September 2007
Rotary Club
of
Eastbourne
(1922 – 2007)
President: Bob Hamblyn
Secretary: Arnold Cornish
Treasurer: Colin Middleton
www.eastbournerotary.org.uk
President’s Log
Firstly, my thanks to John Coffey for volunteering as Club webmaster. In today’s world where ‘change’ is so rapid, it is vitally important to tool up the Club to embrace change as an opportunity - not as a threat. Communication is, as ever, the key. The brilliant thing about a good website is that it opens up communication not just to members within the Club but to our supporters both locally and further afield.
We are uniquely placed to build on the excellent work promoted by David Lambird in the Caribbean Ball. The suncoastsouth.org.uk website which is currently running, makes an excellent platform to work from and will give a flying start for John to develop what I am sure will be seen as one of the best Club websites around.
Following an excellent talk by James Hookway on “Relay for Life” Pat and I attended their first Eastbourne Relay on 25 August. It was extremely well organised, raised huge amounts of money and is destined to be a highly successful annual event.
Thanks to George Collier for arranging tickets for the ‘Last night of the Proms’ on Sunday 26 August. Ten of us attended at Battle Abbey for a long walk followed by an excellent supper and open air concert in ideal conditions.
District Governor, Denis Spiller visited the Club on Monday 3rd September. We also welcomed Carol Johnson, President of the Inner Wheel Club of Eastbourne and our partners. Denis gave a very informative talk; reinforcing the part that each of us plays on the world stage of Rotary. It is sometimes difficult to envisage the bigger picture and he did this well.
Having privately canvassed views, there was an overwhelming consensus that it would be a sad day for the Lille tripartite link to fail. On 10 September, Allan Wooley, Chris and Yvette Smith and I attended the Lille Nord Club weekly meeting. We were warmly welcomed.
They agreed that we should manage each event together, with emphasis on seating people to communicate whether in French or English. They also proposed that we should meet informally perhaps once or twice a year on a single club to club basis for lunch and drinks in Kent or near Calais.
We also settled a date, since confirmed, that the Tripartite meeting in Lille will be the weekend of 24 /25 May 2008. I hope our response will be to arrange the biggest attendance ever. Please put this in your diaries now and give your full support.
Yours Aye. Bob
Lille trip report
Bob, Chris Smith, Yvette and myself travelled to Lille for the day on Monday 10 September - £54 return on Eurotunnel with Bob's car, to heal a breach with Lille Nord. There has been poor attendance at the last two visits to Lille. This in contrast to Ghent where we are always welcomed and enjoy each other's company. (In Ghent at this year's Tripartite, most of the Lille members largely ignored our team if they could not speak reasonable French. That, of course, cuts both ways.)
I must say our Lille expedition was well received - helped by Yvette who speaks a little French (!) - she says it's 40 years out of date. Chris speaks reasonable French and Bob and I stutter along. Bob had prepared a nifty two minutes worth of address in French which helped, I hope, convince them that our hearts were in the right place.
Our next visit to Lille is due next May 24/25. There are three main issues here: Do we keep these links going for the sake of it or is there a point? So few of the Club seem interested in supporting the trips - either inward or outward and it falls to the few to do the work and lastly - will it make a difference in future? The French are bitter about the wide use of English as the worldwide language of business; Chirac had a campaign to stamp out Anglo words and phrases which creep in to the French language - like le weekend etc. An air traffic controller at Heathrow told me that they quite frequently have sharp exchanges with Air France pilots who try and avoid English which is most definitely the vehicle for air control.
The Lille club generously gave us lunch at the Crowne Plaza - their meeting place which interestingly was not up to the Chatsworth standard.
David Hinchcliffe the UK's Commercial Attaché in Lille made our visit possible and a success. We were placed near English speakers. We met some of the old guard - Daniel Coliche and others, and some promising new soldiers like Gregoire who has taken over from his father Francois as i/c Protocol.
An interesting prospect.
