Dear Fellow Rotarians,
When the clock stroked at 12.00 tonight a while ago , the leadership of Rotary International, Districts and clubs have turned over to the new RI President, new team of District Governors, Assistant Governors, District Committee Chairs and Officers, Presidents, BOD members and Chairmen. Our time has come to “ Be a Gift to the World”, the new RI Theme for 2015-2016. It is time for us to take responsibilities of the District and Clubs from IPDG Andre Suharto and his team.
Congratulations to IPDG Andre and his dedicated team who has done so much for the District and brought the vibrancy of the District and Clubs to Light Up Rotary. We admire your leadership and dedication; a unique motivating and results-oriented style that we don’t read in books. Thank you “Best Class” District Governor Andre Suharto!!!
Thanks to the Founders Paul Harris and his friends who started this wonder organization called “Rotary” , 110 years ago that has brought us together and enable us to do so much good to our fellow human beings. We have worked together all these years in bringing joy and happiness to many people out there who need us. We have spent our time, talent and treasure to bring different meanings, different values and make a different to untold number of people’s lives. This is all started and continued with the same overriding purpose: Service Above Self”.
As the 2015-2016 District Governor, I wish to seek for the same sense of purpose of the heart, the same dedication of the minds and the same commitment of the hands of my fellow Rotarians and friends to walk and work with me to help the pain and suffering of many out there, and bring more joy and happiness to more hearts and home.
Walk and work with me, my dear friends! I have walked the path of Rotary for 20 years. The scenery in the villagers and aboard has made me both glad and sad. Each time we visited, lived moments with the less fortunate, and extended our hands, we made a difference in so many lives.
I have walked the path and held hands with many before me. I have watched in awe as a young man when people; my club leaders, District leaders, Rotarians talk and walk their talks. I have walked the wonderful roads of friendships, learned deep and wide, and am now standing on the shoulders of giants, my predecessors whose very noble thoughts and wonderful deeds will forever humble me.
I have worked with many Rotarians and learned the trade of giving; a trade that gives us immense pleasure and profits for our hearts and families. I found Rotarians to be leaders, regardless of their professions or assigned position. I have learned much each time I worked with them, everywhere. I have learned to arrange chairs for health care projects, carry boxes of food from lorries, wade through mud while pulling pipes for gravity feed to provide water, hold babies in operation theatres for cleft lips “ smile enabling” surgeries. I have also learned to sing and dance with Rotaractors and Interactors as they develop interracial and international friendship and practice leadership. I have also worked my heart when my eyes cried along with the joy of mother upon seeing her ex-cleft baby’s first smile, and when I smiled along with the handsome smile of an ex-cleft lips boy on his wedding day.
I will not work though, to get over the silent grief I still feel over the loss of our good Rotarians, our good friends that have walked and worked with us as brothers in Rotary.
I bid you my friends a Happy New Rotary year! We celebrate the immediate past with pride and admiration. We have walked happily and worked hard together with our great IPDG Andre Suharto and his excellent team. Let us welcome and celebrate the new Rotary year with love and anticipation, walking and working together with the belief that a life of love and giving will always be a beautiful and meaningful one.
This year will stay beautiful and meaningful because you are there to walk and work this journey together with me to “Be a Gift to the World”