Green Gold Could Save South Africa

Hydrogen has an enormous potential to be the main source of power in the future to replace power generated with fossil fuels like coal and petroleum, the cause of much of the global warming that the earth is experiencing.

South Africa is in a unique position to capitalise on the rapidly developing use of electrolysers to split hydrogen from oxygen in water to "harvest" the hydrogen. South Africa has a rich source of sunshine to use solar power for the process and also a rich supply of platinum, which is used to keep the two elements separate. Much of the expertise needed is already available at Sasol.

                       Lael Bethlehem and Babette Gallard

There are other countries, especially in North Africa and the Middle East, which are equally well placed to capitalise on these developments, which means the time to act is now, said Lael Bethlehem, our speaker at the meeting this week.

She was suggested as a speaker by Babette Gallard.

Lael is an investment executive at Hosken Consolidated Investments, and has been involved in the development of Karoshoek Solar One, a solar power project in the Northern Cape which feeds power to Eskom. HCI is a part owner of Karoshoek.

She said although there have been many breakthroughs in developing the technology required for the process, especially in the past five years, energy from hydrogen still costs about three times as much as that generated by fossil fuels.

Set-up costs to build plants are, however, already lower than that of coal generating plants and the market for so-called green hydrogen is developing rapidly in the shipping and aviation spheres, which will serve to bring the cost down. Much research is also being done in the automotive industry.

                               Paul Kasango with Nola Ostle

In the meantime arrangements for the Golf Day on Friday, 15 October at the Wanderers Golf Course, are proceeding and the field of about thirty 4-balls is filling up rapidly.

Quite a few members have been helping with selling raffle tickets, amongst them Linda Vink, Nola Ostle, Joan Donet, Sam Devernieul, Helene Bramwell, Janice Angove, Amina Frense, Judy Symons and Adele Dabbs. More than R15 000 has been collected thus far and there will be more selling attempts over the weekend and on the day.

Adele has donated a week at her holiday home in St Francis Bay as the main raffle prize and that seems to be attracting a lot of interest.

The organising committee, led by Mike MacDonald, has asked for more contributions for prizes and leads for sponsorships. It costs from R2000 to sponsor a hole where the sponsors can advertise by putting up banners, etc. The committee has also asked each member to sell one raffle sheet.

The funds raised will be used as seed money for Donate a Loo in applying for a Global Grant.

Another fun fundraising initiative was highlighted by Julian Nagy, who paid a welcome visit to the club with his daughter, Paula and her fiancé, Nick.

This is the Power of Pennies initiative, where participants each contribute R100 a month, which gets put into a kitty for a quarterly draw where the winning number gets half the uptake - the balance goes into  club funds. To encourage members and their family and friends, a minimum of R5 000 has been set as the prize in the first draw.

This will be on 1 December at a function still to be announced, so sign up and join in the fun. Sarah de la Pasture has all the details.

Important dates: On Saturday from 9 - 12 there is a club assembly at Twickenham Guest House in Auckland Park, a meeting to discuss the way forward for the Rotary Club of Johannesburg New Dawn. Please join us!

Club assemblies are compulsory for clubs and all members are urged to join and give input on the direction the club will be taking over the next few years.

The assembly will start at 9 am and hopefully be finished in time for the rugby at noon. The venue is Twickenham Guest House at 66 Twickenham Ave, Auckland Park. There is safe parking and the entrance is in Greenlands Road just around the corner from Twickenham Ave.

                                 Emma Wade-Smith OBE, the speaker next week

On Tuesday at 7 am the club council will be meeting on Zoom with the District Governor, who every year meets with the leadership of all clubs in the district as part of their duties.

The speaker at the meeting on Wednesday is Emma Wade-Smith, the first ever Her Majesty's Trade Commissioner for Africa, representing the UK Government's Department for International Trade.

Emma, who has been in South Africa since 2016, will be speaking on trade relations between the UK and Africa. She'll be introduced by Nick Bell from the UK.

A Thought for the Week: Alcohol does not solve any problems, but then neither does milk. - John Wayne (1907 - 1979)

 

Heritage Food More Than Just Boerewors

If you think South African heritage food consists of bobotie, boerewors and malva pudding, you need to broaden your horizons, Hillary Biller, food editor of the Sunday Times, told the meeting this week.

The newspaper's Lifestyle section featured South African chefs this past weekend who each spoke about their favourite South African dish and their choices are very different from the above three examples.

