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GOVERNOR'S
MONTHLY NEWSLETTER 總監
President 文 告 月刊

Dear fellow Rotarians and members of the family of Rotary,

love to travel! I even enjoy the mundane process of getting
I from here to there. But last year, my wife, Gay, and I had one
of those experiences that would strain the optimism of even
the most cheerful traveler. We found ourselves with six hours to
wait, at an airport where we were not scheduled to be, on a President 2019-20
day we had not planned still to be traveling, having woken up Rotary Club of Decatur
that morning at a hotel unknown to us the night before. It was Alabama, USA
one of those days.
As we waited at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New
York City, Gay and I took a walk to people watch. We went
from one end of the terminal to the other and back, looking at
every gate, every destination, every group of people waiting
for their flights.
Each gate was its own island of humanity. When we walked
down the center of the concourse, we were in New York,
moving along with everyone in one river. But when you veered
off into those seats, you left that current and landed on an
island. You were already in Delhi or Paris or Tel Aviv.
As we started our walk, I thought: “All these different people,
all these different countries, all in one place. This is like Rotary!＂
But as we walked past gate after gate, I realized something. It President, Rotary International 2019-20
was not like Rotary at all. Because everyone in that river was
heading for an island. And every island stayed an island. The
people heading to Taipei might be talking to one another, but Mark Daniel Maloney
they were not talking to the people heading to Cairo or Lagos.
Contrast that with Rotary. Rotary allows us to connect
with one another, in deep and meaningful ways, across
our differences. It connects us with people we would never
otherwise have met, who are more like us than we ever
could have known. It connects us with our communities, to
professional opportunities, and to the people who need our
help.
Connection is what makes the experience of Rotary so very
different from walking along that concourse at JFK Airport. In
Rotary, none of us is an island. All of us are in Rotary together,
whoever we are, wherever we are from, whatever language
we speak or traditions we follow. We are all connected to one
another — part of our communities and members not only of
our clubs, but also of the global community to which we all
belong.
This connection is what lies at the heart of the Rotary
experience. It is what brings us to Rotary. It is why we stay.
Please join your fellow Rotarians on this journey as Rotary
Connects the World.

創刊號 2019 . 07 3