While traveling, have you ever attended a local Rotary Club meeting? If you haven’t, we suggest you take the opportunity. Not only will you be able to learn what other clubs are doing around the world, but be able to share what your club is doing.AND…you just don’t know who you might meet! That was the case in 1999 when Past District Governor Bob Hagan was in the Bahamas and attended a local Rotary meeting. Who knew that one of the people he met would end up being the 2018-19 Rotary International President! It was that story PDG Bob told a well-attended event on Saturday, February 16 when RI President Barry visited Roswell.

The day started early with the District 6900 Interact Conference at Roswell’s Blessed Trinity High School. Over 100 Interact students attended. After a welcome by Roswell Rotary President Becky Stone, a short history of the 4-Way Test by Rotarian Elwyn Gaissert and an introduction by Rotarian Michael Parks of the Rotary Youth Exchange Program, the conference was underway with Mentor Speed Matching. The students rotated tables every 15-20 minutes where various mentors, many of whom are Rotarians, lead them in discussions of riveting questions such as “What do I dream of becoming at age 25?” and “How will I use my success to help at least 100,000 people?” Students enjoyed the opportunity to connect with Rotarians in a wide variety of careers. In the end, they were given the contact information for the mentors and encouraged to reach out to them. After a warm welcome by District 6900 Rotarians at the entrance of Blessed Trinity, RI President Barry Rassin stopped by the Interact conference, took selfies with the Interactors and shared stories of his travels and answered questions.

The day was also about service .In honor of President Barry and First Lady Esther’s visit, event attendees were asked to bring supplies for seniors living in Puerto Rico, such as adult diapers, body lotions, or powdered vitamin drinks. District 6900 donated $2,000 which was used to purchase grills and charcoal. The Interact students, led by several Roswell Rotarians, boxed the supplies, packed nine pallets of boxes and helped load over 5,000 pounds of donations in the awaiting trucks. With the help of Stone Mountain Rotarian Chris Brand and FODAC, Roswell Rotary shipped all of these supplies to seniors in Puerto Rico who are still in need after the devastation of the 2017 hurricane.

The excitement continued with RI President Barry and First Lady Esther joining over 300 Rotarians, Rotaractors, Interactors and RYE students for a wonderful lunch of chicken parmesan and social time. After lunch, Roswell Rotary held a special club meeting . If you were not overwhelmingly proud to be a Rotarian before President Barry spoke, you most certainly were after his inspiring talk. He talked about how important relationships built through Rotary help to change the world and even save lives. According to Rassin, “A Rotarian can call a Rotarian to call a Rotarian to save lives.That’s the power we have in this organization.We are collectively incredibly powerful and we are individually incredibly powerful.”

President Rassin recounted stories of such phone calls that saved lives.He described how a Rotarian called him in 2010 immediately following the earthquake in Haiti to ask for medical assistance. After a few more phone calls, Rotary had the first airplane of supplies to arrive after the earthquake. Local Rotarians found a location to land the plane and to deliver the supplies to those in need for 45 days.

President Rassin also received a phone call from New Zealand with a frantic father asking for help for his daughter and family that were in Haiti under a collapsed building. The daughter was able to get a call out before her cell phone died. Again, a phone call to a Rotarian that called another Rotarian that called another Rotarian lead a group to rescue the family after several hours. The power of Rotary to save lives is amazing.

President Rassin updated the audience on the battle to end polio around the world. He also encouraged Rotarians to reach out to our youth and young adults as the future of Rotary. After his remarks, Roswell Rotary honored him and First Lady Esther as Honorary Georgia Citizens by Roger Wise and presented them with a proclamation from the Georgia State Senate by Senator John Albers and a letter from Representative Mary Robichaux. Roswell Mayor Lori Henry proclaimed February 16 as Barry and Esther Rassin Day in Roswell, Georgia!

Later that evening, the festivities and service continued as District 6900 hosted a champagne reception and cocktail party at the home of PDG Bob Hagan and Carol Abreu. In addition to a meet and greet with President Barry and First Lady Esther Rassin, the evening raised over $6,000 for Polio Plus. In referring to the work Rotary has done since starting Polio Plus in 1985, Rassin says, “We can’t stop until it’s done. If we don’t get to zero, and no polio virus anywhere in the world, we can’t stop because it will spread.” He informed us that there were only 33 cases of polio in 2018, in three countries - Nigeria, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. He explained that we are hopeful that 2023 will bring certification that polio is eradicated from the planet. Certification will require three years to pass without a polio case. He further explained it is estimated that it would only take ten years for the number of cases to explode to 200,000 if we stop vaccinating children. He said, “When Rotary commits, we go all the way.” Just the week before his visit to Roswell, Rotary had coordinated with its partners and had 48,000 immunization teams cover Pakistan to immunize 39 million children in one week.The power of Rotary overcomes political and religious roadblocks! Rotary is able to build bridges where others have failed to save lives.

President Rassin left us with a challenge to think about what we need to do differently to remain relevant in the world.He suggested that building relationships between Rotarians, Rotaractors, and Interactors is critical to the sustainability of Rotary. “We must be the inspiration. We need to awaken in the soul of every Rotarian, a longing for a better world. The more we inspire that desire, the more we can make our word a better place.” Rotarians, Rotaractors, and Interactors in attendance certainly were inspired by Rassin’s words.

Roswell Rotary is working on editing the video from Rassin’s visit and will be sharing it with other clubs in the District so that he can inspire those Rotarians that were unable to attend.