Hillary told the club than until fairly recently traditional African food had never been properly documented and there have been very few cookbooks that reflect these recipes. This is all changing.

                      Old friends ... Helene Bramwell introduced Hillary Biller at the meeting

The popular foodie Zola Nene, originally from KwaZulu-Natal-Natal, featured lamb chops in her dish of lamb chops (very traditional South African fare) with isigwamba (mealie meal with spinach) and chakalaka.

Anel Potgieter, food editor at Rapport, is a Vrystaatse meisie who loves melktert (who doesn't!) She chose curried tripe and trotters as her heritage dish of choice and the photograph features on the front page of the Lifestyle section. It's not for the faint-hearted.

Mopani worms from Venda are also not and obvious choice for many diners, although those who've tried these easy snacks swear by them. They feature in the dish created by chef Lufuno Sinthumule of mopani worms wrapped in sweet potato strips and served with an avocado dip. Avos are of course plentiful in the northern provinces.

                  New recipe books reflect the changes in mainstream South African and African cuisine

Carrying on with the theme of a rainbow cuisine, Verushka Ramasami, a lecturer in tourism and hospitality, features samp and beans Durban style, which obviously means the addition of the spices traditionally used in curry dishes.

Mokgadi Itsweng, author of the book Veggilicious, features dikgobe sorghum grain, a heritage food, with cowpeas in her recipe, which she claims is the origin of samp and beans.

The celebrated chef, food historian and author Cass Abrahams, now retired, doesn't really like the term Cape Malay food and rather talks about African food infused with dishes from other countries.

                  Delicious looking Rex Union marmalade

To round off her talk Hillary shared some interesting facts and trivia about a number of other typically South African foods like rooibos, Ouma rusks, Mrs Balls chutney, peppermint crisps and Durban bunny chow.

She also told how the South African Slow Food movement had been instrumental in saving the 50 or so remaining Rex Union orange trees in the vicinity of Hunter's Rest near Rustenburg and then held a draw for club members for three recipe books (pictured above) and three jars of her own home made Rex Union Marmalade, said by aficionados like Graham Donet, Ian Widdop and Adele Dabbs to be the best in the world.

                   Sarah de La Pasture, Helene Bramwell and Adele Dabbs at the meeting

Carrying on with the theme of food, Brendon Martens said in an update on the seedling project that the Urban Agriculture Initiative has visited about a dozen urban farming projects proposed by Rotary and given advice on how to grow and water the seedlings being grown at the National School of Art site in Braamfontein.

Three of these sites have so far put in orders for seedlings, despite the fact that they are very well priced. About 15 000 seedlings are growing at the moment out of a capacity of 90 000, meaning that the uptake has been relatively slow.

                   Lucille Blumberg at Parkview Golf Club

Lucille Blumberg reported that the country is now moving out of the third wave of the coronavirus pandemic, but that it is up to all of us to prevent a fourth wave, expected around December.  This will only happen if enough people get vaccinated before the traditional Christmas holiday gatherings and if people keep to  masking, sanitising and social distancing, she said.

She said that despite there being a plentiful supply of vaccines, the vaccination rate is still not high enough.

"We need to get the economy back and we need to get tourists back," she said.

                                    Joan Donet, Linda Vink and Helene Bramwell selling raffle tickets

Golf Day: The first session selling raffle tickets outside Parkview Spar last Saturday was a success, with Linda Vink and Joan Donet being joined from time to time by other club members, most notably Nola Ostle and her friend Grace, Amina Frense and Helene Bramwell, in selling more than R4 000 worth of tickets.

There'll be more ticket sales tomorrow and Saturday from 9 - 12am and volunteers are welcome to come and join in, even if it is just for a while.

Power of Pennies: The first draw, with a first prize of R5 000, which will help no end with your Christmas shopping, for this fun fundraiser will be held on Wednesday, 1 December. If you haven't joined yet, get moving by contacting Sarah se La Pasture, who'll register you and explain how  you can pay your R100 a month.

Next Week: The speaker is Lael Bethlehem, who'll be speaking on the hydrogen economy, a global movement using hydrogen as a low-carbon energy source to eventually replace fossil fuels.

A Thought for the Week: If moderation is a crime, then indifference is a fault. - Jack Kerouac (1922 - 1969)

The Shattered Dreams of Abused Kids

Instead of talking about herself and her career as other members have done over the past few months, Karlien Kruger opted to use her turn at the microphone at the meeting this week to bring the club up to date with developments at Copessa, the NGO tackling child abuse and gender based violence in Soweto that she has been consulting with for the past more than two years.

