As it was Paul’s first visit to our Club he was introduced to us by our President Elect Tony Loughran (our President was unable to attend the meeting) and invited to say a few words.
Paul will take over from our current District Governor Chris Brenchley on the 1st July this year. As well as being DGE, he is a member of the Rotary Club of Bexhill.
We were interested to learn that Paul is a Vicar; he reminded us of this in his opening words when he said he often likes to start a church service with a joke. And this he did by recounting the classic joke about a lady in hospital who had learnt, during a near-death experience, that she had 30 years to live. She was so thrilled at the news she underwent all sorts of plastic surgery. But the moment she crossed the road on leaving hospital she was struck down by an ambulance. On reaching the pearly gates she commented that she thought she had 30 years to live. “Ah, sorry,” said God, “I didn’t recognise you!”
There was a purpose to the story. Our Club is now 100 and we have many Members who have served for a number of years. “Perhaps you don’t recognise your Club,” mused Paul. But he encouraged us to keep our passion for Rotary strong, “You’ve done lots of good,” he said, “so that passion is certainly there. If we are passionate, others will see that too!”
Paul touched on technology, and Zoom in particular (his personal record being 6 zoom meetings in a day!) “Covid acted like a time machine,” he said, “It brought 2030 to 2020”. It’s a change we can all embrace.
Paul also spoke about diversity – “Diversity is our future,” he said. “We should see people as people”. He also told us to go and “tell a story” – i.e. to tell our friends and neighbours what we do. Finally, Paul wished us a great year ahead. “I hope we can all work together to help the community!” he said.
At the end of Paul’s presentation Rotarian Andrew Barchi gave a warm vote of thanks to Paul on behalf of the Club.
You can read more about Rotary South East UK, District 1120, on the website here.
Picture; Paul Forstick addresses our Members during our business meeting. Picture credit: Martin Ward/Rotary Club of Canterbury.
