US-Mexico Heart 2 Heart shared by Mar at RCF
Rotary Club of Farragut members learned how Rotarians around the country and at home are collaborating with clubs in Mexico to provide humanitarian services through a Heart 2 Heart program during RCF’s virtual meeting Wednesday, Aug. 12.
Bearden Rotary Club member Rosa Mar, who volunteers with Rotary International’s Heart 2 Heart program, shared experiences from her last Heart 2 Heart trip to Mexico, which she made with 36 other Rotarians in November 2019.
Mar said since the program’s beginnings, Rotary Clubs have invested $5 million in its 296 projects around the country.
“Our club has been a consistent supporter of Heart 2 Heart through the years,” RCF media chair Tom King said.
For Mar, the program hits home.
“My parents were from Mexico, and they instilled in me the pride for Mexico and for the United States. This project is very special to me,” she said.
Mar said she joined Rotary Club six years ago because of the club’s Four-Way Test and Heart 2 Heart.
RCF’s new District 6780 governor, Ron Appuhn, listened to the meeting. “Ron has been a moving force behind Heart 2 Heart for a number of years and has worked with Rosa on this project,” King said, further explaining the program is a cooperative effort among Rotarians, primarily in U.S. Heart of America Zones 30 and 31, and Heart of Mexico Districts 4170 and 4140.
The first cooperative effort took place in 2004 with a well water project in a rural town in Mexico’s 4170 District.
King said Rotarians have provided clean drinking water in communities, hospital equipment in Mexico, midwife training, bathrooms in schools, orthopedic surgeries, dental care, rebuilding houses after earthquakes and facilitate kidney transplants for teens and young adults in Mexico.
The project to kidney transplants project started with Ignacio Holtz 21 years ago “because he was the beneficiary of a kidney from his wife,” Mar said.
“Even though he didn’t need the money … it spoke to him that he had the resources, but what about all the other people in his country that don’t have the resources, specifically in his area.”
As such, every year, “we have the privilege to listen to the recipients and the donors who tell their stories about getting a kidney transplant and how life-changing and how life-giving this treatment had been,” Mar said.
During her 2019 visit to Mexico, she met Holtz during a district meeting.
“I can’t say enough good things to say about him,” Mar said of Holtz.
