III ITFR World Tennis Championship
Salerno, Italy, September 8-15 2007
ROTARY ACE
www.rotarytennis.org
Newsletter no. 4 – 30th of July 2007
Table of contents
Rotary, tennis and …
Rotary’s winning smash in Salerno
The Amalfi Coast: Vietri sul mare
“Lusitania”: a taste of Portuguese culture in Salerno
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Rotary, tennis and …
Dear Rotarian Friends,
first of all I have the pleasure to inform you that if you haven’t registered before July, 19 for the III ITFR World Tennis Championship you still have the chance to do it: the official hotel, the Grand Hotel Salerno, in fact has given us few more days to book the convenient weekly package. You can write to me at info@rotarytennis.org for the instructions.
I have received many requests to play tennis from the participants’ guests therefore the Organising Committee is trying to organise a tournament for the ladies. If your wife or your guest is willing to play tennis, please inform us as soon as possible so that we can realize it.
I remind you that even though you cannot participate to the Championship this year, it would be proper to subscribe ITFR (subscription is free and the on line procedure is very quick, you only have to surf www.itfr.org). This way you will constantly be informed about all the tournaments an the tennis events organised by the fellowship all over the in world and you will always be in contact with the Rotarian tennis fellows.
In this issue you can read a beautiful article written by the RAI sports journalist Salvatore Biazzo, describing the similarity between Rotary and tennis, and also lend a look at our splendid Amalfi Coast and plan an evening dedicated to music during your stay in Salerno.
Feel free to contact me at info@rotarytennis.org for any communication or question.
Kind regards
Marco Marinaro
President of the Organising Committee
ITFR WTC 2007
Rotary’s winning smash in Salerno
I believe that tennis is now the only sport in which two players, whatever might have been the course and the result of their challenge, at the end shake hands. The net that separated them, finally unites them.
As far as I can remember, not one player, winner or loser, withdrawn from such procedure, which is not a written rule, but is unanimously accepted and acknowledged as a mark of distinction of a discipline that in each individual highlights culture before technique. This is what comes to my mind while somewhere seeing the umpteenth player hit another player’s chest with his head; while somewhere else seeing a soccer player leaving the playground and dribbling the substitute fellow’s outstretched hand making a good but ignoble feint; while seeing, at the end, the funerals of a sports manager beaten to death on a soccer ground, and of a policeman killed in front of a soccer stadium, with criminal-like manners.
I don’t write this to sanctify tennis – which of course has its own problems – but to understand in which remote region of the sports world there is still a gleam of value, and to convince ourselves if this discipline is appropriate to spread the Rotarian principle of a Fellowship.
It is said that the Romans already played tennis. In involved and primitive ways of a sport that has grown more refined through times, using instead more technique than imagination. The genius of Rod Laver, the left-handed bent of John McEnroe, the prowess of a smile-less man as Bjorn Borg, the impertinence of Jimmy Connors, the strength of bum-bum Boris Becker today find a sublime synthesis in the stunning performances of Federer or of Sharapova, who express the best at the highest level, the strength and the elegance of the sporting gesture.
Modern tennis developed around the second half of the Nineteenth century, and since then it is a sport played in clubs but not a club sport. Parochialism is out of question, as also country pride. The side, the fans follow a person chosen as an idol, regardless he or she speaks our mother tongue. The champions are, so to say, cross-party, not factious. Being bipartisan they best express an feeling which is not limited to each player’s home country.
Rotary is like tennis, it expresses a global spirit; it spins in the same direction and nevertheless in every direction, it is tied to tradition and at the same time is turned to the future. In the movement there is evolution, progress, development, overcoming a result to aim to the next. Fellowships are not a modern invention and, even though they are as well old, are still a vital element and useful mean – as often underlined by the Ditrict 2100 Governor Vito Mancusi – to establish the principle of “service and fun” and to develop it in the best ways, so that the effects on the community can be strong and visible.
As a tennis player I am, so to say, “sleepy”: as far as I am concerned “service and fun” are often incompatible, unfortunately. Nevertheless I think that a world tennis championship for Rotarians is not a pure display. I mean that it is not a way to show off oneself, instead it is a politically correct way to repeat in a sporting attitude Rotary’s philosophy, thus making it clearer and more understandable. Marco Marinaro, recently appointed ITFR “Tour Director for Europe”, is right when he says that also through sport, and in such a peculiar sport as tennis, founded on personal prowess and on general fairness, it is possible to build a new operative model to realize projects and to create solidarity.
