By Gabriella Vukman
The Upwey-Belgrave RSL is uniting service people young and old as they gear up for events in 2024.
Number one on the list for January is challenging members to visit every single RSL venue in the state.
RSL Active Coordinator Kylie Arndt said, “we wanted to create something that our members can continue to contribute to and follow along, so we asked our members to visit and take a photo at every RSL in Victoria“.
The photos are uploaded to the Upwey-Belgrave RSL Facebook page for all to see and interact with and the list of each visited Victorian RSL along with its date of visitation is being ticked off on the website.
“It’s growing and people are certainly latching onto the idea; It’s been fantastic,“ Ms Arndt said.
“We’ve had some of our housebound veterans phoning up and saying how much they’re loving the photos that they’re seeing.”
“It’s bringing back thoughts of fellow service personnel that they may have seen and or fought with from those areas.”
The challenge was launched when an email was sent out to all of the Upwey- Belgrave RSL members on 30 December, enlisting their help in visiting every RSL in the state.
The challenge officially commenced on 1 January and according to Ms Arndt, members have “already ticked off 10 sites”.
Further encouragement of unification and socilaisation is elicited by the RSL through their Museums Victoria-accredited military museum.
On Saturday 6 January, museum staff who are volunteers and ex-service personnel, hosted an interactive demonstration of some of the 2500 renowned artefacts occupying the museum.
The museum, naned the Running Rabbits Military Museum, houses all kinds of war memorabilia from captured flags to machine guns and artillery.
The museum has access to a great deal of data.
“People can come down and learn about their family’s military past,” Ms Arndt said.
If we are given a service person’s name and date of birth, we can get access to all the war records including where they were posted and what medals they were awarded.”
The RSL has a bus that can take veterans out on outings and has planned a number of visits.
“We will go and take our veterans out for lunch and visit a couple of different RSLs so that they can have a look around.“
The Upwey-Belgrave RSL’s 2024 initiatives stem from feedback received by service personnel.
“Last year we put out a feedback form asking all of our service personnel past and present what they would want from us so that we’re not assuming what they want,” Ms Arndt said.
“The feedback concluded that our members want to go on outings, they want to do workshops and so we have tailored our plans to this feedback.”
