Golden News
Volume 13 - Number 04
The weekly newsletter of the Rotary Club of Kowloon Golden Mile, Hong Kong.
GERONIMO MEETS SITTING BULL ?
Well, last week's meeting was certainly a glorious moment for all of us, but particularly for our Indian members. Not only did we have our beloved President Ram "Bo" in the chair, we also had our homie DG Dipo Sani "Tarium" at his side. Two Indian brothers, together, like two wild stallions, leading the charge towards the new millennium. Two Indians ?? Stallions ?? Leading the charge ?? Quick, circle the wagons and somebody call the Cavalry !
By the way, does anybody know what the "M.V." stands for in "M.V. Ramadasan ?? Could it be Most Venerable ? Or Mucho Virile ? Or maybe it's Mutton Vindaloo ? Or More Vino ? Answer on a postcard please.
Anyway, our fearless leader is still conducting himself in a very Presidential manner, with dignity and decorum. My only complaint is that he keeps using his backhand drive to whack the gong, but every good President knows that true Presidential style requires that a left-handed forehand smash is the correct procedure. And if the Sergeant sits too close to El Presidente and is initially too slow to duck during the down swing, he or she will eventually get the idea (or severe brain damage).
On that note, what happened to our squad of Sergeants-At-Arms last week ? We have 3 SAA's but none of them showed up. Shame on you !!! If this happens again, you will be demoted to Corporals, and we all know what that means, right ? Yes Sir. It's Boot Camp and KP duty again, so I suggest you guys get your collective act together. You have been warned.
Anyway, thanks to "Carmen" Miranda for stepping up to the plate last week to help members lighten the load in their wallets.
BULLETIN TRIALS & TRIBULATIONS !
In an effort to continually improve the presentation of the Golden News, this issue is being sent to you as black print on a white background, with headings in blue or red. I am trying to find the best combination of colours which will appear legibly and vividly, irrespective of which email client (reader) you use. Comments on this and previous colour schemes used are most welcome.
Presently 51 of KGM's 55 members are on email, and this equates to a rate of 93%. Who are the four still living in the dark ages ? It may surprise you to know there are two lawyers, Kenneth So & Liam Drake, our Multi-Level Marketing Mogul Angel Yan and our fruitiest member Mazhar Sultana. Actually Mazhar HAS an email address but (quote): "It's lost somewhere in my computer but as soon as I find it, I'll let you know." (unquote) !! Hmmm. I think Mazhar should NOT operate heavy machinery !
Unfortunately those without email facilities do not receive the Golden News. Frankly folks, I am not a babysitter. If our friends are not interested in joining the 21st Century and getting themselves organised with modern technology, so be it. I have been using email since 1992, so it cannot be considered a fad. This bulletin was written and sent to you from Manila and, as I travel frequently, fax is simply not an option. If anybody thinks I am being an unreasonable jerk, you are hereby appointed Deputy Bulletin Editor, and your sole responsibility is to convert my email bulletins to fax each week and to then send it to the Dinosaurs. So, any takers ? No need to reply. Just go ahead and do it. Thanks.
By the way, we also have 10 former members on our email distribution list, namely Adrian Smith, Walter Whyte, Eric Lee, Steve Evans, Alf Croucher, Malcolm Milne, William Fai, Stacey Pallaras, Dick Mak, Derek Andrew and, of course, our Honorary Member and Charter President Chandru Parmanand.
LAST WEEK'S SPEAKER - DG Dipo Sani
Well it sure felt good having KGM's prodigal son return to address us as District Governor, but it was a pity that so few members attended the meeting, especially since it was The Grand Pubah's birthday. There was cake. There was champagne. There were naked women frollicking amongst the members. Well, almost. We had to cancel the bump 'n' grind bit we had organised at the last minute because Mrs. and Ms. District Governor turned up. Spoil sports !!
Anyway we presume the low attendance is due to the summer holidays, although down in Australia (where men are men and the sheep are nervous), it is the middle of winter ! And why the hell do they refer to this part of the world as "The Far East" ? From where I come from, it is more like "The Middle North" whereas, to geographically challenged Americans, it is "Somewhere Near Hawaii" !
