meetings in a way that ensures that pre-meeting food and refreshments are enjoyed as a group was discussed at the recent club assembly. These kinds of discussions are never easy, as past traditions rub up against new possibilities, but ensuring that there is respectful and well informed debate and discussion is of course what all Rotarians would expect.

The above is of course a rather long winded introduction to a very brief report on the Community Committee social get together at Gorkha a Nepalese and Indian restaurant at Eastern Beach. A fine time was had by all in an evening which raised the spirits of all who attended. Certainly that event plus some very cordial Community Committee meetings has served to show newer Rotarians just what fun being a Rotarian can be.

I wait in anticipation for a flood of social reports from the other Committees.

Club Awards

Don Lawry PHF Sapphire Pin

Is a valued trustee of the Johnston Memorial Trust, where he adopts a clear, measured and logical approach to funding applications.

He volunteered for the Taveuni building project in Fiji.

Don did an excellent job as chair of the 2020 Carnival Committee, where he demonstrated strong leadership and excellent organisational skills. He is well organised, easy to work with, hardworking, reliable, approachable, likeable and has an enviable ability to get the best out of people. Don is a fine Rotarian who exemplifies all aspects of both the four way test and our principal motto of service above self. Pakuranga Rotary is fortunate to have such a person as a member.

Duncan Loney PHF Sapphire Pin

Duncan stepped up as President when the Club was in a difficult situation. He secured the attachment of the Satellite Club securing 18 new members for Pakuranga. He gave financial support and became a Rotary Grandpa to a uni student, assisting her to become a Rotarian. He brought a jolly and professional touch to meetings and was very active in fundraising efforts for the Club. He co- established the biggest environmental project this club has seen, since Trees for Survival, engaging with six other service clubs, Council, Enviroschools and Bio Security to establish the Trap Library across the Howick Ward. Always cheerful, energetic, pleasant and positive.

President’s Cup

Penelope Franca, from our Auxiliary club, initiated and ran the Plunket programme, supplying hundreds of garments for needy children. She led the Communicare Knitters programme, providing donated wool to the group who in turn, produced baby clothes. She was a member of the Carnival Committee redesigning and printing flyers and street signs and collecting field data at the event. She also worked at editing Membership material. Penelope is a hard working, pleasant, cheerful and positive Rotarian.. all this while working full time as a successful real estate agent and a young baby at home.

Joe D’Ambrosio

Is part of our Auxiliary and a very valued member the Pest Free committee where he played a major part in establishing and running the electronic registration system, keeping track of hundreds of traps and trappers across the whole Howick Ward. This was ground breaking work, without which, the programme could not have proceeded.

Changeover with a difference

This year Covid forced us into rethinking Changeover.

We opted for a mid-Winter Xmas theme, with five homes becoming Xmas Bubbles with up to 12 guests around the dinner table. Half way through the evening, all locations logged into Zoom, beamed from Alison’s home, and witnessed Bart give his end of year report.

Certificates were awarded to his Board members as well as Nick, Del and Joe d’Ambrosio (of the Auxiliary) Bill Duncan and Bob Ritchie received Charter Member pins. Then came the PHFs. (all the awards had been secretly delivered to Bubbles and were presented personally, by the host… a lovely touch). [More details in the Bulletin.]

Following the handing over of the Chain, Alison briefly outlined her plans for the year… service to the community, and introduced her Board. Our thanks to our hosts Allan Vester, Alison Gilbert, Don Lawry, Kelvin Davies and Peter Armstrong. A very pleasant and inclusive Changeover.

Guinness Down Under

Monday night saw the club host its first guest [non club member] speaker by Zoom. Given the ability to have speakers who are not in Auckland, or possibly even in New Zealand, its very likely we will have more such occasions in the future.

Rod Smith, author of Guinness Down Under, took members through the history of what is an iconic company and brew. Started by Richard Guinness in 1757 the company moved to its current site at St James Gate, Dublin in 1759, brewing ale which given general town water supply quality was a safer drink than water. The recipe for the porter that the company is now world famous for came from London.

Production was limited by heavy excise tax and tariffs on exports to England and by the time Richard Guinness died in 1766 around 22,479 barrels were being produced per year. The removal of those restraints and good management by successive generations of the Guinness family saw that production rise to over 2 million barrels. Brewed in fifty countries under license, that has continued to grow and over 9 million glasses of Guinness are poured around the world every day using the “double gas” method first developed in the 1960s and replacing the cask conditioned method used previously.

