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Well our fearless leader has finally returned to Hong Kong, after a gruelling trek between the capitols of Europe. As the assembled masses of KGM members waited anxiously for him to speak his first inspirational words after his two week hiatus, an eerie hush descended upon the room, and a silent crescendo of eager anticipation could be felt reverberating through the heavy air.

 

As he rose majestically from his chair, he grasped his trusty gavel with a gentle firmness, he cast a knowing smile to his left and he struck the gong with restrained confidence. As his replaced the gavel, his lips began to move, and I could hardly contain the tension within me, as he slowly began to speak his first words.

 

"First of all", he said with an air of authority which promised his next few words would be indelibly carved in our memories for generations to come, "I would like to welcome myself back" !    Quick. Somebody get me a change of underwear.

 

OK, Shakespeare he is not, but it still great having President Ram "Bo" back. Of course, this is not to detract in any way from the marvelous job done by VP Ebe Tung "Chee Wa-tusi" in his absence.

 

Moreover, I can state categorically, and without fear of contradiction, that of all the VP's who have ever filled-in during the President's absence in the 13 year history of KGM, VP Ebe was undoubtedly the most recent.

 

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Once again for the benefit of newer KGM members, Vocational Talks are when KGM members tell us about their current vocation in life (i.e. their business or profession), although we always welcome an insight into their personal lives too (e.g. I collect McDonald's Snoopy toys and I like pulling the wings off insects).

 

Presumably this week we shall hear about the exciting world of insurance and the inner workings of Hong Kong's legal system. If we are really lucky, maybe Kumar will wear his barrister's wig to the meeting, but I certainly hope he will refrain from wearing a short skirt, stiletto heels and fishnet stockings. He simply hasn't got the legs for it.

 

Then again, things have been a little quiet recently.

 

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07 October - Elissa "Goldfinger" Cohen, who shares her birthday with musician Yo-Yo Ma and prominent South African, Bishop Desmond Tutu. Hmmm. Does this mean in future we should refer to Elissa as Yo-Yo Tutu ? Yep. Pass the peanuts.

 

09 October - Balu "Kojak" Chainrai, who shares his birthday with the late John Lennon, who starred in the movie "Some Like It Hot" with Tony Curtis and Marilyn Monroe. Or was that Jack Lemmon ? Whatever.

 

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OK kids, it's officially "Sold Out". Well, almost. We reserved 60 seats (3 tables of 20), and we have 55 firm (paid) commitments in hand. The deadline for us to return any unused tickets to the hotel is Wednesday this week, but it would be really great if the last 5 seats in our section could be used by KGM members and their guests, instead of unknown riff-raff.

 

According to Hans "The Hun" Peter (which, by the way, sounds far nicer than Hans "The Enormous German Sausage Eater" Peter), there are some members who have indicated they want to attend, but they aren't sure nor have they paid up yet. Like, when do you plan to decide ? The day after the event ?? Oy vey !

 

Anyway folks, remember our new fellowship policy is: "Money Talks, (deleted) Walks" so, if you wanna play, ya gotta pay ! Capish ?

 

Cheques should be made payable to "Rotary Club of Kowloon Golden Mile" and given to Assistant Fellowship Director Hans, who will immediately give you your tickets. 

 

If you don't know any details about this fellowship but would still like to make a last minute bid for tickets, kindly slap yourself across the forehead like an Italian, then call Hans on 9039 3094, like NOW dude !

 

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There are four types of membership in a Rotary Club, namely:

 

ACTIVE - This is the most common form of Rotary membership, which represents the vast majority of Rotarians in KGM and indeed District 3450. Basically a person "actively engaged in a worthwhile business or profession" is entitled to be an Active member of a Rotary club, and a membership classification is "loaned" to them on their induction, in order to classify the nature of their business or profession. There are a variety of rules applicable to the classification process, but this will be covered in more detail in another newsletter.

 

However the basic concept is that only one person from a particular (and well-defined) classification may be admitted to a Rotary club. If, for arguments sake, we already have a member classified as "Importer - Widgets" then we cannot admit a further Active member under the identical classification unless the first Active member gives their personal consent. In such an event, the second person admitted to the Club under an existing classification will have "Additional Active" status, but note that "Additional Active" is NOT considered a separate type of membership in Rotary.

