PE William Emmanuel Yu
It is timely that Rotary International recently introduced a new area of focus: the Environment. The Rotary Club of Manila Bay (RCMB) has always been supportive of environmental initiatives with our annual tree planting activities in the La Mesa watershed, coastal clean-up drives, and many others.
RCMBayer and Avid divers PP Bong Cruz and Rtn. Mace Resurreccion started a program called “Every Dive is a Clean-up Dive”. The concept is to increase awareness towards ensuring that our coastal areas are clean and protected while enjoying their favorite pastime – Scuba Diving. The goal is to build a commodity of like-minded individuals with expanded awareness. Rtn. Mace also runs Pawikan PH that aims to protect the population of sea turtles by conservation of their marine ecosystems.
“We all have our own hobbies. We like to do things we enjoy. Why not gather a few like-minded individuals and do some good along the way? If everybody did their own little bit imagine what we could achieve as a whole”, shares Rtn. Mace. Rtn. Arnel Andal adds, “These common interests and advocacies are made more meaningful when done with family and friends. The stark contrast of the beautiful sea spoiled by garbage is enough to make many people think about their actions. Hopefully, they bring this awareness into their day to day lives and perform acts such as avoiding single use plastic, recycling, and reducing waste.”
PP Bong adds, “Fellowship and service are key aspects of being a Rotarian. By creating events like these, we get to do both. At the same time, we bring our friends and family along to broaden awareness of the issues at hand. In this case, the environment. We have found a few new members this way as well.”
These Rotarians share a key aspect of what makes Rotary appealing – Using Fellowship for Good. The Philippines is blessed with kilometers of beautiful and pristine coastline. Let us do our share to keep it that way.
For interested parties, please feel free to reach out to PP Bong <bongc40@gmail.com> and Rtn. Mace <macedvm78@gmail.com>. They dive every other week.