Karlien estimates that she and fellow club member Gavin Atkins have done the equivalent of R335 000 worth of consulting for Copessa (Community-Based Prevention and Empowerment Strategies - South Africa) led by the inspiring medical doctor Dr Nobs Mwanda.

Copessa deals with the aftermath of violence against children and child abuse, and more recently gender based violence, and attempts to prevent conditions that can lead to violence.

Karlien and Gavin's efforts have revolved around putting proper administrative structures and practices in place to help the organisation to run more smoothly and enable it to concentrate on projects and fundraising.

These projects include a soccer league designed to keep mostly young boys off the streets and transforming dumps where children are often in danger, into play areas, a holiday schooling programme, a library unit, a sewing project for women and health parks, amongst many other efforts.

When the successive lockdowns started at the end of March last year, Copessa also set up a feeding scheme distributing food parcels and have started a garden project for food security to address poverty. This has been so successful that they are already supplying the local Pick n Pay with fresh vegetables.

                                  Dr Nobs Mwanda

These are all major achievements given that raising funds for all their efforts has become more and more difficult over the past almost two years, something that we at the Rotary Club of Johannesburg New Dawn know only too well.

With the work that they are doing, Copessa is a prime candidate for a Global Grant (along with Donate a Loo), something which President Ian Widdop will be addressing over the next few months with input from club members at a Global Grant meeting for which we've set a Wednesday meeting aside during October.

                                   Hannes Dressler

Hannes Dressler told the club that by next month he and  his wife Katya will have been in South Africa for three years. They're unfortunately leaving South Africa at the end of the year as Hannes's contract with SAP in South Africa has expired and he'll be deployed elsewhere, although he doesn't know where yet.

Hannes told how he'd seen the New Dawn sign up at the Parkview Golf Club soon after arriving in the country and decided to pay the club a visit. A hearty Guten Morgen! from Graham Donet and a genuine greeting from fellow German Frank Odenthal, who has since left the club, sealed the deal for him and he joined soon afterwards.

Hannes had met Katya when he moved to Moscow where she was HR head at KPMG and introduced him to the company and country. He says although they were expecting a posting in Europe, America or other similar places he was given the option of China, India or South Africa.

They were sent on a scouting tour of South Africa and both immediately decided this is where they wanted to be.

He said South Africa is in many ways similar to Moscow, where you have to be a member of the inner circle, whether in the country, in your community or club to be anyone. Rotary has, however taught him that the more open you are as a club or community, the better ideas you get and the more creative you can be.

                                   The poster for the New Dawn Golf Day raffle first prize

Hannes also pledged 4 bottles of the finest whisky from the Bottega Café Whisky Club in Parkhurst as a first prize for the Golf Day coming up on Friday, 15th October, as well as a case of wine.

The Golf Day is in aid of Donate a Loo, the other project in which New Dawn is involved for which the process of applying for a global grant has started.

These two projects will have to find an overseas sponsor club and New Dawn would also have to contribute. As mentioned, Karlien and Gavin for Copessa and Helene and Adele at Donate a Loo will be involved with President Ian in identifying the specific projects, the overseas contributors and the writing of the final proposal.

Time will be set aside, probably during the second club meeting in October, for members to join in the discussion.

Dates to Diarise: This Saturday and the following one we'll be selling raffle tickets for the Golf Day at the Spar in Parkview. Contact Linda Vink (082 782 4628) if you want to volunteer to help.

The meeting next week will be a morning meeting and not an evening one as originally planned. The speaker will be Hillary Biller, food editor at the Star, talking about heritage food.

The meeting the week after (29 September) marks the DG visit to New Dawn.

There'll be a club assembly at Twickenham Guest House in Auckland Park on Saturday, 2nd October.

The New Dawn Golf Day, in aid of Donate a Loo, is on Friday, 15 October at the Wanderers Golf Club.

A Thought for the Week: The purpose of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware. - Henry Miller (1891 - 1980)

Spying on the Spies With Red Ronnie

It's hard to believe the looting in KwaZulu-Nata and Gauteng was six to eight weeks ago, a truly traumatic experience for the country but looking back, it all seems shrouded in fog.

