On January 28, President Jason observed an eye-check session at Caritas Tsuen Wan as part of our District Grant project with Caritas and Rotary Club of The HUB Hong Kong. President Tony of Rotary Club of The HUB Hong Kong was also in attendance.
Our Club has successfully applied for District Grant this year to support a Joint-Club Project with Rotary Club of The HUB Hong Kong. Special credits shall go to Past President Samuel Chung, Past President Eddie Leung and Past President Mark who have been offering a lot of valuable advice to the process. This year we co-operated with Caritas Tsuen Wan and Ngau Tau Kok Centers, serving children in subdivided units by offering them eye-checks (two times in 6 month’s time), and giving them free spectacles if necessary. To kick off the project, Caritas Ngau Tau Kok Center conducted its first service day on October 15 (Sunday), by offering eye test for around 85 children in the nearby neighborhood.
Our Club has sponsored a total of 100 underprivileged women a health checkup package plus two health talks for Caritas Tsuen Wan and Ngau Tau Kok. For the project, our Club has received support as part of a District Grant. The purpose of this project was to raise the women’s awareness on their own health conditions and provide basic check up including DEXA bone density scans as many of the beneficiaries neglected their health conditions due to financial stringency and commitment towards household chores.
Finally our District Grant Project with Caritas Tsuen Wan and Ngau Tau Kok kickstarted with a health talk on December 16 and 19 respectively for underprivileged women who were mostly recovered from Covid. Our Club sponsored a total of 100 women to do health check during February to April 2023 with DEXA scans to help detecting osteoporosis and other major women related diseases. During the health talk, many women were quiteconcerned about HPV related diseases and ways to prevent it.
Past President Grace represented our Club and participated in Part 2 of Caritas Health Check Program. Part 1 was completed in Ngau Tau Kok on 5-6 July 2022. This one was for Tsuan Wan Centre with 50 street cleaners receiving the Automatic Retinal Image Analysis (ARIA) test, a technology developed at CUHK in 2015. In addition, blood test for cholesterol and blood sugar were administered as well.
On July 6, our Club kicked off the new Rotary Year’s first project with Caritas Ngau Tau Kok for the Street Cleaners. A total of 50 street cleaners received health check using Automatic Retinal Image Analysis (ARIA) method for screening of stroke and Alzheimer’s risk factor + cholesterol and blood sugar level testing. While on site, Rotarians also participated in stretching exercises together with the beneficiaries.
On May 27, Club members participated in the second service days in Phase 1 of our street cleaner project with Caritas. We gave out 120 care packages (福袋) to street cleaners in Ngau Tau Kok on May 20. On this day, we did the same at Tsuen Wan with 150 care packages. President Sam, Past President Eddie, President Elect Eliza and President Nominee Jason participated in this service day. Phase 2 of the project will be health days for street cleaners in Ngau Tau Kok and Tsuen Wan, providing them with a basic health assessment and follow-up by Caritas social workers. It is anticipated that Phase 2 takes place in July 2022.
This was the first of two such service days in Phase 1 of the street cleaner project with Caritas. We gave out 120 care packages to street cleaners in Ngau Tau Kok. Inside the bags were disinfectant liquid, KF94 masks, pain relief ointment, rapid antigen tests, facial tissue, water resistant plasters and a bag of rice. The next service day is on May 27 in Tsuen Wan. Phase 2 of the project will be health days for street cleaners in Ngau Tau Kok and Tsuen Wan, providing them with a basic health assessment and follow up by Caritas social workers. It is anticipated that Phase 2 takes place in July 2022.
On December 19, Rotaract Club of HKU Lap-Chee College International organized a Christmas fun day with children at Caritas Ngau Tau Kok Community Centre. President Sam, Past Presidents Grace and Lily, Immediate Past President Mark, President Elect Eliza, and prospective member Tony went to support our Rotaractors. Our Club was a supporting Club in this Rotaract project.
On November 26, our Club met for lunch at our usual meeting venue, Regal Hong Kong Hotel. To ensure proper social distancing, Regal gave us a large room, with 4-person tables separated by ample spaces. Our speaker of the day was Ms. Monica Li, senior social work supervisor at Caritas Ngau Tau Kok. She came to our Club meeting to give a summary of the execution of our joint project: Rotary Cares Food Aid 2020 (疫下關懷送暖行動). In a nutshell, the project provided financial relief to over 200 families, in Ngau Tau Kok/Kwun Tong area, in the form of food coupons which can be redeemed at local merchants in their community. The financial relief aimed not only to lessen pandemic’s impact to the savings of grassroots families, but also to support local merchants deeply affected by economic slowdown. Caritas took due care to select families most affected by the pandemic, including families with no constant income, large families with many children to support, families living in subdivided housing and/or rooftop housing etc. The selection process was finely granular, on a case-by-case basis, to ensure that those who needed help the most would get priority. Ms. Li shared anecdotes from beneficiaries, including…