by Andy Lester
5/21/2010 8:55:00 AM
Boa ação
Rotary cumpre mais uma de suas ações beneméritas. Andy Lester, presidente do Rotary Club de Edmond, Estado de Oklahoma, nos Estados Unidos, está na terrinha e, em parceria com o Rotary Club de Fortaleza - Planalto, entregará um veículo utilitário à Associação Peter Pan, que foi adquirido com fundos originados de doações de rotarianos daquela cidade americana, da Fundação Rotária e dos rotarianos do Planalto. Solenidade será amanhã, às 12h30, no Ideal Clube, após visita à entidade.
So read yesterday's newspaper article announcing our visit to the Planalto Club today (http://diariodonordeste.globo.com/materia.asp?codigo=787059). Try this for the English translation:
A Good Deed
Rotary is doing another charitable work. Andy Lester, president of the Rotary Club of Edmond, Oklahoma, United States, is in our land and, in partnership with the Rotary Club of Fortaleza - Plateau, will deliver a utility vehicle to the Associação Peter Pan. The vehicle was purchased funds from donations by Rotarians of that city, the Rotary Foundation and Rotarians of the Planalto club. The ceremony will take place Thursday, at 12.30, Ideal Club, after a visit to the entity.
What a special day it has been. This morning we first visited another agency the Planalto Club supports. Called "Viva a Vida" (roughly translated as "Enjoy Life"), the agency is located in a very poor neighborhood called Tancredo Neves. Among other things, it creates a safe environment for children, trains young adults in important job skills, has a senior center for older members of the community, and provides a dental clinic.
We then drove to the Associação Peter Pan, the beneficiary of our joint project with the Fortaleza - Planalto club. It’s an amazing facility, run by amazing people. The head of the agency, Miss Olga, welcomed us with open arms. She told us what makes the agency special is that it has two bywords – share the work and complete transparency.
The facilities look more like a home than a hospital. This is no accident – Associação Peter Pan has sought to create an atmosphere that is welcoming to its child cancer patients, many of whom we were able to meet. Associação Peter Pan is about to complete a new building, which will provide a much larger and more up to date place for the children and families it serves.
At about 11:45, we drove to the "Ideal Clube," where the Fortaleza - Planalto Rotarians hold their meetings. It is in a beautiful location: those seated at the head table look out over the Atlantic Ocean, just across the street. Several other Rotary Clubs also hold their meetings in the aptly named facility.
Several people spoke, including our host club's president-elect, a past district governor, Miss Olga of the Associação Peter Pan, and me. We had a delicious meal. Edmond Rotarians would have felt right at home. Served buffet style, it included salad, rice, a beef dish and a fish dish, dessert and coffee. We saw the beautiful vehicle the two Rotary Clubs jointly purchased and donated. Both Krista and I were favorably surprised at how nice the vehicle is. The meeting ended with a brief television interview of both Krista and me. Throughout the day, Flávio Araújo, the young Rotarian lawyer with whom we have been working via email for the last couple of years, did a great job as our translator.
Tonight we are meeting several of our fellow Rotarians for a seafood dinner at one of the beaches. It should be a fun evening.
Krista is staying with the family of Rotarian Juvenal Duarte. Fatima, his wife, may be the Brazilian version of Krista.
Andy