Christmas Charity Donations given out

At our first meeting of 2012 on the 4^th January we entertained and distributed £1500 to each of the charities we supported in our Christmas collections. They all had representatives there and they were thanked for taking part in our collections and each given a cheque before telling us what their charity wanted to achieve and how they accomplished it. The rest of the money raised will be distributed throughout the year to other deserving causes.

 Back Row – left John Parker (DebRA), right Laurie Wills (TREES)

Front Row – left David Banks (Sutton Foodbank), centre President Chris Forkan, right Rosemary Attridge (CRY)

 

Nonsuch Rotary laundered Christmas Collection cash !

 News Flash – As a result of hundreds of coins being contaminated by a sticky jam tart, Sue King had to wash them before they were accepted by the local bank. This is just one of many incidents that members and wives of the Club had to deal with during an action packed Christmas Collection last December.

 To start with……… we couldn’t! A puncture on the lorry before we even commenced the first evening round prevented us from collecting. However, we were assisted by three young men who not only showed us how to release the spare wheel but went on to change the wheel themselves. They refused any payment asking us to add it to the charity collection.

 During the second week we suffered a power failure when an electric cable was severed. Cometh the moment, cometh the man. Diego “call me sparky” Alves jumped up and in a moment repaired the break using a liberal amount of parcel tape. A huge cheer rang out from the Elves when the music and lights came back on.

 We were very fortunate to have enormous support from our better halves with at least nine wives coming out on many occasions. The weather was much better than the disasters of last year but nevertheless some of us were soaked on a couple of nights. A sprinkling of snow at Tescos could not prevent Santas and Elves bringing joy and surprise to hundreds of small children. As usual the greatest pleasure we receive is seeing the faces of the children, parents and grandparents, when they see Santa on his sleigh and hear the Christmas carols. One such parent even said that her Christmas did not start until our sleigh had been round.

 One amusing story out of many recalls little Johnny opening the door to one Elf. “I’ll go and get my Mum” he said. Twenty seconds later he returned and explained “My Mum says she is out!!”

Once again, many, many thanks to all members, wives, friends and charity supporters for your support. The total raised was in excess of £9,000 which is a tribute to everyone’s hard work.