Well I had no idea what the Carbine Club was, but I accepted, and I am so glad that I did. The Carbine Club was founded in Melbourne in 1961 and was inspired by the legendary racehorse Carbine which won the Melbourne Cup in 1890 by 21 lengths carrying 65.5 Kilos, a true champion.
Since then Carbine clubs have been formed throughout Australasia, in Hong Kong, South Africa, Papua New Guinea ( in 1990) and most recently this year in Singapore.
The underlying motive of the club is the enjoyment of life and good company and raising funds for the assistance of young sports men and women.
The welcome speech by Richard Sapias was humourous and got the afternoon off to a great start.
The stand out comment for me was when he said that if some of the comments or stories from the stage offended anyones race, religion or colour, then we just don't give a f*ck! More power to political incorrectness.
The main speaker was Steven Bradbury, Australia's 1st Winter Olympics Gold Medalist. I will be honest and say that I though he was a bit of a joke, having won his gold from last position when all of the other competitors fell.
Steven Bradbury wins Gold!
But having heard his inspirational and gutsy story of having appeared at 4 Olympics over 12
years, survived two life threatening accidents on the track, including a broken neck and a ruptured artery in his leg, come back from those injuries to compete at the highest level again, I left there with nothing but admiration for the guts and steely determination that led him to eventual success as the last man standing in Salt lake City, Utah, his 4th Olympics. It had taken him 12 hard years to become an overnight success!
You can learn more about his inspiring story at: http://www.stevenbradbury.com/
Steven passed around the ice skating racing boots he has helped design, and which have been worn by multiple Olympic gold medalists and then passed around his Gold Medal for everyone to see and feel. Now that was fairly brave in PNG, but I am glad to say that he did get it back.
And if you are looking for an entertaining and inspiring speaker for your next event I can't recommend Steven highly enough.
The afternoon continued with some great humour from Vince Sorrenti. His take on ethnic humour in Australia was just brilliant.
What cracked me up was that the big banner behind Vince on stage had his name spelled incorrectly as Vince Serrenti and the printer was in the room to take the flak. His excuse; I copied the name from the tickets ( also spelled wrongly).
You can see Vince in action on Youtube at:- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5-xS27kFCs&feature=related
Washed down with copious quantities of PNG fine SP lager I had a brilliant afternoon.
Thanks Mal, for the generous invite.
Good luck
A Pomme in POM
.
No comments:
Post a Comment