First, I want to express my thanks to Rich Proctor, who ably stepped in to fill my role at our regular meeting this week. As he noted when calling the meeting to order, my “travel angels” abandoned me for my return trip from the Thanksgiving holiday. Although I believed I had threaded the needle by arriving at my destination before the big snowstorm and would leave days after it had passed, the continued chaos that gripped Chicago on Saturday reached across Lake Michigan and smacked me on Monday anyway. Did you know that some small aircraft can literally be “rebooted” to correct certain transient issues? I certainly didn’t, and I work with rebootable technology professionally. However, after rerouting through Detroit and Denver, I have finally returned to our blessed island.
I’m sorry that I missed the meeting, but I was able to watch the Zoom recording once I had settled back in. I was able to see Kent Reinker lead the Club in song and see Dawn Marie’s heartwarming inspiration. And although I wasn’t able to see him, I heard that Michelle Dolan brought a guest to the meeting. I was, however, able to see Gwen Yamamoto-Lau introduce our speaker Rocky Mould of HSEA and then watch his presentation and his call-out to former HSEA Board member Bob Sumpf. I recognized the voices of Reese Liggett, Alice Tucker, Erik Soderholm, Clif Purkiser, and I believe Grace Sheckler asking questions of our speaker. So, clearly there was engagement in the room which fills me with gladness. I love the current energy of our meetings and the related vibrancy of our Club. Thank you to all who contribute to that.
Remember that next week we will be back at The Pacific Club where our speaker will be Carol Lin, who was the first national news anchor to report the attacks of 9/11 in 2001. We are in the 25th year since those tragic events, and Carol will be discussing her forthcoming book, When News Breaks: A Memoir of Love and War. Stories will include what it was like behind the scenes at CNN on that fateful day, as well as her process for writing her first book. The new book is listed on Amazon, although I plan to reserve one of the 24 special-edition / signed copies available for purchase at Barnes & Noble in Ala Moana. I’m sure that it will be a fascinating discussion, and I look forward to seeing many of you there – in person!
Join Shaka Santa (aka Rick Tabor) and Tutu Mele (aka Linda Coble) to bring holiday joy to hundreds of kids!
Assistance includes help with parking and managing snack stations, which include shaved ice, hot dogs, and popcorn. The volunteer call time will be at 3:00 PM, and volunteers are asked to stay until 9:00 PM to help with cleanup.
To ensure Palama will have enough volunteer shirts and bentos, they kindly ask that all volunteers sign up by December 5th. Please complete the volunteer form andemail it by the deadline. Once Palama has the final list, they will give specific assignments and any additional details.
This announcement is to let you all know that in two weeks, at our regular meeting on December 16, we will have a brief Annual Meeting at which we will vote on the nominees selected by our Nomination Committee and President Elect Carolann Biederman for the upcoming Rotary Year. Those nominees are:
President Elect Nominee for Rotary Year 2027-28
Michael Marsh
Board Directors elected to a 3-year term beginning 2026-27
Greg Lui-Kwan
Ian Wetherell
Hai Cha Lambert
I am pleased to endorse all of these choices and express my gratitude for all who step up to positions of leadership in our Club.
Please register NOW to attend Dec. 16th (Lee needs to give an accurate count for seating and food) or be on Zoom for official voting.
If anyone has questions or concerns, please let me or Lee know before December 16.
Mahalo nui loa
Brian Dunkel
President
The Rotary Club of Honolulu
An international service project in Vietnam, led by Rotary Club of Honolulu, almost didn't happen - after 14 members were already in the country.
A Service Project in Vietnam--That Almost Didn't Happen
On September 20, 14 members and friends of the Rotary Club of Honolulu (RCOH) came together in the city of Hue in central Vietnam. We were gathered to embark the next day on a service project that would provide playground equipment, lunch boxes, pens and crayons to 6 elementary schools in a remote commune west of Dong Ha not far from the border of Laos. Our local hosts and partners were members of the Rotary Club of Quan Tri, a relatively new club of 14 members. The playground equipment was in the warehouse, ready to be installed. The 500 lunch boxes and pens were on the bus, and the crayons were in our respective suitcases.
We were ready and excited to go, and then we got a text from Uyen, our local Rotarian contact: newly installed local government officials weren’t going to let us (foreigners) get on the school campuses. Our participation in this project was effectively cancelled.
Nancy Youngren, the international service chair for RCOH, had been working on this project for almost a year, and there was no previous indication that the government might get in our way. In fact, the school administrators were very supportive of our project. Before we left for Vietnam, Nancy stressed to our participants that the theme for this adventure would be “nalu”, a term that means wave or more appropriately “go with the flow”. So, we did.
If you have a project you'd like to present, please complete the Project Recommendation Form and email to our Director of Community Services, Nancy HERE.
Do you have a speaker recommendation? If so, please complete theSpeaker Recommendation Formand send it to RCOH Administrator, HERE. She will submit all forms to the Speaker Committee.
.jpg)
