2018-2019 Rotary Club of Kyoto South President: Hideaki Ogawa

A home has its family tradition and a school has its tradition of the school.
What is our tradition for Kyoto Minami Rotary Club?
“Southern Wind” is a wind created by people who pursue their profession. It is a “Human Shower”
“Southern Wind” is a wind of Samurai, where a mighty warriors of hundreds of political battles feel at home. It is a “Human Shower”
Let’s live as Rotarians together with young fellows in era of drastic changes post 50th anniversary
Above is a phrase of 15 years ago by Mr. Naraji Hashimoto, the 38th Chairman, expressing his intensive love for the Rotary Club.
Taking 65th anniversary as an opportunity, we would like to succeed his will as firm identity, unique character and admiration, to become “Southern Wind” together.

We decided to hold up below as our club motto of 2018-2019.

伝統の継承と革新つながる南の風
Passing on Tradition and Southern Wind that Leads to Innovation

The Rotary Club of Kyoto South is celebrating the 65th anniversary since its founding. The passion at the time the club was founded has been handed down by our predecessors, and these good traditions have led us to grow into one of the clubs with the largest memberships in Japan. It has already been 5 years since our 60th anniversary. The next generation has already begun to carve out a new history for this club.

As the Rotary Club of Kyoto South will welcome its 70th and 100th anniversaries we must continue to evolve to remain the type of club that is desired by the people and the city.

However, this club will not grow in the future if we just flaunt the current number of members, sit on our hands, and blow a “Southern Wind” that is only about fun.

We need to take this time to validate our history by clearly recognizing again what it is that has made the Rotary Club of Kyoto South attractive; what is behind the growth of the club to date. Having done this, we must not just simply hand down the factors behind this growth, but rather we must evolve the Southern Wind to have a new attractiveness that matches the changes of the times so that it will continue to blow warm and strong.

The 5th anniversary is a very important time for linking to the next age. But it shouldn’t end with just celebrating the anniversary, I want to make this a year for showing the direction to the new age.

One of the Rotary Club’s mottos is “One profits most who serves best.” I think it is fair to say that this is one of the major attractions of the Rotary Club.

In other words, I think we can interpret this to mean that the more one participates in the activities of the Rotary Club, the more connections that will be made with people and things, which in turn will surely lead to receiving something.

What is received will differ by person, and that you must find for yourself, but I think it is because the Rotary Club of Kyoto South has actively developed novel undertakings and had active club activities that it has been able to gather many members, receive the most rewards, and grown to be the club it has become.

Today, the coming of IoT is making our lives more convenient and comfortable. Connecting a variety of things will allow us to see a new world. The obstacles that have limited technological development to our own world will all be broken down by the interconnecting of various things; making it possible to build a new age.

The Rotary Club has a wide range of connections from within the region to throughout the world. And the Rotary Club of Kyoto South has connected its 65-year history and tradition. Evolving this connection I think will bring a new age to the Rotary world as well.

Doing this begins with increasing the attractiveness of the regular meetings; the foundation of Rotary activities, getting old and new members to meet there, and then evolving the various undertakings and club activities. Having active club activities will deepen the ties among members. Then overlapping the ties among trustworthy people will allow us to build a robust organization.

Actively engaging in activities that contribute to society and undertakings that will reach out to the world will link us to a variety of things and worlds, so in this way I want to evolve the value of existence of the Rotary Club of Kyoto South.

There is one more permanent mission of the club, which operates in Kyoto. That is protecting the traditions and culture of Kyoto and linking them to the future.

The number of visitors to Kyoto, both domestic and foreign, is increasing each year. That is how attractive Kyoto is as a face of Japan and allows us to also say it is a very desirable destination. To ensure this attractiveness continues perpetually into the future, the traditions and culture of Kyoto must be protected and accurately presented to the world, which I can say is the mission of those of us who live in Kyoto. It has been decided to move the Agency for Cultural Affairs to Kyoto, so I think it would be good for us to support this development with activities that promote Kyoto as the cultural capital.

伝統の継承と革新つながる南の風
Passing on Tradition and Southern Wind that Leads to Innovation

We would like to promote our activities with this motto this year.