PENGUINS AGAINST CANCER

Following a significant victory against the Freshers in a hard-fought rugby game at Honor Oak Park, the Penguin flock found its collective second wind and journeyed to the Roben's Suite on the 29th floor of Guy's Tower, within the great Guy's Hospital, for the PAC AGM and annual dinner.

 

All of the extended Penguin community were very sorry to hear of the tragic passing of young Fergus Scholefield.  In line with the wishes of Barney and Lou, Fergus's parents, Penguins Against Cancer has now started up the Fergus Scholefield Cancer Research Fund which aims to award financial bursaries to selected postgraduate cancer research students, in Fergus's honour.  The research when published will acknowledge the support given by the Fergus Fund.  Please click here to read a short piece written by Barney about Fergus in our 2016 Penguins v Freshers Match Day Programme.  Please click here to find out more about the Fergus Fund.

 

The AGM was conducted efficiently and 90 Penguins of all ages, shapes and sizes sat down to an excellent banquet, faultlessly organised as ever, by the incredible Susanna Roughton.  The President said some words of welcome and awarded Orders of the Penguin (Emperor class) to:

 

• Terry Gibson, PAC Emperor Penguin

• Caroline Small, PAC's inestimable Treasurer

• Duncan Austin, PAC Trustee Coordinator

• Tommy Knight, PAC Senior Student Rep

• Ben Thorpe, Penguins Rugby Captain

• Charlotte Beardmore, PAC Trustee

• Bill Hogan, extraordinarily generous PAC benefactor who subsidised
  the vast majority of students attending the PAC Annual Dinner

 

Pat Gush conducted an enormously successful raffle and auction which between them raised in the region of £1,000 [detail to follow from the Treasurer].  

 

Ben Challacombe said some words on behalf of the GHRFC supporters club and introduced his colleague, known as Aussie Ben, who, as a professionally trained opera singer, performed an impromptu, and spellbinding rendition of ‘O Sole Mio’, as a tribute to Fergus Scholefield.  It is impossible to effectively convey the emotion of the occasion in print, but readers may wish to dwell on the meaning of some of the lyrics:

 

What a beautiful thing is a sunny day!
The air is serene after a storm,
The air is so fresh that it already feels like a celebration.
What a beautiful thing is a sunny day!

But another sun that's brighter still,
It's my own sun that's upon your face!
The sun, my own sun,
It's upon your face; it's upon your face!

When night comes and the sun has gone down,
I almost start feeling melancholy;
I'd stay below your window
When night comes and the sun has gone down.

 

 

Another excellent, enjoyable, emotional, Penguin soiree.

     

 

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