It’s true to say my rate of posting to my blog has diminished of late, but that’s simply due to being so busy with other things. While it’s fresh in my mind I must just post about this mornings visit to the Rotary Club of Chestfield.. The last time I visited was a special evening meal and presentation though I’d decided to go during that same day. This time, I decided to go less that 24 hours before hand too, partly to spread the word about our club ‘Outdoor Skills Day’ (more another time on that).
Although it’s been a while since I’ve visited another club (having been so busy), once again it was time well spent. They had an excellent speaker talking about how to implement successful, sustainable water projects in the developing world. The speaker (who spends 3 months in America and 3 months in the UK for her work in this field.. or perhaps lake seeing as we’re talking about water) clearly understood the issues involved in not only delivering an aid project, but making it sustainable. She’s also worked with Rotary in the past, including at the Rotary International level and explained some of the RI logic in allocating the international charitable funds. For example, RI wont support a project to put a well into a village unless there is a justification this is the best of all systems for that village. She had a photo of an RI person at a well in a village that was very overgrown. The well worked fine but the locals didn’t use it, they were happy to drink the water from the river not aware that it caused disease. For that particular village, a different solution would have been a more effective investment of resources.
Summary of things learnt at this meeting:
- Rotary International is careful about how it spends funds collected for the international projects
- Even a single Rotary Club can call upon the skills of experts working internationally
- All daffodils are Narcissus*
*Thanks go to President Andrew for that fact, they were selling flowers, I think to raise club funds.