Finally I have been invited to put a small group together, say, in November to travel to Ghent where a new exhibition of English painters is about to open in a fine, newly re-furbished gallery. A quick one or two nighter. Any member who is interested please see or e-mail me.
Well done President Bob who made this visit happen, and for driving (from my house at 6.15am!).
Allan Woolley
Geoff Holt and his Personal Everest Challenge
Members who were at the RIBI Conference in Bournemouth met Geoff Holt, an Honorary Member of Hamble Valley Rotary Club. Geoff is paralysed from the chest down following a swimming accident at the age of 18 and he is confined to a wheelchair. He holds many disabled sailing endurance records.
On 20th May, Geoff set off in his 15ft trimaran dinghy ‘Freethinker’ to sail single-handed over 1400 miles around the coastline of Great Britain. Geoff’s "Personal Everest Challenge" was planned to take around 60 days, but bad weather caused several stop-overs on dry land, including one of 25 days in Wales! The whole Challenge actually took 109 days by the end of which Geoff was very much looking forward to finishing back at the start of his epic journey on the Hamble.
A test of physical and mental endurance beyond most fit and able sailors, the Challenge was also an extremely complex logistical effort. A support crew of 8, including his wife Elaine and five year old son Tim, followed Geoff on sea and land during his daily trips of about 50 miles. They used 2 motor homes (one modified for wheelchair access), a Land Rover with crane and winch and a 22ft safety RIB. The project was supported by RIBI as part of the Sailability Collaboration Project and members of local Rotary Clubs and Sailability groups provided local knowledge and assistance. Sailability, for which Geoff is raising awareness and funds, is the supporting charity for the disabled sailing division of the Royal Yachting Association.
On Thursday 30th August, Geoff’s daily trip brought him into Sovereign Harbour, Eastbourne. George Collier and President Elect Bill met him when he arrived, and President Bob visited him during the evening.
Geoff was delighted that we turned out to meet him, and also with the local PR that was arranged. A full report and picture appeared in the Eastbourne Gazette the following week. BBC Southern Counties Radio included an on-air interview during Richard Lindfield’s ‘Drive Time’ whilst Geoff was at Sovereign Harbour, which included a plug for Rotary at the end. ITV Meridian South-east included short clips in the evening and late night bulletins.
At the finish on 5th September Geoff said "It's hard to believe right now but I have climbed my Personal Everest. I've achieved what I set out to achieve and I'm the proudest and happiest person alive right now. My first thoughts are with my crew, without them there would have been no Challenge and to each and every one of them, I owe a huge debt".
To learn more about this incredible and inspirational Challenge and a little more about Geoff, please visit his own website at www.personaleverest.com
George Collier
Geoff Holt arrives at Sovereign Harbour
(Picture George Collier)
International report:
Tripartite: President Bob, Chris Smith and Allan Woolley visited Lille-Nord Club earlier this month to discuss the future of our two clubs. The meeting was most cordial and Lille were very enthusiastic about continuing their relationship with us. We are now awaiting proposed dates for the Spring 2008 weekend from Lille club.
Jazz Concert 2008: The date for next year's jazz concert is 2nd April, to be staged at Eastbourne College as on previous occasions. Geoff Williams has again come up with a top class jazz group, the Half Dozen, led by renowned jazz musician Digby Fairweather. The band's website is www.digjazz.co.uk The group is very well known in the jazz world and has won "Best Small Group" award in the British Jazz Awards.
Group Study Exchange: We are asked if any of our Club members can share the hosting of one Rotarian and four members of the visiting Australian team from their District 9520 (details recently e-mailed to club members who are 'on line'), for District Conference weekend in Eastbourne. Dates yet to be covered are the nights of Saturday 27th, Sunday 28th and Monday 29th October.
Urgent: If you are able to help with hosting please contact Ron Genty.
For the reciprocal trip by a District 1120 Exchange team next year, we need to find a suitable candidate, male or female, with varied experience for the four-person District team visiting Australia. Candidates should be between the ages of 18 and 36.
