By: Hermann Welm
(There were 28 participants signed on for the meeting.) President Colette “Lady Grizzly” Lay opened the ZOOM meeting by reminding us that the R.I. President is Mark Daniel Maloney, of Decatur, Alabama, and his theme for the year is “Rotary Connects the World!” Our Greeter, Steve Wilcox, led us in the Salute to the Flag and his Thought for the Day: May We Never
May we never take for granted… Holding the hand next to us while we pray in churc
Being together as we celebrate a graduation, wedding, baptism, bar mitzvah Grilling with our neighbors in the backyard
Sitting next to each other in class, a business meeting or in a board room
Getting to wait in a crowded restaurant on a Friday Night
Being able to go to a museum, art gallery or a bingo hall
The sense of community going to the local pancake breakfast
To walk across the street and shake a new neighbor’s hand and give them a batch of homemade cookies
Playing a game of pickup basketball at the park
Walking into our places of work and saying hi to the janitor
Watching our children compete in sports
Going to a baseball game
Opening the door for a stranger as we walk into a store
Seeing children play during recess at school
The delivery we receive at our front door
Watching students scurrying across a college campus
The voice of a friend saying, “I’ll be right over”
The sights and sounds of a bustling city
Giving our grandmother a hug at the nursing home
Having a birthday party with our friends
Steve went on to tell us that the Summit Financial staff are working from home and they are managing quite well. His younger son made the school’s baseball team and older son is currently furloughed along with millions of others! Visiting Rotarians: None. Announcements: There will be another ZOOM “Happy Hour” at 5:00 pm on Tuesday, the 12th. Look for an email with the link. Please send any “Good News” to Ana Dominguez so she can include them in the weekly Crow’s Call.
“Lady Grizzly” noted that a 27-foot banner thanking our club, created by Ana Dominguez, will be hung at the main entrance to the San Ramon Regional Medical Center for Hospital Week!
There was a picture of Lourdes Ylagan’s newly-installed Mini Library which featured free masks for anyone needing them. This Scribe built it for her and she and a neighbor installed it in her front yard.
Program:
Lady Grizzly introduced Rick Llojeta, who with Ana Dominguez, has been leading the Llojeta Water Project in Bolivia for the past several years. Rick’s grandfather, whom he never met, was President of Bolivia and they owned a large estate not far -- distance-wise, but quite distant travel-time-wise -- from the capitol city of La Paz. Part of the estate was a small village in the mountains, currently with about 650 residents, which Rick visited eight years ago as part of a film he was producing for PBS about his family history. Link to his film:
or
He discovered that they were having water delivery problems since their poorly-built system of tanks and above-ground pipes was now 20 years old and in poor shape. While the village has water rights to an abundant year around supply, their delivery system was periodically failing, forcing the people to hike miles in VERY steep terrain -- from 18 to 80 percent slopes -- to carry water back to their homes. So he wanted to help the village with revitalizing their water system but had to overcome their suspicions first.
Rick approached Ana and the two of them presented the plan to our club about four years ago. We donated $12,000 to the project, and with what is known as “Rotary Math,” the District and The Rotary Foundation added funds to come up with a total of $66,000 for the project. The Rotary Club of La Paz is the “on-site” liaison for the project and virtually all the professional-level experts needed to design it do so pro bono!” The money is therefore available for supplies, construction management and the hiring of local labor to perform the actual work.
As of January 2020, after fits and starts due to political upheavals in Bolivia, and winter weather that made the only (dirt) road to Llajeto impassable, the project was restarted and reached the 75 percent completion point. Then the coronavirus debacle hit and everything stopped again. The latest update is that the shutdown is to end in two weeks and the construction team expects to be able to finish up pretty quickly at that point. A sign, thanking Rotary, will be placed in the village. We, on the other hand, need to thank Rick and Ana for their amazing persistence in getting this project approved and moving forward. NOT an easy thing!
Recognitions: Julie McKinney was absolutely merciless in “recognizing” her fellow Rotarians. Kathy Gailey for her “week of birthdays;” Fred Nevarez, for his birthday (nothing planned); Ed Duarte for his (going to Copper Valley); Ray Giles, for his and for ducking out of the meeting early; Chris Gayler, for his and for the very appropriate background he created for this ZOOM meeting (sitting in the empty CCCC meeting room all by himself); Gobind Anand for her son-in-law’s birthday; Jeff Disch, for being in Rotary for 32 years; Barry Toby, for he and Cindy ZOOMing in from a boat on Lake Alamanor and for being grandparents once again (their daughter, one month ago); Patti Hennigan, for being an “expecting “ grandma (December 2020); and finally for herself (Julie M.) for her birthday this coming Tuesday.
Wheeewww! Raffle: NONE, again!