But I digress. DG Dipo gave us an inspirational speech, and this was followed by a "shorter" (if you catch my drift !!) speech from our even more diminutive DG Elect Johnson Wan. Also in attendance were District Secretary Tang Kam Tim, Deputy DS Joseph Chan, PDG Joseph Lee and our beloved Club Advisor and Assistant Governor Larry "The Don" Parmanand, which leads me to the question: "Exactly who is Luca Brazzi, and why is he sleeping with the fishes ?".
THIS WEEK'S SPEAKER - Kenneth Kwan Ph.D. "Chaos to Order: Benefits & Secrets of Traditional Chinese Advanced Qigong, Yan Xin Qigong".
If I had any idea what this was all about, I could make a snide or witty comment. Since I don't, I guess you guys will have to wait until next week !
LAST FELLOWSHIP EVENT:
Well waddya know ? My continual nagging seems to have worked, because last Friday evening KGM had it's first fellowship event of the year at Beer City, Tsimshatsui. Well done, Stormin' Norman. Who loves ya, baby ? It was a fantastic night. There was beer. Lots of beer. In fact, there was a whole beer factory. And peanuts. Salty ones. And pretzels. And, er, there was, er, um, hell, how am I supposed to know ? I wasn't even there.
Unfortunately your erstwhile scribe could not attend as I was forced to languish by the pool in Manila for the last four days. It's a rotten job, but somebody has to kick start the Philippine economy, right ? Anyway, as far as I know, nobody was arrested during the KGM fellowship, so I guess it can be considered a good night ? Or does that make it a boring night ? Whatever.
Hopefully the attendees managed to decide on future fellowship events for the year. Or maybe they just got sloshed and fell down. In any case, will somebody please let me know, so that we can publicise our fellowship plans in the bulletin and on the KGM web site. Hello ? HELLO ? Norman ! Are you sober yet ? Talk dirty to me !
NEXT VOCATIONAL VISIT:
It seems nagging and snide remarks definitely work, because not only did we have a fellowship event, but Miranda "King" Kong has submitted two proposed Vocational visits to the Bored, er, Board of Directors, and we should expect our first outing soon.
One of these is a visit to her very own label factory in China, and the other is a visit to the Marine Police, to be organised by her "significant other" Tony, who is one of Asia's finest.
KGM WEB SITE:
Observing the Olympic motto of "Citius, Altius, Fortius, Corruptus" (Faster, Higher, Stronger, More Kickbacks), our intrepid Webmaster has introduced innovative new concepts onto the KGM web site, which the District 3450 web site is going to copy. KGM leads the way once again !
Go to the "Members Only" section, click on "Club Forms", and you will find forms to electronically report "Make-Ups", request a change of Membership Classification, apply for Leave of Absence, update your contact details etc. Thanks to PP Robin "The Hood" Ching for originally suggesting the electronic make-up form. Each of these forms will generate an email message to the Webmaster who will, in turn, ensure that your submission goes to the correct person for action.
Under "Board Minutes", there is also now an "Attendance at Board Meetings" link, so that members can keep tabs on their elected officials during the year. Our first Board meeting this year was unable to proceed to business due to a lack of interest, er, lack of a quorum, which is a woeful start to the year, but hopefully this is just due to the usual "Summertime Exodus". However those of us who did turn up used the opportunity to (again) try sorting out the accounting mess left by the organisers of an event earlier in the year (which I am not allowed to mention by name, because some people are VERY sensitive).
By the way, if you find some of the KGM web pages displaying advertisements on top, do not fret. This is unavoidable with "free" web sites, who need to generate income somehow. However the Webmaster is currently negotiating with a Hong Kong based ISP (Internet Service Provider), to have the KGM web site hosted locally in Hong Kong, as this will eliminate all ads. When we do change to local hosting, we will use the opportunity to launch our reserved domain name www.rckgm.org which is shorter and much easier to remember !
Moreover, once all this has been completed, the KGM web site will be able to achieve its full potential, including the use of "KGM" email addresses such as president@rckgm.org and secretary@rckgm.org and so on. Of course, we will change the re-direction each year to whoever is the correct person occupying the relevant post. Pretty cool, huh ?
