We had an interesting speaker at our last meeting. Sabina Andron is a Research Fellow in the School of Culture & Community, University of Melbourne. In her talk Sabina wanted to challenge our thinking of street art and graffiti. Graffiti removal was also discussed. It was an especially relevant talk, as Sabina also spoke on the recent graffiti of “Pam the Bird” that was painted on the Bolte Bridge.

The Boroondara Farmers Market embraced the festive spirit on Saturday 18 July, transforming Patterson Reserve into a cheerful Christmas in July celebration. Despite a surprisingly low turnout of just 36 stallholders, more than 900 patrons enjoyed the market, making the most of a gloriously sunny winter’s day. Together with Santa in a funny hat, highlights of the morning were the Christmas-themed raffle, with a basket of festive goodies up for grabs and the ever-popular Rotary Christmas Cake stall, well organised by Joanne Shentu. The lucky raffle winner will be drawn at the Rotary Club of Glenferrie meeting on 28 July.

The Rotary Inner Melbourne Emergency Relief Network (RIMERN) is a multi club Rotary project operating in inner Melbourne, providing furniture, appliances and homewares to welfare agency clients who have experienced homelessness, domestic violence, incarceration, refugee displacement and other crises. The program is now firmly established as a significant component of our club's community service. It is supported by more than twenty Rotary clubs and our club provides volunteers for a half day every month. 

Attendance: 29  Members: 26 (of 48) 54%   Guests: 3

Speaker: Dr Sabina Andron Topic: Graffiti - the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Dr Sabina Andron has been researching visual culture in cities for many years to understand how we create and resist social orders through the use of public signs and images. She is currently an Australian Research Council (ARC) Fellow with a prestigious "Discovery Early Career Research Award" (DECRA) at the University of Melbourne’s Centre for Cities.

The Rotary and Community Service Radio Show this Friday night on 94.1FM 3WBC, streaming Live on www.3wbc.org.au between 6 and 8pm, will feature a pre-recorded interview with our very own Amelia Anderson, Immediate Past International Service Director, and Taplima Muana the current Membership Director of the Rotary Club of Bo in Sierra Leone.

The club dinner meeting on August 11th will be dedicated to a Club Forum, the purpose of which is to obtain feedback from members in all aspects of club activities and to provide information, particularly to new members, of the many programs in which we are involved. In addition to providing impactful programmes our club should provide an enriching, stimulating and enjoyable environment for members, who hopefully feel that they are part of something worthwhile.

Rather than exploring opinions by questionnaire (which we all loath) your unstructured feedback would be valued.

It may sound surprising, but one tap of the "Like" button on Facebook can help promote the Rotary Club of Glenferrie to hundreds, or even thousands, of people. That's because Facebook doesn't simply display every post to everyone. It uses sophisticated algorithms and artificial intelligence to decide which posts deserve a wider audience.

When our posts receive plenty of likes, comments and shares, Facebook recognises that people are engaging with them and rewards that activity by showing them to many more users. The opposite is also true. Posts that receive little engagement are quickly pushed aside and seen by far fewer people. In other words, every click really does count.

There's no joke this week, and I'm not joking. Amusing anecdotes appear to be scarce on the ground these days. So if you've come across something that's tickled your fancy, don't forget to spread the joy. Send it to the Bulletin Editor. For crying out loud!