SDRotary - Getting Involved

October 17, 2001

This Bulletin Was Written By Tom Sayer.

This Week's Meeting

The place was packed! We had to set up a makeshift table in the corner to handle the crowd! Peter Doody led us in the pledge followed by David Archambault’s reading of an open message to the terrorists written by a Miami Herald Reporter. Click Here For Full Text. Linda Jalving then led us in “America The Beautiful.”

We had quite a few visitors today, including Vanessa DuBois, our Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar from France, and several Rotarians visiting from England.

Announcements

It seemed like the entire Rotaract Club came to our meeting today to receive a check from our Club to supplement to the $1600 they raised for the relief efforts in New York. We pledged to match their funds, but ended up adding a whopping $5,801. Pictured here is the “printable” version of Gary Green delivering our check to Amy Edgett, current Rotaract President.

Ø Don’t get to the meetings late any more! Melissa promises to get started promptly at 7:30 to allow more time for our speakers. Remember that the meetings are scheduled for 7 am to give ample time to socialize before the program starts at 7:30 am.

Ø David Archambault introduced Sharon Lawrence from Voices For Children. This organization recruits volunteers to serve as child advocates for abused kids who are under court supervision and in foster care. These volunteers interview parents and foster parents, review medical records, spend time with the kids, inspect the homes involved and thus become the eyes and ears of the court, helping judges make decisions as to continuing placement. It takes about $1,000/year to provide one child with an advocate. Voices For Children served 3,000 kids last year. This morning we were pleased to support this organization with a check for $2,000.

Ø Gary Sirota reminds us of the Responsibility Fundraiser coming up November 10^th.

Sgt.-At-Arms

Providing a valuable service to the male members of the Club, Frank announced certain upcoming anniversaries, including yours truly (17 years), Peter Doody (7 years) and Rob Berry. Colette Murray was recognized as winning the award in her category (Consulting) as a San Diego Woman Who Means Business. Then, in our own Rotarian Survivor contest, Frank pitted Dave Archambault against Alan Talbott in a contest of biking trivia. The crowd was divided in support of these two worthy adversaries. The question was, “Name any one of the ten best places to go biking” (or something like that). After some hemming and hawing, Alan said, “Colorado.” Pretty general response, but a wrong one. So Dave countered with the equally general, “California.” Apparently correct due to some obscure trail in Eureka. So all those who raised their hands in support of Alan were called upon to throw a buck in the basket.

A few bragging bucks were offered: Mrs. Scanlon is pictured in Business Week for having something to do with Sun Microsystems; Gary Green paid penance for kissing for the camera; Jim Mulvaney’s wife chaired the Grossmont Hospital Fundraiser; Jim Dunn is expecting “an independent young woman” in the near future; and Margaret Oppliger just returned from the Canadian Rockies.

STUDENT OF THE MONTH

Mike Whitehurst introduced us to Mirna Andrade, San Diego High School senior and our Student of the Month. Mirna has more than qualified under all the criteria for this award, having overcome the personal challenge of losing her mother early in her childhood, rising to ASB President, organizing 2 blood drives, volunteering for St. Vincent de Paul, and holding a position with the Barrio Logan College Institute which tutors underprivileged kids. Mirna has the desire and determination to succeed in life and wants to first attend USD on full scholarship and then start her own business. Congratulations, Mirna, and good luck for the future!

This Week’s Speaker

Joe Ciokon held back his own emotions as he relived the harrowing personal experience of the bombing of the Marine barracks at the International Airport in Beirut, Lebanon almost exactly 18 years ago (October 23, 1983). Before showing us a video of the way a Battalion Landing Team makes its way from ship to shore, Joe gave us a quick update on current events. We currently have the USS Carl Vinson, the Kitty Hawk and the Enterprise in the Middle East, each with its battle group of 7 support ships. The Kitty Hawk is without an air wing, so she is mostly involved in special ops. The Stennis is being pushed out sooner than expected to join the rest of the forces. If I heard correctly, soon we will have 6 carrier battle groups engaged.

Eighteen years ago, Joe was the station manager for the Armed Force Radio station in Beirut. The mission was to bring programming from the US to troops stationed overseas. At 6:15 am on October 23, 1983, a truck filled with high explosives entered the parking lot of the airport and made several revolutions before breaking through multiple barriers and then crashing into the Marine barracks and exploding. Six medical corpsmen and the only surgeon on duty were killed instantly, along with many others. The senior dentist became head of triage until a surgeon could be sent from nearby ships. The last body was not pulled out until six days after the attack.

That was 18 years ago. Joe’s words for us today are to have faith in our troops and have faith in our leaders.

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