 

SENIOR ACTIVE - An "Active" member of a Rotary Club automatically becomes "Senior Active" after they have achieved certain milestones or achievements in Rotary. The most common milestone is simply 15 years membership in one or more Rotary clubs, but a lesser tenure of membership is required for Rotarians aged 60 or over. The only other way to become "Senior Active" is where the member is a present or past officer of Rotary International.

 

Trivia: KGM has only two "Senior Active" members, one who qualified under the "15 year" rule and the other who qualified under the "officer of RI" rule. Can you guess who are these two members ? Answers at the end of this bulletin.

 

PAST SERVICE - This type of membership is essentially for persons who previously held "Active" membership, but who have since retired from the active pursuit of their business or profession.

 

HONORARY - An "Honorary" member is a person who has "distinguished themselves by meritorious service in the furtherance of Rotary ideals", and KGM has recognised two such individuals who qualify under this rule, namely Sir David Akers-Jones and Charter President Chandru Parmanand.

 

 

Some members who regularly visit our web site (both of them), have complained they have to "page down" too much in order to get to the section they want to see. As your Webmaster is highly concerned about the health and well-being of members, and he would hate to see them partaking of too much strenuous exercise, he recently added a series of navigation "bookmarks" to the web site.

 

Now when you visit the KGM web site again, at the extreme top of the main web site page you will find a row of tiny, blue-coloured hyperlinks indicated by words such as "#Our Meetings", "#What's On", "#Rotary Links", "#HK Links" and so on. If you click on them, this will immediately scroll the page down to the relevant section of the main web site page which you have clicked.

 

Additionally, at regular intervals down the page, you will also see numerous tiny blue-coloured links indicated by the word "#Top" and, if you click on any of these, you will be taken back at light speed to the top of the page. Pretty neat stuff, huh ?

 

In anticipation of your next question, your Webmaster advises that he has purposely avoided using "frames", which is what you see when you visit a web site which has all of the internal links listed down the left-hand side of the site. This is because the KGM web site is now 100% "browser neutral". Many older browsers cannot view web sites with frames.

 

This means that irrespective of whether your browser is the superior product created by Prince William of Washington, or the poor imitations churned out by others (including the Jurassic Period "Internet-In-A-Box"), you can still view all components.

 

Anyway, your Webmaster hopes that his latest gesture of goodwill to his fellow Rotarians will enable him to win a Nobel Peace Prize for services to humanity. If not, maybe somebody will buy him a Myers's & Coke. Either way is fine with him.

 

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1) At www.condomania.com you will be able to find out the latest, er, um, accoutrements for use by persons of the male persuasion during er, ah, indoor sports activities. As an active sports shooter, I remember the days when sex was safe and guns were dangerous, however these days the tables have turned 100%.

 

2) At www.anagramgenius.com/server.html you will find an unusual site where you can generate anagrams of your name. For instance, if you enter the name "Dipo Chanidram Sani" you get "I am sardonic and hip" as an anagram, while "Brian John Hodgson" returns an anagram of "dashing job on horn". Hmmm. I wonder what we would get if we knew what the M.V. stood for in El Prez's name ?

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"The first casualty of war is truth."

Hiram Johnson

 

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A young boy went home after school and asked his father to help him understand his homework assignment entitled "What's politics?", which he had to return to his teacher the next day.

 

The father explained: "Well, let's take our home for example. I am the wage earner, so let's call me management. Your mother is the administrator of the money, so we'll call her Government. We take care of your needs, so let's call you the people. We'll call the maid the working class and we'll call your baby brother the future. Do you understand?"

 

To which his son replied: "I'm not really sure, Dad. I'll have to think about it."

 

That night, awakened by his baby brother's crying, the boy went to see what was wrong. Discovering the baby had seriously soiled his diaper, the boy went to his parents' room and found his mother sound asleep. He then went to the maid's room where, peeking through the key hole, he saw his father in bed with the maid. The boy's knocking went totally unheard by his father and the maid, so the boy returned to his room and went back to bed.

 

The next morning the son told his father: "Dad, I think I understand politics now."

 

To which the father replied, "That's great son. Can you explain it to me in your own words ?"

 

"Sure, Dad", said the son, "It's like this. While management is screwing the working class, the government is sound asleep, the people are being completely ignored and the future is full of sh*t!"

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The Phantom