Of course to organise a world tournament according to ways and rules of the “Rotary rite” - hard-and-fast rules as the trappists’, who meeting the fellow monks remind them that “they will die” – is not an easy job. But I have to admit that I have always followed the Rotary Salerno with interest, especially thanks to the continuous discussions with my friend and colleague Pino Blasi; it is a strong club, always keeping windows open over the world. The Africa Project – started under the presidency of Antonio Bottiglieri – aiming to renovate the tuberculosis ward of Lacor Hospital, near Gulu in Uganda, really struck me. A beautiful thing.
The World Tennis Championship 2007 is another prestigious acknowledgement in the collection of medals won by Salerno Rotary. September is not far for who has organisational tasks and lives anxiously thinking about what is to be done, but the President Andrea Carraro is the right man in the right place.
The revenue in terms of publicity will be extraordinary, a good thing for Rotary and for sport: when soccer seems dominated by violence others terms of comparison must be multiplied, it is necessary to spotlight on those forgotten disciplines in which winners and losers still shake hands.
Salvatore Biazzo
RAI journalist
The Amalfi Coast: Vietri sul mare
Departing from Salerno the first village you find on the panoramic road of the Amalfi coast is Vietri sul mare, which includes the centre, the marina and fraction on the hill, Raito. Since centuries ago the traditional activity of the people in Vietri is the manufacture of ceramics, but it was the coming of some artists from northern Europe, especially from Germany, in the very first decades of the twentieth century what marked a turning point in the production and in the decorative style of ceramic. The German artists learned from the local craftsmen how to shape and paint ceramic but they used their sensitivity and introduced their personal naif style (which not by chance is still now is called “German style”) and whose themes are the ordinary life and jobs of the local people: fishermen, peasants, animals and landscapes. The local craftsmen developed an original and very simple style in the decoration of dishes and tiles which basically includes silhouettes of animals in bands of vivid colours, especially the traditional Vietri colours: blue, green and yellow.
The biggest and most famous ceramic manufactory in Vietri sul mare is Ceramica Artistica Solimene. Vincenzo Solimene and his family have been working for more than a century in the ceramic business and in 1951 engaged the Architect Paolo Soleri to plan a building to house the new factory.
The factory was completed in 1954 and it is one of the most significant buildings of this century, standing on solid rock in Vietri sul Mare on the Amalfitan coast, which is famous for its ancient tradition of ceramic craftmanship going back to the 15th century. Its production of crockery, floor and wall tiles, worked and painted entirely by hand, combines the use of ancient techniques, such as the use of the potter’s wheel, with the very latest in modern technology in order to guarantee the strength and durability of its crockery even when washed in modern dishwashers. The great versatility in the decoration, in the shapes and in the lead free glaze, which is the result of continual study and research, allows to satisfy any customer requirement and also enables to create new products on request. The “Ceramica Artistica Solimene” exports all over the world, and also holds exhibitions and courses for the training of young people in the art of ceramic production, thanks to the “Centro Studi D’Arte Vietrese” which holds annual courses, authorized by the Campania Region.
Not one visitor leaves the Amalfi Coast without paying a visit at the Solvimene factory, as testified by tens and tens of signatures left by movie stars and directors, politicians and international jet set people. For more information you can visit the web site www.solimene.com.
“Lusitania”: a taste of Portuguese culture in Salerno
From September 12 to 22 2007, partially at the same time of the III ITFR World Tennis Championship, a very interesting festival dedicated to the culture of the Portuguese-speaking countries will take place in Salerno. As everybody knows, Portuguese is spoken not only in Portugal and in Brazil, but also ma in other countries in Latin America as well as in African countries as Capo Verde, Mozambique and more.
The trait d’union of the language therefore unites countries and cultures geographically distant, describing a unique and multicoloured painting, full of diversified meanings and accents.
Of course the festival has various sections, each dedicated to a different art, among which literature, theatre and music. In particular the music section is directed by Fiorella Mannoia, a very talented artist who ispired her latest work just from Brazilian music.
The “Lusitania” concerta will take place in the Arena del Mare, following this program:
September 12: TERRAKOTA;
September 13: MERCADO NEGRO;
September 14: LUNA; TERESA CRISTINA; SAMBARATO; BATACOTO;
September 15: TERESA CRISTINA; SAMBARATO; BATACOTO; MISTURA FINA BOSSA CLUB;
September 16: FIORELLA MANNOIA;
September 22: ARTEMIS DANZA; BRASIL PASS.
You can find the full program and the details on www.rotarytennis.org.
For more information please contact: info@rotarytennis.org | 
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