BY CLARA A RODRIGUES|NT NETWORK

When we think of our school years we will definitely agree with Mary Hopkins ditty ‘Those were the days my friend…’ Who can ever forget those days? And reunions try to revive and relive those memories.

School memories are so delicately encased in a recess somewhere in our minds and seem almost so recent despite the decades that have passed since we graduated from the portals of our alma mater. A get together of the ex-students from the St Joseph’s Boys High School, Bangalore will hope to crack and burst those tender bags of emotions bottled as memories when they meet in Goa for the inauguration of the Goa Chapter of their ex-students association.

Says, Lloyd Macedo, an alumnus of the St Joseph school, “It’s difficult to explain in words what my memories of the school are. Just standing outside the school after the completion of your studies makes you feel so transformed. Maybe it is the ambience and love one feels for our school.”

The school’s ex-students association have chapters in many places around the world like Dar-es-Salaam, Nairobi, Australia, UK, erstwhile Burma etc while in India they have their chapters in places which include Coorg, Kerala, Mangalore, and now in Goa where as many as 30 ex-students are presently residing. Mr Macedo says it was a difficult task to try and reconnect with the old boys. He tells us more on how the problem was circumvented, “Our networking was so good, that through emails and other technological advances we got in touch with the alumni of the school. The age range you see is marvellous. The oldest is about 86 years old while the youngest are the ones who have recently completed their schooling here.”

Fondly called the old boys, after the pioneering members of the first ex-student association of the school named the association, if you go anywhere in Karnataka, and ask about the old boys, almost anyone would know who exactly you are referring to.

The school has an illustrious garrison of students who shone once they started their journey into the professional arena. To name a few are Sabeer Bhatia, co-founder of Hotmail, Mark Mascarenhas, founder and director of Worldtel Inc, Rahul Dravid, Robin Uthappa, Patrick Jansen and Walter D’Souza, both Gold medallists at the London Olympics in 1948, Chetan Kumar Maini, who was part of the design team that designed the car Reva.

St Joseph’s Boys’ High School which was started by the French foreign missionaries is presently being run by the Jesuits. Mr Macedo adds that students of the school were sent to fight for the King and the country during World War I.

He states, “What we have taken, we give back threefold. And an example that makes a point is when the school was undergoing renovation; the need for huge sums of money was met by many ex-students themselves.  

Incidentally, the first scout troupe formed in Asia was started in the St Joseph’s Boys’ school, Bangalore.

Says Mr Macedo, We all feel a deep feeling of loyalty and belongingness towards our school. Ask any of them to sing the school anthem and they will gladly do so from start to finish with the emotions intact.  

The talk given by one of the old boys of the school, Dr Vece Paes (Bronze medallist at the 1970 Barcelona Hockey World Cup, and Leander Paes’s father) is still fresh in Mr Macedo mind. He says, “It was such a nice feeling whenever a past student of the school came and spoke to us. It was inspiring,” says a nostalgic Mr Macedo who ends his conversation with me by singing the school’s anthem ‘Fide et Labore’ (‘Faith and Toil’).

(The reunion will be held on July 3-4 at Resorte Marinha Dourada, Arpora. Mario Miranda, an ex-student of the school will be the chief guest on the occasion. Old Boys wishing to enrol for the event and join the branch in Goa can call on 9823056298 or 2276780)