Wednesday May 17th

Attendance: 13 (including visiting Rotarian Ralph Jones from the Rotary Club of Alliston and former member and Past District Governor of our club).

 

Chair: President Basil

Anthem: Gordon Brown

Grace: Arthur Retnakaran

 

President Basil announced that he was delayed for our meeting because he was attending the Probus Club with Peter Masson. He explained that Probus is a club for retirees that is sponsored by Rotary and that Probus is short for “Professional” and “Business”.

President Basil also reported on his attendance at the District Assembly, which was also attended by Jacqueline, being her first District Assembly.

 

The Marbelous Draw was conducted by Dhanni and was won, and  lost, by Peter Masson.

 

Sgt-at-Arms Gordon Brown levied fines and Happy Bucks:

Everyone who was not wearing their Rotary pin was fined $10, but then SAA Gord reduced this fine to $1 or $2, depending on the member’s guilt level.

The floor was then thrown open for Happy Bucks, which were contributed by the following members:

Peter Masson was happy about Habitat for Humanity.

Maddy was happy that she attended the Rotary Club of Calgary that boasts about 100 members, meets at the Fairmont, and tries to convince guests that they were the first Canadian Rotary Club, which actually was Winnipeg. LOL!

Basil was happy that he and Dorothy visited Niagara on the Lake which included a show and wine tasting. They visited the Wayne Gretsky winery amongst others, discovering that they also had 99 proof whiskey under the label, #99, at a price of $99.00.

Dhanni reported that her patient (John) was too active and that she has to convince him to slow down to allow himself to heal properly.

Gord was happy about his winning team, Chelsea, as well as T.F.C.’s winning ways.

 

 

Basil introduced our very own Mandy Nwobu to talk about her interesting trip to Nigeria.

           

Mandy shared with us the background to her trip, which was as interesting as the trip itself. Mandy was married for 17 years. She was also a lawyer in Nigeria since 1991. When she immigrated to Canada with her children, she expected her husband to follow in due course. In 2014, while Mandy was encountering the challenges of becoming licensed in Ontario to practice law, her husband passed away in Nigeria. Because she did not possess the required paperwork, she was unable to attend her husband’s burial in Nigeria at that time. The purpose of her trip to Nigeria in November 2016 was perform her husband’s belated burial.

When Mandy arrived in Nigeria, she encountered opposition from her husband’s family who even went to the extent of trying to have her arrested so that she could not attend the burial service. Using her experience as a former lawyer in Nigeria, she held the police at bay and completed her husband’s burial rights.

In African culture, unless the widow performs burial rights with respect to her deceased spouse, her children would be considered as outcasts.

Mandy explained a little about Nigerian culture. Although most of the country is Christian, the government is now controlled by the Muslim minority who are trying to turn Nigeria into a Muslim state, but it is really not a Muslim state at present.

With respect to the kidnappings that were very common in Nigeria until recently, the Nigerian government has made kidnapping a capital offence, which has resulted in a drop in kidnapping incidents.

Mandy also shared with us her struggles to get established as a lawyer in Canada. Being a single mother whose first language was not English and who had limited Canadian experience and financial resources, she was forced to take low paying jobs for about a year and did not qualify for bank loans to set up her own practice. About a year ago, a church elder assisted her in obtaining office space with other lawyers, and she was finally able to run her own law practice and is now practicing in the areas of real estate and family law. It’s been a wonderful year for her, since she has not only been able to cover expenses, but also university fees for two of her children.

Some judges have difficulty with her accent, so she has solved this problem by requesting that she be allowed to file written submissions. She won her first family law case using written submissions.

Mandy took questions following her presentation, and also received encouragement from club members to continue fighting the good fight, because, as Jacqueline pointed out, the onus should not just be on immigrants to adapt to our culture but for us to make an extra effort to assist newcomers in becoming established in our society.

 

Mike Mushet thanked Mandy for a very interesting and informative presentation.

 

The meeting was terminated