The Youth Leadership Course, the Spar Collection, the Quiz, Vocational Service Awards, Medication by WiFi & WoW!

Last Week

I was again not at the meeting but neither was President Jean as she was at our Youth Leadership course in the Magaliesberg.  Unfortunately I was unable to attend the Sunday braai because of another function....I'm not much of a reporter of Rotary Events!

You can see that the various teams had to shop and then cook dinner.  Sadly the the adults only had one small take-away to share between 6.....

The Spar Collection
I don't know what we succeeded in collecting yet but our shift, which was the first one on a Saturday morning, is always slow in starting but we certainly collected more than the previous month......It's just come in from Sybille who had the with to photograph the final tally... R7 626,15.

The Quiz

We have a big advertisement for it every week in The Ramble.  Don't forget.  It's not long to go and we have to get as many people there as possible. 

Rotary Vocational Service Awards

So far we have had only one recommendation. 

This Week

Dr Agatha Banga is going to talk about "Medication by WiFi".  ?????

Banga is a pediatric surgeon who works at the Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital. Her day starts in the hospital wards at 5:00 am where she visits her patients and leaves instructions for the day. She then does a handover meeting with consultants, registrars and medical offices to discuss the progress of patients overnight, theatre cases, and any emergency cases.

Banga is usually in theatre by 8:00 am almost every single day. On the days she is not operating, she attends to over 100 patients at the clinic. The Zimabawean native splits her time treating patients at the Chris Hani Baragwanath hospital, Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital, and until recently, the Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital. 

“Surgery is not anything like Grey’s Anatomy, it’s more like a rollercoaster ride. You need to be more attentive, like essential things you need to do for patients such as take blood and do drips. Those are the things that ensure that your patients are ready for theatre and that your patients will do well after theatre,” Banga said.

Much like the Grey’s Anatomy character Meredith Grey, Banga makes her own scrub caps herself which she wears when operating on patients. She added, “It’s my way of being myself in the job that I have”.

As a medical student, Banga wanted to specialise as a paediatrician. She then took time off from clinical medicine and studied public health at the University of Cape Town as a Mandela Rhodes Scholar in 2015.

“At that time, I realised I discovered that surgery is a public health intervention and I looked at how many paediatricians are out there versus paediatric surgeons. Children are not little adults, and we actually need paediatric surgeons and not general surgeons to manage children,” Banga said.

Wow factor

Secily Wilson

The women virtually float down the runway at the “Fall into Fabulous” fashion show. As they smile and twirl, Secily Wilson sits in the back, relishing her role as fairy godmother.

“When you see before-and-after shots of these women, you can feel the empowerment,” she says. “They’re like, ‘I got this.’” They aren’t models, and their stylish clothes and makeup aren’t the main point of the event. The women are graduates of a six-month program that aims to lift them out of challenging life situations, whether as a result of domestic violence, a bad relationship, or a financial catastrophe.

The nonprofit Wilson founded, called WOW, or Women Overcoming with Willpower, provides a range of sessions that include mental health counseling, job interview preparation, and résumé-writing advice. Since she founded WOW in 2012, the organization has benefited nearly 1,000 women and children through the empowerment program.

In the women she helps, Wilson also sees herself.

Not long ago, she was a well-known local TV news anchor dreaming of a big-time network job. But that was before she had a stroke, on air, just before her 40th birthday. It was the first of a series of misfortunes that hit the mother of two: She was laid off. Her marriage broke up. Her home was foreclosed on. Then she had a second minor stroke.

“Why me?” she remembers thinking. “I lived very silently in this pit of depression and despair, thinking my life was over.” Eventually, a friend told her: “Snap out of it, girlfriend. Enough of this pity party.”

At the Fall into Fabulous fashion show,
 volunteers on the “glam squad”
assist the women in the programme
 with hairstyling, makeup, and wardrobe.

A “trained survivor” and “closet party planner,” Wilson set out to teach resilience to others who were in similar situations but lacked the advantages she had. She rallied friends and sponsors to organize the first fashion show and luncheon, but soon realized she needed to offer more. WOW is now a registered 501(c)(3) organization that serves 15 to 20 women a year, assisted by a range of corporate and other supporters.

One of them is the Rotary Club of Lake Buena Vista, near Disney World (read more about this club). Wilson had joined the club because she was drawn by the organization’s dedication to community service.

The club supports WOW through donations, says Greg Gorski, 2018-19 club president. Members also help coach the women in the programme in job search and financial management skills, and volunteer at WOW events like the fashion show.

The nonprofit has supported women as they bought their own homes, returned to college, and established savings accounts for the first time.

Yvonne Hoffman, Before & After

Yvonne Hoffman recalls her first day in the programme, when Wilson asked each attendee to name five positive things about herself. Hoffman couldn’t come up with even one and broke down in tears. She and her two teenage daughters were just coming out of a bad domestic situation.

She says Wilson jumped in and quickly cited two things — her pretty smile and the fact that she had shown up to start anew. Today, Hoffman is happy, newly remarried, and working a higher-paying home health care job after going back to school.

“Secily was there when I needed her more than I ever needed someone in my life,” Hoffman says. “I think it’s because she’s got this ability to have such empathy. She’s been there.”