Zimbabwe: Bulawayo South club have indicated that a water supply project is top priority. Discussions with joint venture partner Truro Club to see how we can help such a project are being arranged.
Social: A social evening has been arranged at the Picasso restaurant in Mark Lane, Eastbourne. There is a varied menu, certain to satisfy all comers. The event is to be held on 7th November, 7.00pm for 7.30pm. A number of good quality raffle prizes are needed and donations will be gratefully accepted. Tickets will be available shortly. It is proposed to invite the other Rotary Clubs in the area to attend.
ShelterBox: A cheque for the funding of one shelter box for the Peru Earthquake disaster was recently sent to the Cornwall-based charity run by the Rotary Club of Helston-Lizard. A letter of thanks has since been received.
Foundation:
Improving our understanding (of Foundation): The District information evening due to take place on the 21st September in Eastbourne, was cancelled due to lack of support from clubs in District 1120. We are inviting the speaker, District Foundation Chairman, Bob Burge, to give a similar talk to the club at a future date - details later.
Ron Genty
Car numerology – a brief history of the car number plate system in the UK
With the introduction of “The Motor Car Act 1903”, every car had to be registered with a County or County Borough Council, and it had to display a unique identifying number, issued by them, in a prominent position on the car. A similar system had already been in operation in Holland since 1899.
In 1903 the first registration number in the UK is believed to have been A 1. It was issued in London to Earl Russell. Each County or Borough Council was allocated one letter to use on number plates, they could not have known how popular the motor car was to become. As the number of cars increased they quickly ran out, then they started to use two and subsequently three letter combinations. The Liverpool KA series lasted only 2 years between 1925 and 1927, whereas other councils in rural areas were still using 2 letters in 1963. In contrast, by this time several councils were close to the end of their allocation of three letter registrations, so a 7th digit was added to the number plate system. The extra digit was a letter , so post 1963 numbers had 3 letters then a space then up to 3 numbers and a suffix letter which gave away the age of the car. The letters I, Q, Z and U (Nor “O”) were not used as a suffix letter. In fact I, Q and Z were not used at all.
By 1983 they faced the same problem and deftly extended the system by reversing the number plate giving it a prefix letter, and then up to 3 numbers a space and 3 more letters. The prefix letter now gave away the age of the car.
By 2001 the problem was looming again and the current system was introduced. Now each number plate has 7 digits and the fist 2 letters give the region of the country where the car was first registered, followed by 2 numbers which give the age of the car and then 3 random letters. An example of this could be NE51 XXX. The NE tells you the car is from the North East of England. The 51 tells you it was registered in September 2001 and the last 3 letters are selected at random and mean nothing.
Many celebrities have number plates which indicate their particular talent. Famous Liverpudlian comedian Jimmy Tarbuck has COM 1C and magician Paul Daniels has MAG 1C – Who Wants to be a Millionaire TV presenter Chris Tarrant has CHU 8B showing his love for fishing. Celebrity hair stylist Nicky Clarke has H41 RDO on his number plate, and VIP 1 was originally issued for the Pope’s visit to Ireland.
Other celebrities prefer to use their initials on their plates, Max Bygraves had MB 1, Princess Anne used to display 1 ANN on her car, but it was removed for security reasons.
The most expensive number plate is reputed to be RR 1 believed to be worth £500,000, but has not been sold recently, which would make MS 1 the most expensive sold to date for £350,000.
Ken Rawlings
From an old magazine of Reigate Parish Church
Today we mourn the passing of a beloved friend, Common Sense, who has been with us for many years. No one knows for sure how old he was, since the record of his birth was lost long ago in bureaucratic red tape. He will be remembered as having cultivated such valuable lessons as knowing when to come in out of the rain, why the early bird gets the worm, why life isn’t fair, and maybe it was my fault. Common Sense lived by simple, sound financial policies (do not spend more than you earn) and valuable parenting strategies (adults, not children are in charge).