Rotary Club Morimondo Abbey

[Article by Silvia Lodi Pasini published in "Settegiorni"] – The Morimondo Abbazia Rotary Club resumes the tradition of "charity dinners" reserved for women only this year. As is known, this is a decades-long tradition in Abbiategrasso, which began at the time when Rotary membership was not permitted to women (they were only admitted in 1978). Which is why in the Lion City, where the first Rotary club was founded in 1968 with its toponymic name, the wife of the president in office started the tradition of organizing a charity dinner, usually monthly, open only to women. Since tradition dictates that the president's wife should be in charge of promoting the initiative, and since this year the Morimondo presidency is headed by a woman, Martina Forti, continuing the tradition of the charity dinner inaugurated last year by Morimondo thanks to Vanessa Locatelli as the president's wife, seriously risked being interrupted. The club's management took care of saving the good work begun last year, identifying member Sara Valandro as the suitable figure to act as the "matron" in charge of organizing the dinners. This is how finally, last Wednesday, the friends of Morimondo Abbazia were able to reunite with each other at Villa Umberto (granted free of charge by the president's husband, Alberto Cola) for a good cause: to raise funds for "La Piduns": a social promotion association founded in 2018 by the late Augusto Conti, already founder of the ASD Superhabily of Abbiategrasso for the promotion of sport among people with disabilities. With the same spirit, Augusto and his wife, Ramona Tarenzi, founded "La Pidùns" in 2018: a social promotion association, developed together with a staff of professionals in the psycho-socio-educational sector with art masters. The association, which is based in Besate and which functions as a day centre, aims to overcome social barriers through the teaching of arts and crafts, or the "Skills Workshop": courses and workshops in cooking, candles and objects, also with a view to recovering the traditions of the past. “Pidùns wants to enhance the resources of the person with disabilities, who, guided and accompanied in the discovery of their own abilities and resources, can become in all respects a productive individual who can be inserted into the workplace, as well as reaching a significant level of autonomy” explained Tarenzi. It is no coincidence that the Pidùns boys were the ones serving the tables.
Silvia Lodi Pasini