President’s Column
by Pres. Manuel U. Along

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ONE AND ALL!!

Last week was the most gratifying week, so far, of my tenure as president of our rotary club. For the first time we had a guest speaker during our regular meeting. Appropriately, being the first one, he had stature (the top diplomat of the Republic of China in our country). Quite an interesting person and could be a class A golfer if given enough time to play more frequently. At the reception hosted by the honorable Mayor Tinnex Jaraula in the evening of Dec. 3 at the Grand Caprice restaurant, Ann Pres. Biema and I were given the opportunity to meet and mingle with the bigwigs of our city government and the local taipans of Cagayan de Oro (three of them members of our club: See Hong, Albino LimKetKai, and Stephen Gaisano). Seated beside me in our table was Vice Mayor Vicente Emano and a couple of city councilors.  I would like to thank Mayor Tinnex for giving us the privilege to be present in that affair. By the way, I took that opportunity to inform and invite Rtns. Albino and Stephen to our Christmas party this 12^th of Dec., which elicited positive reaction from both of them. We will ask PP Manny Alinabon, who is close to both, to remind them of the event before Saturday.

FREE CATARACT OPERATIONS!!!

What made the week most gratifying was the free cataract operations sponsored, among others, by our club last Dec. 5 at the Camiguin General Hospital. The advance party, consisting of 10 nurses, five RCCDO Rotarians (PE Dietmar Schug, Dir.Alvin Benasa, Leo Aba, Dexter Bandera and myself), Ann Angelu Bandera with daughter Angel, Ann Pres. Biema and our daughter Angel, arrived in Benoni before noon of Dec. 5. We went straight to the hospital where the nurses, after having lunch, went to work setting up the equipment which will be used by the three doctors (Drs. Carlo Romero, Augusto Dejos, and Jun Lamatan) who were expected to come late in the afternoon.

I was a bit apprehensive that there will not be enough patients. There were only twenty(20) screened by Dr. Jun Lamatan last Nov. 21. PP Carlo wanted at least 30 to make the trip worth the effort. My apprehensions were a bit lessened when I saw plenty of people gathered near the entrance of the operating rooms.  The local nurses still could not  determine if there were 30. For all we know, most of them might be companions of those who wanted to be operated on.

The operations finally got underway at around 5:30 PM and continued non-stop until 11:30 PM. The doctors and nurses just alternately took brakes to get in some food, drinks, and a little rest. To use a cliché’, after the dust settled in, THIRTY FIVE (35) patients were operated on by our team of doctors. A record! PP Carlo said the previous record was 32 (I didn’t know there was a previous record). We even had to turn back six because

the hospital ran out of sterile sheets needed for each patient. They prepared 30 after being told 20 were screened. The five extra recipients were squeezed in because the OR staff prepared 5 extra sheets in case of emergency. Since it was near 12 midnight, they decided to give the extra 5 to the cataract cases. The local OR staff were very helpful. We were so happy with them that Pres. Biema and I donated roasted pig for their Christmas party. That made them very happy. So, we were happy, the nurses were happy, and most of all, the medical mission recipients were very happy! I would say that’s a fitting conclusion to the first semester of the rotary year.

This week is our last meeting for the year. After our Christmas party we will see each other in January 2010. From my family to yours, A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!