Natcon Directory | Page 28

UAP NATCON 41 Sonny Rosal, fuap, asean ar., intl. assoc. aia, green ap Immediate Past National President Mabuhay! Welcome delegates to perhaps the best national convention ever! The UAP’s 41st National Convention simply because this convention caps the year long celebration of the 40th foundation of the *NO. 1 and 5 time **PRC-APO of the year awardee, the United Architects of the Philippines. Let me share a short odyssey I read on being against all odds and surviving; Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Antarctic expedition of 1914 would ultimately fail, but the hardy crew he mustered would still win honor and recognition for its ability to survive against the odds. After their ship Endurance was crushed in pack ice, the crew abandoned the plan to cross Antarctica on foot and the aim became merely to survive. Over two years, Shackleton led the crew across ice floes, then in lifeboats to a camp on Elephant Island where for six months the main group would subsist on seal meat and blubber. Shackleton took five men around the island to the north and then across 800 miles of treacherous ocean to South Georgia Island. He then hiked with two others for 36 hours across the island’s uncharted interior to a whaling station with another three months to go before he could safely reach the crew left on Elephant Island. He later wrote, “We had suffered, starved and triumphed, grovelled down yet grasped at glory… We had reached the naked soul of man.” 26 Congratulations to all the HARDWORKING members of the organizing committee headed by no less than Arch. Cathy B. Carunungan for a JOB WELL DONE! You have TRIUMPHED! Grasp Glory with your bare soiled hands. Thank you very much for your SERVICE. Bless all of you. Congratulations to the members of the National Board of Directors and the Executive Directors of the seven Commissions. May your experience give you wisdom to share to those who dream to serve wholeheartedly our beloved UAP. Thank you very much for your SERVICE. Bless all of you. And last but not the least, thank you to the ever reliable and obedient UAP Secretariat. Long life to all of you. UAP still needs you. Thank you. BE WELL. BE ONE UAP!