It was a nightmare, said Ronnie Kasrils, that started with the arrest and incarceration of former President Jacob Zuma on charges of contempt of court.

Kasrils, a member of the Rotary Club of Johannesburg New Dawn and ex-Minister of Intelligence, was the speaker at the hybrid meeting on Wednesday.

During the 9 days of hell that followed, he said, more than 350 people lost their lives. South Africa had never seen anything like this since 1994.

     The damage to the economy from the looting is estimated at R20 billion in KZN and R3.5 billion in Gauteng

The security cluster at cabinet level had failed to pick up that trouble is coming, said Kasrils.

"When they hear that Caesar is going to be stabbed on the steps of the Senate, they should immediately go to the President and tell him, not write reports that no-one reads," he said.

                        Ronnie Kasrils. The photo is from the Internet

There was no single cause for the looting and destruction, he said. Poverty is one of them, in a country where an estimated 60 percent of the population lives in poverty. Disunity, splits and faction forming within the ANC also played a role.

"We've by no means seen the last of the problems in South Africa," he said.

It is up to South Africans to demand that the right, strong people get put into key positions and those who are a deadweight are gotten rid of so that especially the police, military and intelligence services are sorted out.

                                 Eric Kimani, an eminent Rotarian from Kenya

Another interesting speaker this week was Eric Kimani of Kenya, the first ethic Kenyan to become a District Governor in his country, who addressed a seminar on Membership.

Rotary is flourishing in the East African country and for all the right reasons.

PDG Eric told how he has led a movement to create four new clubs in his home country over the past few years, all of which are flourishing, and two of which have a membership of 80 or more and heading for 100.

One of the ways they have achieved this, is by a rigorous training programme for prospective members before they even join. He told the meeting of a few highlights of the programme, which is available to clubs through PDG Annie Steyn.

     Wendy Challis, Mike MacDonald (doing the brag), Judy Symons, Helene Bramwell and Linda Vink at the meeting

The first requirement is that prospective members must attend at least 4 of the 6 training sessions if they want to join any of the four clubs.

They must be introduced by a Rotarian. Walk-ins are not countenanced.

They must show understanding of the three Rotary non-negotiables: Participation (Rotary is for leaders, not followers, he said); attendance of at 50% of meetings is compulsory; and payment is compulsory. If you can't afford it, you can't be a Rotarian.

Prospective members must know where the Rotary Foundation fits in and how it works.

                                       Graham Donet, President for September, and Paul Channon

Before finally being accepted they must attend a fireside chat of at least two hours, normally in the form of a cocktail party, to meet senior leaders of the club.

By that time they would have had to attend at least four of the previous eight club meetings, which means the whole process can take a few months.

Instead of telling people they should join Rotary to take part in community projects, they end every lesson by telling prospective members what Rotary can do for them. They emphasise the advantages of networking, of how Rotary helps you with personal discipline by teacher you how to keep and manage your time.

Another personal advantage is learning the tools of management.

                               We made the front page after the tree planting at Zoo Lake last week

Through Rotary you come to distill your conscience by taking to heart the lessons of the 4-Way Test.

Rotary also helps you to become a global citizen. It gives you a global passport with which you can create global networks.

You join Rotary to learn, to increase your knowledge because Rotary is such a diverse body of people, most of whom share their knowledge for free. You can travel all over the world and people will open their homes to you.

"Tell people Rotary is fun, tell them Rotary is 95% personal gain and 5% community effort. Once you've told them that, tell them  what Rotary does and what Rotary has done, for example with polio eradication."

He also told the meeting of a Buddy system they have initiated where a club will have, for example, 10 groups of 8 randomly chosen members who hold their own casual meetings over coffee or a glass of wine and discuss club matters. The system has been so successful that many of the groups find a name for themselves and tackle projects together.

Next Week and Beyond: More members will be introducing themselves at the meeting next week. The following week (22 September) Hillary Biller, the renowned food journalist, will be talking about heritage food. Remember the DG visit on 29 September.

A Thought for the Week: We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don't like? - Jean Cocteau (1889 - 1963)

Spring in the New Dawn Step

Just when it seemed as if winter would never end, with snow on the mountains down south sending icy winds our way, Wednesday, 1 September  dawned as a true Spring day on the Highveld with the Rotary Club of Johannesburg New Dawn.

At 6.30 am Zoo Lake was already bathed in sunshine and became warmer as the fun Rotary morning with a tree planting, induction of 5 new members and an inspiring update on the work of The Link Trust progressed.

