“Once you leave from here, you won’t ever return to even say hello. Nobody does.” Those words cut like a knife. I was screaming in my head, not true. I will come back. I promised myself, I would. The year was 1992. I was passing out of my school. And those were the parting words of a teacher we greatly feared.
And then you know how it is. You ramble, you live, you learn and then you earn. I got busy with my life. But somewhere, I had this nagging feeling, I wanted to return back to my Alma Mater. It wasn’t until 2009 and thankfully for Mark Z and his FACEBOOK, that I managed to do something about it. A random statement, saying I was planning to form the Alumni of our school, got me in touch with a few like minded people. We stuck it out for the next year and a half, and finally October 23, 2010 we officially formed ‘Josephites of Yesteryears.
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| Our Alumni Logo designed by yours truly 🙂 |
It had not been an easy journey. All of us were in varied industries and hence, timezones. We were made of different stuff. The one thing common we had, was the love for the school. We decided to have the first ever reunion in the history of 104 years of St. Joseph’s High School, Juhu.
What were we thinking? We were 6 of us. We were coordinating across batches and trying to trace teachers who’d long left the school or retired. Was it even possible from non existent phone numbers? Well, there was only one way to find out. January 8, 2011 was the D day. And then what followed can only be termed as a single minded devotion to say ‘Thank You Teachers’. We had a whopping response of about 250 ex students from various batches. Right from the catering to the photography, we had ex students participating everywhere. The REUNION was held in our school hall. The place that had witnessed the best of our performances and debates. Our teachers and staff came from all corners of the city and beyond, taking the number up by another 100 attendees. The ones who could not, made it a point to send messages. We honoured students who had made our school proud. We danced, we chatted, we hugged and we cried. We had a student from the 1969 batch. We had 3 generations of students who came too. We met all the ancillary staff who blessed us with moist eyes. We had an evening we can never forget. It was Yesterday Once More.
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| The Dream Team |
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| The Teachers having a field day. |
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| Our star performers with their fav students |
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| Come one, come all, camaraderie across batches |
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| Batch Photo after 20 years of leaving school, priceless! |
Today, JOY Alumni as it is fondly known is very much active. We had a follow up reunion in 2012. We’ve managed to upgrade the staff room. We have started an annual Talent Contest. We have also tutored kids. We are looking at sponsorship of deserving kids this year. Step by step, we have been growing. We are looking at making a difference to a school that we proudly belong to. And finally, I could tell that teacher of mine, Ma’am, we came back.
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