Circular No 826

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

Caracas, 2 of September 2017 No. 826

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Dear Friends,

Have you looked up your name in Internet?? You should Google it, just out of curiosity.

You may be surprised by the amount of line that exist with your name. 

Look up the IMAGE selection in your search, what is your impression??

The Circular would like to read your comments.

There might be errors in spelling that you might want to amend.

Have fun.

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News

Another visitor has gone to Anguilla, George Laquis and family:

Don Mitchell <idmitch@anguillanet.com>

Aug 28 at 4:10 AM

Dear Ladislao,

Anguilla welcomed George and Jackie Laquis for a week in mid-July 2017.  They were accompanied by their five children, a daughter-in-law and 14 grandchildren for a family vacation in a restful setting.   They stayed at Cap Juluca Hotel on Maundays Bay, but explored various restaurants and other beaches on Anguilla.  Don and Maggie spent some time with them, and everyone enjoyed a magnificent meal at world-famous Pims Restaurant. 

A photo of the evening is attached.

Don

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By Rafael Echeverria

I was SO inspired by your latest Circular No. 46 and reading the story by Robert Huggins ... you know .... he described IN A VERY PRECISE MANNER how we all feel about the long lasting marks The Abbey School of Mt. St. Benedict left in all of us ... deep in our hearts ... .

I remember how we use to complain all the time ... "Gosh ... this is jail man ... " ... The food stinks ... it's terrible" .... "All the"Fathers are dictators" .. and so forth ... but the truth is that we ALL miss those days ...any of us would give anything just to go back to one normal mount day .... just for one day .... wouldn't we ????

.. I know I would ... any time ...  

Yes !!! ... Yes !!! ... That's Mount St. Benedict ... AND WE ARE ALL BLESSED for ever being a part of that "jail" .... it was heaven !!!! .... but it's only now that we realize it ... so please extend my best regards to Robert and convey to him my best feelings .... he has made me "revive" my best times .... and I still have sooooo many more memories ... it's incredible .... how important can a life experience be ....

God Bless Mount  !!!! ... for ever !!!! ... and The Mount Boys of whom I feel so proud to be a part of .... and I feel so proud of Trinidad ... their people ... I still have so many friends from there ... I have to go back one day !!!! .... HOPEFULLY NEXT YEAR .. FOR THE MOUNT BOYS GATHERING !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ... Please Ladislao ... tell all how much I love them and miss them ....

To be a Mount Boy ... is an old experience transformed into a culture ... almost a philosophy about life ...

Rafael

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Abbey library needs help

By ANTHONY MILNE

ORIGINAL editions of early works by Sir Vidia Naipaul, Sir Louis de Verteuil’s 19th-century book on Trinidad, works on West Indian sociology also from that century, and writings by French priest Père Labat on what the Caribbean was like 300 years ago are among the treasures in the 89-year-old library at the Abbey of Our Lady of Exile, at Mount St Benedict in St Augustine.

Talking to the Express last week, Fr Christopher Theunissen, now in charge of refurbishing the library, spoke about other works there, the library’s history, and plans to continue refurbishing the library.

Funds and equipment, including proper lighting and air conditioning, and computer facilities to help catalogue the library’s collection, are also being sought. The library has just received a gift of a dozen chairs from Bewil & Co, of Philips Street, Port of Spain.

Original works by Eric Williams are also on the library’s shelves, as are the complete works of Sir Walter Scott and Voltaire, political writings by South American Liberator Simón Bolívar, books by Charles Kingsley, ancient musical manuscripts.

There is also, of course, a comprehensive collection of scriptural and theological works for use by monks, students of theology at the Regional Seminary of St John Vianney and the Ugandan Martyrs, just down the hill from the abbey, and members of the public allowed to use the library.

The library now houses about 20,000 volumes.

Rev Theunissen explained that a library of sorts was established at the 90-year-old abbey the year after it was founded by Dutch Benedictine monks who had been expelled from Bahia in Brazil where they had fallen foul of the government.

“In 1979,” Theunissen explained, “one of the monks at the abbey, Fr Ildefonse, was appointed librarian.” Other monks had helped with the library before this, including Revs Adelbert van Duin and Francis Friesen.

One of his first tasks was to break through the concrete wall separating what was once a tailor shop from a former vestry, to make access to the library possible from within the main monastery building.

