Many of you, especially Cathedralites, have commented on my will power of giving up smoking, alcohol and coffee in one swoop, 25 years ago.
I am afraid all of you are wrong about "the will power" part.
It was NOT will power that made me stop. What it was, was that I had always, and still, always, listen to what my body tells me. That was the main point of my earlier blog entry!
Considering that human brain only uses about 4% of the enormous capacity that it has, it is not usual for the damage to the brain, in the early stages, to coincide with that part of the brain that is actually being used. In my case, this did happen, and MY body realised that immediately. Many observe this damage much later in life, by which time it is quite difficult to go through that regeneration process. Hence, the difficult slide continues, leading to dementia and many other brain-related problems.
I do suffer from rather selected dementia, however! :-)
What would this blog be without such insightful inputs of the likes of Staff members as William Shiri, 49ers Yeshpal Kapadia and Naval Patel, 54ers Gracie (née Hayeem) Leno and Sadhana (née Shah) Madudansadan, 56er Ubi and 69er Prakash Thadani, among many many others.
I am so glad that our Alumni President Rajiv Bhatia took the advice of our late 57er Dr. Behram (Budni) Bhadniwalla in his very last email to the world, seriously, and has started to use this blog as one of his means of reaching the wider Cathedralite audience in the world.
I would like to make a plea to the many who send me jokes. I greatly appreciate your wanting to share these great jokes with me.
However, as I have a readership on my various blogs of well over 120000, it means that I am getting a spate of jokes from several readers. May I kindly request you to limit the jokes sent to a maximum of one a day, and possibly 2 per week.
This will greatly help me manage my account as I am getting repeats of the jokes, and as many of 8 to 10 copies of the same joke, every day!
Also, like Budni, if the joke has a deeper underlying message, it will be much more valued as I share many of these jokes with many others on my different blogs. This makes you a valuable contributor to one my many blogs.
Selected feedback, like Naval Patel on cricket, or articles that appear about the school in various media, are also greatly appreciated. I remember 57er Kashinath Dandekar especially, as he used to send me articles from various media about our school. (Unfortunately, this source has dried up after his return to India!)
The special city reports, as those submitted by 69er Prakash Thadani, are much appreciated, not only by me, but by those who I share them with. Especially inputs such as this one about Global Warming:
from Prakash Thadani
date May 23, 2007 7:47 PM
subject Global Warming, Please attend the screening if you can
Dear Friend,
This is the copy of our invitation for the screening of "An Inconvenient Truth" - a documentary by Al Gore.
We would appreciate it if you could spread the word amongst your friends.
Please ask those interested to call RISHIKA at 9820354428.
Also, it is not compulsory to carry the card as long as they confirm that they will be attending the show.
thanks
Sincerely,
Prakash A Thadani
For a slide show, loooong and sloooow, about this event visit the 56er Reunion Site.
I am grateful for 56er Ubi (H. S. Uberoi) for sending met this very personal note about his relationship with the former Principal of the school, Col. Eric J. Simeon.
Dear Jacob,
I met Eric for the first time in Belgrade, then Yugoslavia, in 1971/2 or so.
He and his wife Jean came to visit Jean's brother Mr. Rikhi Jaipal, the then Indian Ambassador to Yugoslavia.
The Jaipals brought the Simeons along to our home for dinner. We struck up a good rapport and spent some good times in Belgrade for the period that they were there.
I remember Eric telling me that though he was an army officer, he had an abiding interest in education.
If my memory does not fail me, his first educational assignment was as the head of India's first Sainik School.
He was a hardcore La Martiniere man (I forget which, Calcutta or Lucknow) and I suspect that his innermost loyalties were with La Martiniere!
After Belgrade, our paths crossed again in 1977 in Dehra Dun, when he was the Principal of the Doon School. We spent a night or two in Dehra Dun with some old students and evaluating as to whether we wanted to send our first born to Doon School. We decided in favour of keeping him with us.
Years later, in 1981, when I was transferred back to Bombay from Nairobi, my thoughts turned back to Cathedral and the need to find admission for both our son and daughter, Samir and Yasna.
I was very pleasantly surprised to learn that Eric Simeon was then the Principal of the Cathedral School! It was indeed a small world!
If it was 1971, when we first met the Simeons, Samir was three and Yasna was not then born!
When I spoke to Eric Simeon from Nairobi, he felt that I should come to Bombay to get Samir tested for admission. So, in 1981 August or so Samir entered Cathedral under the stewardship of Eric Simeon and shortly thereafter, did Yasna.
Our relationship continued and grew stronger in Bombay and I recall with fondness of the occasions Eric asked me to be the chief judge at the annual cross country races (I recall Tara Malkani being a judge too one year and when he asked me to coach the schoolboys in boxing in 1984/85.
He was often critical of the standard of judging in boxing in Bombay!
We met frequently, both he and his delightful wife Jean.
It was during his tenure as Principal that the school celebrated its 125th Anniversary.
In 1984/5 Samir and his wife now Anahita (née Mehta) both became headboy and headgirl respectively under Eric Simeon.
I'm sure Eric had something to do with the chemistry the two developed and eventually get married!
As the ex-officio Vice-President of the Alumni Association, Eric Simeon could not suffer fools and was quite outspoken in his views!
I met him last in 1986, in Bombay, when I was transfered to Abu Dhabi.
I shall cherish the memory of Jean and Eric Simeon warmly.
Ubi
I must also draw attention the Memorial Service which will be held in New Delhi for Col. Simeon. This was the message from his son Dileep, a fellow Stephanian:
There will be a Memorial Service for the Late Col. Eric Joseph Simeon, ex-Principal, at the Cathedral of the Redemption, North Avenue, Near Gurdwara Rakabganj, New Delhi, on Tuesday May 29, 2007 at 5:15 pm sharp.
Dileep Simeon
Once again, remember that this blog is by you, about you, for you, and Annikki and I are purely vassals of all of you out there!
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