At the invitation of President Margaret who opened the meeting and welcomed all, PP Chris Curtis welcomed our distinguished guests.
Andrew, Caroline, John, Mary, Patsy, Tom Pembroke, John Norris. Mark Khoury, Patrick Kennedy, Millie Samuels, Tim Wiseman, Madelaine.
 
Announcements
 
PP Jenny
  • 24,25 Sept at Penrith, transplant Olympics will be held 8-14 Jan.
  • RYLA looking for young people between 18-28 and 12 months since they attended school.
  • Regular meeting deferred to Wednesday for a zone dinner at the North Ryde RSL club to meet with the District Governor .
  • Art Show successful evening last Friday. Buzzing. An annual fund raiser and very important event on our Rotary calendar. We hope they sold well as our club receives a portion of the proceeds. [Scribe has noticed that the longer you have been in the club, the less free wall space you have at home].
Sergeant Session
 
With PP Chris
  • Phil gum boots at table. [They are actually Blundstones, bought at the International Conference last year]. There was an Olympic theme and the lack of imagination has given the sergeant great fodder.
  • Margaret boasted 5year old grandson school Champion. [we would expect nothing less].
  • Chris' own granddaughter 1Year old today. She screamed today so that was a bonus for the coffers.
  • JP for flying under the radar.
  • Vlad for donating his meal to your scribe, pleading that he wasn't hungry. That was obviously a falsehood - nobody has heard of a Russian who didn't like food. The cooks magically appeared with a plate et Voila
 
Guest Speaker
 
PP Jenny introduced Tom Pembroke. Ex Joeys and teacher at Pius.
Tom Pembroke
Apologised for his family because they are usually a bit noisy.
And for the dog, an uninvited guest!
Finished school at Joeys. Flunked 2 degrees. Gambler. Dropout. Saw documentary to swim English Channel. Became motivated. Got a tertiary qualification in teaching.
Went from planned life that needed no effort to becoming self-sufficient. Tom indicated that he wasted his initial family nest egg on gambling and partying. [not sure that "wasted" is the right word but I digress].
swimming the English Channel turned out to be a little harder than it sounded. Jelly fish in swarms. Busiest shipping channel. Ships hate swimmers - usually empty their bilge to show their displeasure]. 14 degrees. Motion sickness.
Moved to Southampton to train for the event, giving himself three weeks to do so. Many people fail after two years training. The drawback in choosing Southampton is that there is No pool, no swimming training available.
Swam daily for 3 weeks in a backyard pool. No passport. No lights. No coach. No practice swim. No plan.  Apparently one needs a passport to tread on the shore of France. [Either that or just keep swimming till you hit Australia].
After 3 hours, sickness hit. Motivated by the suffering of his beloved deceased sister. Hypothermia. Colder times and warmer. Then jelly fish and fatigue. Sleep. Painful stings that woke him up, thankfully. When out of it started thinking of deceased sister and his young friend Nicholas. They went through real drama. This was a diddle by comparison.
After 13 hours completely gone then a 2 minute effort got him past the tide. Then mum jumped in with 200 metres to go. [later said that many people fail at this point. Also because fog sets in and the whole thing is automatically cancelled].
Completed the impossible and swam it on 3 weeks training. Proud of that but still believes that he as an idiot for the poor prep. Reformed for the next tilt and trained for 6 weeks!
This was the North Channel Scotland to Ireland. 36km. Trained illicitly in the Joeys pool for that one beauteous it was only 10 degrees. Ideal!?
This swim was 11-13 degrees, jelly fish.
Then Catalina. 32 Kms
Then Molokai swim 42 Kms. Sharks.
Worse jelly fish stings and severe sunburn. Skin peeled off back in layers like wallpaper. Massive swells.
To come
TuShare. 20 Kms Honsho and Hokkaido
Cook Strait. 25 Ks.. Great white sharks
Gibraltar 16 Kms. The odd marine craft might be a problem.
Support from family and Nicholas with leukemia.
Questions
David. - how do you motivate kids to "put in" - life in general?
A. Tell them that they have skills and work to achieve them and not just stop at the wall.
Q. Solve society's problems?
A. Get kids off their mobile phones. Would pass legislation if PM.
Roger thanking Tom:
To die without doing anything is the ultimate failure. You won't fall into that category. [Dry]. We've all walked 10000 steps so we've made a start [was funny but you had to be there].
Presentation of the polio donation. "Relieving the world of Polio - That's an objective - perhaps even grander than the one you achieved".
 
Attendance
 
  • 15 Rotarians,
  • 15 guests,
  • 1 visiting Rotarian
 
Bon Voyage Robyn and Ray
Thanks to all the Pembrokes.
Sergeant: $98
Margaret won the booty.
Next meeting - Wednesday at North Ryde RSL club for the DG visit.