He was helped by other monks, including Rev Francis Alleyne, now Abbot.

“In 1982 Fr Ildefonse began the daunting task of proper cataloguing,” Theunissen explained. “It had become necessary to introduce a recognised standard system, the Dewy Decimal Classification”.

He got help from a Mr Nadar, a trained librarian at the University of the West Indies, also in St Augustine.

The task was completed in seven years, with the then-10,000 books in the library catalogued and a special card system introduced. Theunissen nevertheless bemoaned the fact that a number of valuable books in the library have disappeared, some borrowed and never returned, over the years. 

Afterwards Rev John Pereira, another monk, did a lot of work in the library. The abbey, to celebrate it 90th anniversary later this year, also has archives, kept carefully by Abbot Francis. One of the oldest buildings at the Benedictine Abbey is to be bulldozed on Wednesday, April 3. Monks at the Abbey explained that the ornate old building, constructed of tapia, was to be demolished two years ago. Citizens for Conservation, they said, got the authorities to hold their hand then, promising to help raise the $2 million needed to restore the old building and make it safe.

The building remained standing but no funds were forthcoming. Each Benedictine abbey throughout the world, it was explained, must be self-sufficient and so must be able to raise its own funds or create income.

Theunissen said the abbey library “is one of the oldest of its kind in the Caribbean”, and has a wide and large selection of monastic and spiritual books as well as secular and inter-denominational books.

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By the ed. Written in 2002 =

You read last week an article by Anthony Milne on the “Abbey library needs help”.

Now it is my time to get hold of your attention, get hold of your chair!!!, I am going to rival the Trinidad Express´s journalist. Watch out Pulitzer!! An engineer is about to???

You might not believe me but I never saw this library, it has taken me 40+ years to find this out, can anyone help me to locate it???, Where was it in (1960) or is in (2002) the Library must be big???. Since there is only one computer at the Mount, then I presume that this is where it is located, because to track all the books, it is a big job. I wonder if Don Mitchell saw it in his last visit?.

The only library that I knew for good or bad was on the first floor of the school, situated over the driveway. This library was below the washroom of the upper dorms.

Why I say bad or good, notice that I changed the order!!!, it was because when we reached Form I we were required to read one book per month, if not we were penalized.

This was the bad part as many of us, strike out the bookworms, did not like to read and saw this as a punishment.

At the beginning a lot of us just borrowed and returned the book, just formalism, until Fr.Bernard asked part of the contents, he always knew the contents of all the books of the library, so we were admonished and this time you had to start the reading and of course finish it or be prepared for a poor English mark.

So you could not just borrow a book and return it at the end of the month, but you had to read it. I do not know if we invented speed reading, the Kennedys made it popular in the 1960s, but nobody mentioned us.

The Guns of Navarone?? H.M.S.Ulysses?? Any one remembers??? Maybe I did not write the title as it should be, but at least I remember two of the books that I read, of course no memory of the author, H.M.S. Ulysses had a blue cover???. By the way the Guns of Navarone was a good movie later on!!!. Anthony Quinn and the lot. Was there a movie on the other book???.

The good part was that it gave us the knowledge that we have used in reaching our objectives, thanks to Fr. Bernard´s and Fr. Gerome´s insistence, we became what we are as this helped our education.

As a challenge I am going to make a trip to Trinidad and find this library, never is too late. Maybe I am going to ask Anthony Milne??? I am sure he did a lot of research on it!!.

This trip is going to be around August, September, maybe two weeks before classes officially start at the island.

I need your help with this trip, to be able to gather sufficient information for circular No. 40 and on!!!!. Just look at the number on this circular and you can safely bet on No. 52 sometime in November.

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15-05-2017 12:13:34: M Bodington Roberto: No se quien esta en el grupo equivocado. MSB Mount St. Benedict.

15-05-2017 12:17:07: M Zavarce Arturo: NO JULIOS AMBOS SOMOS DE MSB, LO QUE NO ENTIENDO ES A QUIEN VA EL RECLAMO NO HE VISTO NADA VULGAR HACIA NADIE?? Y DE PASO, EL RESPETO SE GANA Y ESTA GENTE NO MERECE NI EL SALUDO.

