Saturday, 3 May 1986: A Boring Rotary Club Meeting & A Wonderful Encounter

3:30 PM, High Over Guest House, White River, eastern Transvaal.

I’m sitting on a lawn chair surrounded by palms and other exotic trees as I type this.  The expansive view from this hillside vantage point looks out over a low veld forest with farms, citrus groves, and sugar plantations here and there.  A big German shepherd and a huge South African bulldog puppy are keeping me company.  During lunch, I got sick of listening to the innkeeper talk politics (the press mistreats South Africa, bla bla bla.)  More on him later.

Neglected to write last week about the most recent Rotary Club meeting I’ve attended.  Definitely boring!  If I went to many like this, I’d quit Rotary in no time.  The meeting was held in a dining room on the 30^th floor of the Carlton Hotel – Johannesburg’s finest.  I must admit that the view was fantastic and the food was good.  It should be good since I had to pay R9.00 for it.  Usually, Rotary meals are free when you are a guest at another club.  After all, I’m paying $90 a month for my membership in the Summit County Colorado club (which covers meals) so in effect, I was paying double.  This was a downtown business lunch crowd all in suits and ties (fortunately, I’d worn mine just in case.)

There was no speaker at this meeting (usually this club has one).  Instead a parade of umpteen past presidents came up to the podium to talk about fellowship.  I almost took an afternoon nap. 

The only good joke out of dozens of duds involved a chap who was arrested late one night for public intoxication as he staggered along a city street.  He had been so blasted that when he appeared before the magistrate the following day, he had no idea why.

“What am are here for, your honor?”

“You’ve been brought in for drinking.”

“Oh good, when do we start?”

There were actually three black Rotarians at the meeting.  One was a businessman from the West African nation of Sierra Leone.  The other two were local members who sat at my table but too far away for me to converse with them.    Both were relatively older (maybe 60s).  One was an investment banker, and I couldn’t read the other fellow’s badge. 

The highlight of the day came after the meeting.  I was standing in front of the Carlton waiting for a ride when I noticed a woman with a camera standing a few feet to my right.  Then I saw Bishop Desmond Tutu (the Nobel Peace Prize winner) standing next to her.  They turned and walked past me.  Tutu smiled in my direction, I returned the smile and said, “Hello, Bishop”.  I was so startled, I didn’t even think to ask if I could take his picture.  I later learned that he had been at the Carlton for a meeting with a former French Premier.  [Fortunately, my brief encounter with Bishop Tutu on that April day in 1986 was not to be my last.]

Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for his tireless work to end apartheid in South Africa.  He was named Archbishop of Cape Town in 1986.  A courageous gentleman with a warm, infectious smile!  Source:  https://www.wcia.org.uk/academiheddwch/peace-profiles-desmond-tutu-1931-2021/