    Tree planters galore at Zoo Lake. Those not wearing masks (like the guy on the right with the red bowtie) will have   to report to Professor Lucille Blumberg

Excellent coffee and a muffin and rusk (courtesy of Twickenham Guest House) was served from 6.30 am by a very chatty Craig Green of CupaJozi and his mobile coffee kiosk (071 676 3638) if you want to make use of his services).

Craig sold 44 cups of coffee giving him a cash injection of R1100 with the same amount for the New Dawn membership committee.

                Linda Vink wearing her prize-winning hat, with PDG Jankees and Judy Sligcher

To add to the fun Fran Haslam, managing director of the Zoo Lake Users Committee, adjudicated a competition for the best bonnet (ladies) and bowtie (gentlemen).

Because there was no clear winner in the bowtie competition (they must have overlooked mine) the hamper prizes were awarded to Linda Vink and Helene Bramwell, both of whom re-donated their fabulous looking prizes (courtesy of Joan Sainsbury) to the Golf Day, now fast approaching on 15 October at the Wanderers Golf Club.

               Fran Haslam with Helene Bramwell and her hamper       

                                        Joan Sainsbury looked striking in her spring outfit

Fran was also in charge of the tree planting ceremony when an indigenous African Olive (Olienhout in Afrikaans) was planted  a little way uphill from the parking lot of the now defunct Moyo restaurant where it will provide shade and edible black olives.

Although the tree had already been planted the day before, members and guests, amongst them six girls from the National School of the Arts, helped to fill the hole with soil to make sure the tree is bedded down properly.

I've been describing the day in reverse, because it ended with the tree ceremony, preceded by the prize giving and group photograph (see above), which was preceded by the induction and Megan Maynard's talk.

The new inductees are Desh Moodley, Nola Ostle, Velani  Buthelezi, Olivia Schoombie-Khoza and

 Mpho Zetina Mosia

After being inducted by September President Graham Donet, the five briefly introduced themselves and received their badges and other Rotary paraphernalia.

It was certainly a day to remember and hopefully for them an induction that they'll always hold dear.

                                  A very stylish Nola Ostle and Mpho Zetina Mosia after their induction

                                  PP Graham Donet with Velani Buthelezi

Before the inductions Megan Maynard gave an update on one of our signature projects, The Link Trust, which engages volunteers to teach literacy and numeracy to young primary school children who have fallen behind at an early age.

As in so many other spheres, Covid-19 has had a very negative effect on their work at the 19 schools where The Link had been engaged originally, Rotary, through New Dawn, was funding them to set up in new schools at a rate of three or four per year before Covid struck at the beginning of 2020.

                                    Paul Channon with Megan Maynard

In the process The Link has lost quite a lot of their volunteers, either to the virus or because they're afraid to venture out too much, especially deep into townships, even when the schools have been operating.

Ever resourceful, The Link has responded by curating games that the children can take home and more recently engaged with the University of Johannesburg and the Alexander Education Committee to get student volunteers to visit the children.

                                      President Ian Widdop introducing Megan Maynard

A positive development is that UJ has included practical teaching as a requirement for their third-year teaching students, which could potentially guarantee future crops of volunteers.

She said The Link has had enquiries from as far afield as Mpumalanga, KZN and Knysna to set up similar operations. Whichever way things go, they'd like to get volunteers to get back into classrooms for one-on-one teaching as soon as possible.

                                     Babette Gallard with Zoo Lake's newest tree

Well done to Babette Gallard for being so instrumental in organising such an auspicious Spring day, in typical Rotary style with more than just a touch of seriousness to go with the fellowship and fun.

                                      A very colourful Paul Kasango showing off his digging skills

                                       Matt Pitjeng taking a turn with the spade

                                       The photographer photographed ... Hannes Dressler and the tree

Many thanks also to Hannes Dressler for volunteering to be the official photographer for the day and for making his photos available online for everybody to see.

Next Week: We'll be having a hybrid meeting next week, online for those who can't or don't want to venture out and in person at the Parkview Golf Club for the first time in quite a while for the rest of the club.

The speaker will be Ronnie Kasrils in his guise of ex-minister of security services, speaking about the role of the security cluster in the recent widespread looting in KZN and Gauteng.

A Thought for the Week: To be resolute and firm, simple and slow in speech, is to approach true goodness. - Confucius (c. 551 - 478 BC)