Much of the
area inside the 4 pavilions of the Convention Centre was given over to the
House of Friendship. This was the area where exhibitors set up commercial and
Rotary related stands for delegates to wander around. Also found here was an
internet café, a food hall, networking and seating lounges, Meeting points,
Rotary marketplace, Rotary Resource centre, Rotary officer ribbons, and voting
credentials, for delegates with voting rights.
This huge
area must have held hundreds of different stands. Many of these would promote
Rotary projects throughout the world. Others would inform and give advice, such
as about the Rotary Foundation. Some of them would be selling Rotary merchandise,
such as badges and lapel pins (very popular with Rotarians), but also shirts,
hats and other clothing items. I was struck with a rather loud shirt covered in
Rotary emblems which was manufactured in Africa. I had never seen one of these
before, and they weren’t cheap, at $30 each, but I thought it might give me
some distinction at Rotary events. After some consideration, I decided to wait
a few days before buying one, to make sure I still liked it. I’m glad I waited, because by the end of the
week every other person at the
Convention was wearing one, and it
didn’t look quite so unique any more.
The food hall
was very crowded at lunch time, but had various outlets selling a wide variety
of food, mostly European (Portuguese, Spanish, Italian particularly). You
basically joined a queue, got your food, then tried to find somewhere to sit
and eat it. It was pandemonium at times, but fascinating, because you could
find yourself having conversations with
people from all over the world. We actually found it cheaper, and more
comfortable to leave the Convention area at lunch times and visit one of the
many cafes and Restaurants in the surrounding area. At one such Restaurant I
had sardines, something I had been looking forward to ever since we booked to come
to Lisbon. If there is one item of food that is forever linked to Portugal, it
must be sardines, which I love. However, our hotel and all Restaurants we
visited (apart from this one) did not offer sardines, to my surprise. I learned
later that sardines are one of the cheapest foods available, so consequently
the smart Restaurants don’t offer them, preferring to offer more expensive
fish. The best place to go for sardines is the old part of the city, which
unfortunately was out of bounds to us because of narrow cobbled streets and
steep hills.
On another
occasion the DGN and I decided to walk over to the Vasco da Gama Centre, which
had a number of food outlets. As we went in, we noticed John Dumbrell waving at
us from a terrace above us, and I shouted up to him that we would join him and
Jean for lunch. As we entered we found a lift which indicated food outlets were
on the 2nd Floor, so up we went. There were several Restaurants up
there, each with a fine balcony view, but we went from one end to the other,
then back again, but failed to see John and Jean at all. So we had lunch at a
pleasant Italian eatery, and only later realised that we were on the floor
above them.
Vasco da Gama Shopping Mall
One last word
on Portuguese food. Besides sardines, another national dish is salt cod, which
is on every restaurant menu, and is exactly as it says, cod which has been
covered in salt and baked that way. I always try local specialities, but
unfortunately I didn’t much care for it. However I was in raptures about
another Portuguese speciality, the custard tarts, which they call pasteis de nata. As a custard tart afficionado, I can declare them absolutely fabulous. I
took a couple of dozen home with me, and also found a recipe for making them,
and had a go at baking some, with reasonable success.
pasteis de nata
Anyway, back
at the House of Friendship, one of the biggest areas was given over to Rotary
fellowships. These are interest groups, where you can find a group of
like-minded people for almost any interest or hobby you have. I couldn’t find a
Fulham supporters fellowship, nor to my
surprise could I find a Consorts fellowship, but I noted that there was a
bird-watching fellowship. However this one was not represented at the
Convention, so I looked around for something else to join. I came across a
stand with a lonely looking man sitting behind a chess board. Yes, this was the
Rotary Chess fellowship stand. It turned
out he was from England, and we had a chat about our own Rotary clubs, then he
challenged me to a game of chess. Well,
I can play a bit of chess and I usually win when I play against brothers – in
-law Tony and Richard. So I fancied my chances with this chap. It wasn’t a long
game. He had me in checkmate in 4 or 5 moves, I kid you not. Apparently members
of this Fellowship play each other online (There is no other way when your
opponent is on the other side of the planet) and I asked if they were all as
good as him. No, he said, there were many levels, and I could match myself
against a level more appropriate for me. So I agreed to join, filled out a
form, and that was the last I heard from the Rotary Chess fellowship to this
day. Oh well, there is always the
bird-watching fellowship, if I can find out where they are.
The
eradication of Polio worldwide is a major activity for Rotarians around the world.
We have been instrumental in reducing a disease which was endemic worldwide
just 50 years ago, to being in just 3 countries today. It has been a great help
that every dollar raised by Rotary is matched by the Bill Gates Foundation,
meaning that millions have been raised fir this project. A very large stand
displayed one of the original iron lungs, in which young babies suffering from
polio were put to try and keep them alive. It is remarkable to think that
within my own lifetime, these machines were in use in the UK.
Iron lung for Polio victims
One
interesting thing that seems to divide Rotarians from around the world was in
the wearing of ‘ribbons’. These were
labels about the size and appearance of bookmarks, which you could attach to
your delegate badge. Whatever you did in Rotary, there was a ribbon for you.
You could wear ribbons if you were a Club President, a Treasurer, a Paul Harris
fellow, a District Governor’s spouse. Everything, it seems, except a Consort.
Some people were festooned with several different ribbons, which they obviously
wore with pride, but I suspected there was a bit of smugness from some of the
wearers. At the Australian stand they
were giving away ribbons which appealed more to me. I got one which said ‘Don’t
ask me, I just like ribbons.’
The House of
Friendship was a good meeting place for people, and we would often turn up at
the embroidery fellowship stand, where the lovely Helena Daniels, consort to
the DGE of our District, was displaying,
and selling bedspreads and other beautiful embroidered items she and her
fellowship colleagues had created.
To be
continued….
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