Circular No 767

Newsletter for alumni of The Abbey School, Mt. St. Benedict, Trinidad and Tobago, W.I.

Caracas, 17 of July 2016 No. 767

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Dear Friends,

I am resending an old conversation with Cornel de Freitas, interesting because it contains information on the Circulars and a special view on Brothers.

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Cornel de Freitas

12 Mar

Dear Ladislao,

(Please read all the way to the end of 'your' email to me)

{I am deliberately 'pasting' this response to your email 'inside' of the one from Nigel, Re:"SENIOR MOMENT', so I could point out the ones you could use with my other my photographs.}

I am so sorry that I may have expressed myself incorrectly when inquiring why you didn't 'Publish' all of the photographs at the same time.

I do understand that this - what you are doing - takes up a lot of your time and at the same time, takes away from 'family' time.

I need you to know, as I can probably assure you, that I am not the only one that greatly appreciates what you do for us.

When you first made contact with me, It opened up memories, and in a way gave me new 'life' to be able to be reconnected with those brothers at the Abbey School, that played a very important part of my life  They were 'my brothers' and I do 'miss' them.

Getting back to your email: (please see my responses embedded - "por supuesto".... did I get that right...?  )

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Date: Wed, 11 Mar 2009 23:29:17 -0400

Subject: Re: Where are the Circulars ...

From: kertesz11@gmail.com

Dear Cornel,

The pictures are with me or at least I believe that they are, as I have not opened the February emails.

[You are obviously very busy, so I can understand the backlog.]

I try to mix the photos to keep the old old and the recent ALUMNI interested. So I publish four per issue to keep the Circulars alive

I did not know about this before, but I can see your reasoning.

I have your letters in Circular No.389 also at least two photos.

Since I regard the Circular as a leisure stress free work, I take longer than some of you would like me to be. I get a little frustrated after being over 8 hour in front of the computer at work, as I do this between supper and going to bed, sometimes my eyes hurt at seeing the screen.

This is a 'good' thing then, I myself enjoy being able to sit down and spend my time sending out emails to my MSB brothers, instead of looking at TV.

I find it relaxing and there is usually a 'return on the investment of time' - which is the response.

My idea of the Circulars is to gather ALUMNI and give them food of thought and be reunited with long lost friends. I started issue No. 1 with 10 ALUMNI and we are now with a few more than the number of Circulars published, I am sure Nigel agrees with the numbers.

Absolutely astounding...!

I have about ten Circulars ready in draft format. So some news might wait for at least three months before published.

I only publish life or death news immediately. Sorry, that I have not reached to your photos as yet.

It does seem to take a long time, but when you take the amount of info you have to deal with I can understand why.

Please think that the Circulars need material, but if I use all materials as soon as they get to me then there would be times when I cannot publish the weekly Circular for lack of material.

Exactly what kind of 'material'?...do you mean photographs?

This is the only reason that the Circulars are still being published while other have failed. Old news remains old even if published as soon as I get it.  I place importance on keeping a regular mailing system, to keep the MSB memories alive..

An example, those that wrote us five years ago quite long essays, have not been heard ever since, they do not have even an updated photo to share for us to know if they are alive.

Usually I hear from their friends after they pass away, this has happened in over a dozen of cases.

This is sad, am I to understand that shorter messages and an accompanying photo help?  I am hoping that of the group of my form V class, most are still alive and doing well.

At this time I also hope Richard Anderson, whom I haven't heard from since I did send an email/letter, is doing well and his family.  Is he currently living in Florida, and Stephen is still in Trinidad?

I have no excuse but please bear with me, and hope this is not going to keep you from writing.

Oh yes, You do!  This what you are doing is quite an undertaking, I cannot imagine how much time you have devoted to this amazing gift to all of us MSB boys  ....Thank you so very much.

Because of you, I was able to re-connect with Terrence Fereira, one of my class mates, contact and call Nigel, visit with him, organize an evening and even include the wives, reminisce about old times, laugh a lot, even eat a delicious 'Roti' and drink a real Carib beer, and I had the astounding privilege of introducing my son and my two grandsons whom I am so very proud of, thanks to you...!

Have a look at those pictures again and see the look on our faces.

What do you see, and this got started with a simple message from Nigel, that one of my classmates was coming up. 

He said, how about we get together and have a "Roti", and our tiny "ROTILICIOUS" mini-reunion was born.

Had it not been for you telling me that an MSB old boy was living near to me and gave me his telephone number. ---

"MUCHISIMAS GRACIAS CABALLERO!"

This all happened thanks to you!

Am I grateful - you bet your ass I am!