15-05-2017 12:28:08: M Bodington Roberto: Los imagenes vulgares vienen del grupo. Mi reclamo es a el o los que enian tanta basura. Ahora con "esa gente" te refieres a los "innombrables", estoy totalmente de acuerdo con tigo.

15-05-2017 12:28:47: M Zavarce Arturo: VALE. UN ABRAZO.

15-05-2017 12:31:09: M Bodington Roberto: Chevere! Igualmente. Saludos.

15-05-2017 12:45:41: M Zavarce Arturo: HOLA FRANK EDUARDO. ASI MISMO ES.

15-05-2017 12:51:38: M Ibarra Frank: Tenía tiempo sin escuchar mi segundo nombre jajajajajaja...cómo estás Arturo?

15-05-2017 12:52:58: M Zavarce Arturo: BIEN Y TU QUE TAL? HE ESTADO EN CONTACTO CON TU HIJO. TI SIGUES EN RD?

15-05-2017 12:56:28: M Ibarra Frank: Sigo por aquí, tu familia q tal? Tenemos q ponernos a día!

15-05-2017 12:57:56: M Zavarce Arturo: CIERTAMENTE. COMO DECIAS CUANDO ESTABAD CON LOS INDIGENAS, MUCHAS LUNAS HAN PASADO Y MUCHA AGUA HA CORRIDO POR LOS RIOS.

15-05-2017 13:02:56: M Ibarra Frank: Así es! Cuídese mucho, te aviso cuando vaya por allá. Avísame si te puedo ayudar en cualquier cosa. Un fuerte abrazo

15-05-2017 13:03:15: M Zavarce Arturo: DENTRO DE LO QUE CABE, TODOS BIEN, MIS VIEJOS FALLECIERON  Y AQUI VAMOS, PA' LANTE .

15-05-2017 13:03:59: M Ibarra Frank: Igual por aquí

15-05-2017 13:04:00: M Zavarce Arturo: GRACIAS HERMANO. ESTAMOS EN CONTACTO. UN ABRAZOTE.

15-05-2017 13:04:54: M Ibarra Frank: Aunque no físicamente pero siempre están al lado de uno

15-05-2017 13:06:22: M Zavarce Arturo: LO SE FRANK, LO MISMO PIENSO. SON MUCHAS COSAS QUE NOS UNEN A TODOS A PESAR DE CUALQUIER COSA.

15-05-2017 14:11:51: M Coscarart Salvador: <imagen omitida> Resemblence . parecido

15-05-2017 14:16:29: M Cantore Oscar: Que te mejores pronto Sal

15-05-2017 14:41:15: M Zavarce Arturo: CUIDATE SALVA,  PRONTO ESTARAS BIEN. UN ABRAZO.

15-05-2017 14:42:02: M Coscarart Salvador: Gracias mis hermanos

15-05-2017 16:14:17: M Ahow Hector Tx: Vivo en Richmond entre la 99 y West Bellfor Salvador sería bueno vernos

15-05-2017 16:25:59: M Coscarart Salvador: Estamos cerquita yo vivo por la 1463 and cinco ranch blvd. Claro que si . Conocernos. en 28718 Primrose Bluff Dr Katy Tx 77494. mi cell es 3374128751 Cuando estubistes en el mount st benedict. Abbey School.

15-05-2017 16:29:31: M Ahow Hector Tx: Hasta el 68 Mi cell 713 325 4705

15-05-2017 16:30:08: M Coscarart Salvador: yo estuve del 67 Al 74 cual es tu apellido

15-05-2017 16:30:36: M Ahow Hector Tx: Ahow

16-05-2017 08:21:27: M Kenny Azizul: Hey Sal we need to get Don Mitchell and Abasali in this WhatsApp with the other guys can u please invite them in

16-05-2017 11:22:20: M Coscarart Salvador: Ok azizul i´ll get them in. brother.

16-05-2017 11:23:06: M Kenny Azizul: Great

16-05-2017 16:14:53: M Coscarart Salvador: Azizul I will need their phone numbers.

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EDITED by Ladislao Kertesz,  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:

17DM0001DMIGRP, Don Mitchell and George Laquis

02UN0002FCT, Fr. Christopher Theunissen Librarian

05LK0002FBRDRFAM, Richard Driver

15LK1117FBRDA, Robert Date