NETIQUETTE:
Since we're on the subject of email, I thought I should help budding emailers with a few rules on "Internet Etiquette", otherwise known as "Netiquette":
1) Never send a whole email IN CAPITALS, as using capitals is a convention for ANGER, and it is also very difficult to read. If you want to emphasise a word or phrase, it is acceptable to use capitals, but DO NOT use capitals for the WHOLE message. Get it ? Alternatively, you can emphasise a word or phrase simply by using asterisks, such as "I think it's *your* turn to buy *me* lunch".
2) Never send people messages larger than 500k unless you are *sure* they want to receive them. Many business people travel with personal computers and they use a "roaming service" to send and receive emails, BUT not all countries have high-speed connections like Hong Kong. For example, here in Manila at a 5-Star hotel, the best speed I can achieve is 14kbps, which is considerably slower than my usual Hong Kong connection of 52kbps.
3) On the options of your email client, you should turn OFF the "include message with reply" option. In Microsoft Outlook Express, go to the top of your primary email screen, scroll down to Tools/Options/Send and then make sure "Include message with reply" is NOT checked. (Elissa - you must turn the monitor on first, OK ?). There is a similar choice available in Netscape. If I send you an email message, I don't need to receive it back from you with your comments on the top or bottom. (Cassidy, this means YOU !).
There are also a number of abbreviations used in email, and some common ones include AFAIK (As far as I know), FWIW (For what it's worth), IMHO (In my honest/humble opinion), OTOH (On the other hand), IYCSWIM (If you can see what I mean), BTW (By the way), LOL (Lots of laughter), ROFLMAO (Rolling on floor, laughing my ass off) and SNAFU (Situation Normal, All Fouled Up).
For those of you married to er, um, ah, shall we say a "dominant" woman, SWMBO is a common way for you to secretly refer to your good lady (She Who Must Be Obeyed) !
I hope you found this article useful. If so, GTBOS and TTFN (Glad to be of service) and (Ta Ta for now) !!
THIS WEEK'S BIRTHDAY CELEBRANTS:
26 July - PP Joseph Kwan, who shares his birthday with Mick Jagger. How appropriate !! Sex. Drugs. Rock 'n' roll. I had absolutely no idea what a tremendous influence PP Joseph must have had on The Jagger-Meister.
But now we know the truth. Two equally wild and crazy party guys, sharing the same birthday. Sharing a love for the same type of music. Sharing the same hairstyle. OK, Jagger has bigger lips, but PP Joseph normally uses a much nicer shade of lipstick. He also has bigger buns.
AND THE WINNER IS ..... ?
Those of you who were cajoled by birthday boy PP Joseph "I'm a rocker, not a fighter" Kwan into buying a raffle ticket or two for Rehabaid recently should check their tickets, because ticket number 05876 (which was in the series sold at KGM), won 10th prize, which is a Hitachi 20" TV.
If you won the prize and didn't realise until you read about it here, I drink Myers's Rum and Coke !
QUOTE OF THE WEEK:
"If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.".
Sir Isaac Newton
JOKE OF THE WEEK:
Two women were playing golf. The first women teed off and watched in horror as her ball headed directly toward two men playing ahead at the next hole.
The ball hit one of the men, and he immediately clasped his hands together at his crotch, fell to the ground and proceeded to roll around, visibly in agony.
The woman rushed down to the man and immediately began to apologise. She said "Please allow me to help. I'm a physical therapist and I know how to relieve the pain for you."
"Ummph, oooh, nnooo, I'll be all right ..... I'll be fine in a few minutes" he replied breathlessly as he remained in the fetal position still clasping his hands together at his crotch, but still writhing in pain.
However the woman persisted, and he finally allowed her to help him. She gently took his hands away and laid them to the side, she unzipped his pants, put her hands inside and she began to gently massage him. After about 10 minutes, she asked him "How does that feel?"
To which he replied "It feels really fantastic, but my thumb still hurts like hell."
The Phantom.