But you can always be sure that I answer all emails, sooner or later.

I extended my reply because those of the 1950s claim that I do not take care of them, it is difficult to cover 40 years in each Circular.

God Bless

Ladislao

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Ladislao,

I need you to know, that all of your efforts are greatly appreciated, how does that little phrase go again?

"You can please some of the people some of the time, but you can never please all of the people all of the time..."

Thank you sincerely for your great work,

GOD bless you and your loved ones, and reward you for all the lost time with them, they, I am sure, understand and must love you a lot for your devotion.

Cornel de Freitas..

P. S.:

Just so you know, I am using the colour purple in honour of the really great Brother I lost recently.  Carlos and I were closer than I even imagined, I realized how close now that he is gone.

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2009/3/10

Cornel de Freitas <corneldefreitas@hotmail.com>

Hello again Ladislao,

Got your email, I saw the picture of me as a boy sitting on the playing field, but you did not publish the 'string' of pictures, any particular reason why?

I thought they would give a perception of my growing 'older' and what I look like now.

I am also aware that Nigel sent you the pictures of the 'Mini-reunion' we had up here.

I was a really great evening that just happened with a few suggestions.

I have already written to you about that evening, but it is also my hope that the others in attendance would take a minute and write a few words of their perception of that really nice get together. 

The photographs of that same evening that shows me, my son Michael, and his two boys, my two angels, could also be included.

Let me know what you think.

GOD bless you and yours,

Cornel ... ...

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From: nigel@adcam.ca

Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2009 07:38:50 -0500

Hi Terrence,

I'm afraid that I really made a boo-boo when I sent out my first report on "Roti Night" by referring to you as 'Trevor'. Please forgive me - as Egan suggested, I must have had a 'Senior Moment'. Cornel, Egan and you too have asked me to correct the report.

I have now had the time to edit the report, such as it was, and to use your name as your parents and not I, wanted, and I've attached this hereto, for your records.

It was really great seeing all you guys again, and how marvellous that, in spite of the fact that some of us had never met the others, we were able to instantly connect and share our common memories. 

I look forward to another visit from you in the future.

Don't forget - Lent starts tomorrow. 

God bless you.

Nigel

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Well, Roti Night has come and gone and we're left with some beautiful memories of friendships formed and associations re-made.

Terrence Ferreira had come in from New Jersey to visit his mother and we decided to get together to meet other OB's, even though we might have come from different MSB "eras", to share a roti and a Carib together.

And so it was that Terrence (59-65), Egan Baichoo (59-60), Cornel de Freitas (60-65), Carlos Guio (74-79), Hudson McKoy (69-74) and myself (55-60) met at Rotilicious. Cornel brought along his son Michael and his two grandsons, Lorenzo and Christian. We also were privileged to have our wives, Maureen Baichoo, Linda McKoy and my wife, Jackie, with us. 

It turns out that Carlos and his brother, Luis, were the last two Venezuelans to attend school at the Mount.

Apart from the fact that the roti was wonderful, we were given a special treat when Terrence revealed his treasure box of memorabilia, containing masses of sports and athletic medals, his scout uniform, bushman's thong, scout belt, scarf, and badges including the treasured and now seldom seen Queen's Scout Badge.  Terrence seems to have been quite an athlete and sportsman, and, as I understand, he was also the Captain of the Football and Cricket teams.

And therein lays a story.

Apparently, the Abbey School was in the habit, as we know, of regularly challenging St. Stanislaus College in Guyana to a number of sporting events, and, from what I hear, we seldom, if ever, won at football.

Apparently, Terrence's dad, Mr. Ferreira, had always said that the Abbey School would never win until a Ferreira led the team.

And so said, so done.

After his death, a neatly filed collection of newspaper reports was found among Mr. Ferreira's belongings, and Terrence presented these to us during our 'Roti Night'.

He asked me to hold onto his medals, paraphernalia and reports, and it just might be that these would be nice to have in any proposed Abbey School Old Boy Museum at MSB.

I have these items in my keeping now, and would be willing to hand them over to someone responsible, once the Museum idea is further developed. 

Thanks, everyone, for coming along.

Enjoy the pix.

Nigel

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EDITED by LadislaoKertesz, kertesz11@yahoo.com,  if you would like to be in the circular’s mailing list or any old boy that you would like to include.

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Photos:

15LK5694FBEDIMSB, Bells in the new tower

14LK5566FBFODIFA, Fr. Odo and Isaias Farcheg

16LK2161LKEGTO, Ladislao Kertesz and Gustavo Tar

10DV0369FBDDVWFE, David de Verteuil and wife