Silver jubilee celebration of
1983-84 batch of St. Patrick's High School held
- Simon Lasrado, Bangalore; Courtesy: Bangalore Mirror
Bangalore, Jan 14: Searching the length and breadth of the country for an
old friend is a theme integral to the story of the Bollywood movie 3 Idiots.
Something similar happened during the 25th year reunion meet of St Patrick's
High School. Uday Kumar, an auto rickshaw driver by profession, is an old
student of the school.
When confronted with the difficulty of getting in touch with students of the
batch whose present contacts were not known, Uday hung a banner announcing the
reunion behind his vehicle.
"Uday would travel across the
city and some of the boys saw that banner and got in touch with us," said Jerard
Charles, a visual merchandiser and one of the members of the core committee of
this reunion. Not only that. Uday took the old addresses of his old batch mates,
visited those areas and also tracked down some of them for the reunion. The
result? Around 70 'boys' of the 1983-84 batch of St Patrick's High School on
Brigade Road met up with their fellow classmates and teachers on 10th January
2010 at St.Patrick's School.
It was a nostalgic time at the new hall of the school where they celebrated 25
years of passing out. "I am happy and excited about this reunion. More than
that, I am just happy that I could get so many of my batch mates together. It is
a delight to see them all happy and enjoying themselves," said Uday Kumar. The
alumni also decided that the next time they should not face such a problem, and
hence started a new website, www.stpatricksschool.in, as the school did not have
one. The old students recalled their teachers and classmates who were no more.
They pooled in money to name scholarships and medical campaigns in their names.
It was a tearful ride down the memory lane for both the students and the
teachers, but these were tears of happiness. Some students flew in from abroad
for the event, among them Ansalem D'Souza, who works for DHL in Dubai. "I had to
come down. It was after 25 years that I would be meeting all my classmates and I
could not miss this opportunity. I remembered the grounds where we had played
many games. That ground does not exist anymore. I was surprised that some of the
teachers actually called me by name," he said.
Somashekhar Raju works in Delhi. He too had come down just for the reunion. "It
was an accidental meeting I had with one of my classmates last Diwali when I had
been to Bangalore. He told about the reunion, but I was not so keen. But after
seeing Uday Kumar's keenness about this event, I was also enthused. This event
has been phenomenal. It has brought back memories of us playing cricket, having
lunch, the cycle stand and more," he reminisced. The teachers were very happy.
Around 70 fellow classmates met at the reunion and many flew from abroad to make it up.
The above teachers & Principals of past and present were felicitated by the batch. "Today we are satisfied that whatever we have taught you was right and we are all proud of you," said one of the teachers..