Phuket Lions club a roaring success

PHUKET: The Lions Club of Patong Beach celebrated their Charter Night on May 29. Almost 80 Lions from clubs throughout Thailand watched on as Charter President Lion Rohn-Napa Kanjanayothee and First President Claude de Crissey were officially presented with their club Charter by former district governor Somchai Chirayus.

Lions Clubs International has more than 1.4 million members in over 44,500 clubs and is the world’s largest secular service organization. It was founded by Melvin Jones in the USA in 1917 and under the motto, “We serve”, has since spread its message of helping others and fostering a sense of community to some 203 countries worldwide.

The Lions Club of Patong Beach was established just last year when a handful of local businessmen decided to join forces to form Thailand’s only English-speaking club outside of Bangkok. The charter group grew rapidly from the outset and soon had a membership of 25. Its members came from nine different countries, giving the Lions Club of Patong Beach a distinctly international and cosmopolitan flavor.

Following its inception, the Lions Club of Patong Beach immediately became involved with the three existing Phuket Lions Clubs to support several ongoing charity events. These included donating encyclopedias to local schools, supporting local students in an international “Peace Poster” art competition, and organizing a large-scale beach cleaning event on Patong Beach in November last year.

The one-day beach clean up brought together more than 300 students and teachers from Patong’s three public schools who worked with volunteer divers from 10 local dive companies to pull rubbish from the sea and pick up trash along the beach.

The act of cleaning was important, but of equal importance was the educating both teachers and students about enhanced eco-awareness and making them understand that we are all caretakers of one of Phuket’s most valuable resources, the sea. Support for this event came from local businesses, the Tourist Police, Phuket Aquarium and local government officials, including the Phuket governor.

Lions First President Claude de Crissey said that the Lions Club of Patong Beach wants to recreate this event again this year, possibly expanding the program to involve more schools, more students and more businesses.

The latest community project undertaken by the Patong Beach chapter involves the distribution of 10 rebuilt computers that were donated by a Bangkok insurance company.

Currently, club members are working with education administrators to determine which of the local schools would benefit from the computers the most. And it doesn’t end there.

Incoming Lion President Jean Leon said that there is a growing list of projects being added to the club’s list for consideration. With the talents and backgrounds of the members of the Patong Beach club available, there is little doubt that they’ll be successful.

Incoming Lion President Leon was also keen to point out that every project requires a certain amount of funding support – something that all of us can get involved in – adding that sometimes even a few hundred baht can make a difference for someone in need and that any contributions made to their charity funds are used as they were intended and are not associated in any way with administrative funds.

If interested in learning more about helping or supporting the Lions’ projects in the community, please visit their website at www.lions-club-patong.org.

— Nick Davies