The company was expanded by a strong export policy. Guinness first came to Hobart in 1824 and by 1851 was being imported into Nelson. The company also entered into a range of bottling arrangements where the brew was bottled in the importing countries often under the name of the bottler rather than the brewer. New Zealand first brewed the beer to bottle here in 1960 but it was only in the 1990’s when we started brewing draught Guinness that the brand really took off.

While the first four generation of the Guinness family were directly involved in the production of the beer, as is often the way management and ownership of the company has passed out of family hands with only 5% of shares now held by the family.

In New Zealand production of the draught product is based at the Lion facilities in East Tamaki. Bottles and cans continue to be imported from Dublin.

If anybody who would like to buy a copy of Guinness Down Under – please email Rod at guinnessdu@xtra.co.nz and he will arrange. Cost is $30 (which includes postage) payable by internet banking. He’ll advise the bank account number.

Zoe Litt report from Germany

Posted by Zoe Lit on Jun 15, 2020

Hi all,

Hope you are well. I heard New Zealand is corona free! Lucky you. Germany is a lot better now with under 10,000 cases. Despite new cases we have been on the decline which is amazing news. Things are slowly starting to return to normal!

My monthly report for this month is a mix of quarantine and life starting again. I’m so grateful that things are coming back to normal and that my new host family is so welcoming and amazing. This would not have been possible without the Rotary and my clubs Saalburg-Taunus and Pakuranga.

Zoe.

The Rotary Walkway - Building Community Assets

The Rotary walkway was built and laid in stages by members and volunteers of the Pakuranga Rotary with the assistance of Council and community sponsorship. It was completed in 2014 when some widening and replacing of older parts of the walkway also took place.

The Pakuranga Rotary shared pathway has become a very popular walk or ride stretching 9km from Prince Regent Drive in Farm Cove to the Panmure Bridge adjacent to the Pakuranga Town Centre. The path weaves past the Pakuranga Sailing Club and offers great views up and down the Tamaki River.

Top Schools - Working with Our Kids

Top Schools is held annually, generally on a Sunday at Edgewater College in Pakuranga, Auckland Organised and supervised by the Pakuranga Rotary, teams from the local schools take part in a range of sports type activities. The emphasis is on co-operation, teamwork as well as friendly inter-school competition. Teams are mixed with students from Year 3 - Year 6.

Rotary Dictionary Project - Furthering Education

In 2008 the Bill and Lorna Boyd Charitable Trust, in conjunction with Pakuranga Rotary, implemented a Rotary Dictionary Project for NZ. The intent was that Rotary clubs throughout NZ would supply Year 4 students (8 to 9 year olds), in low decile schools, with their own named copy of an illustrated dictionary. The dictionary chosen has proven to be superb with a huge uptake by Rotary clubs nationwide

Catch a Top Day Out - Make our Community Safer

Pakuranga Rotary has, for 21 years, run a Charity Fishing Competition with the major proceeds going to Coastguard. Named the “Catch a Top Day Out” it is held around March each year.

Pakuranga Rotary arranges for groups of corporate guests to go out on a launch fishing competition in the inner Hauraki Gulf. Each boat is supplied with fish bait, lunch and refreshments, with the day finishing in the evening with a meal on Motuihe Island and prize giving. We are always looking for more launch owners who would be interested in making their boat available for this fun and memorable fundraising event. If you have a launch and would be keen to help both Pakuranga Rotary and Coastguard, please get in touch with us on the contact us page.

Helping in the Pacific

The Fijian Pre-Schools projects are an ideal example of Auckland based Rotary clubs working together and matching up with an Island club to complete much needed and valuable multipurpose community assets.

In conjunction with the Taveuni Island Rotary, Pakuranga Rotary has been the lead and coordinator for building five preschools over the past 10 years, two in the village of Naselesele, one in the village of Bouma, both on the island of Tavueni plus one each on the islands of Rabi and Kioa. Pakuranga Rotary designed, arranged funding for and coordinated the construction of the preschool classrooms in those island villages. The design and specification work was completed by Stuart Thompson and the completed school rooms are multipurpose also being used as village meeting halls, housing and as refuge centres in cyclones.