Sunnybank74

High school lessons sometimes come in handy, decades down the track. My European geography is very shaky indeed, as we discovered last month when I imagined that if you left Amsterdam because of a volcanic eruption and you wanted to reach Switzerland, you would head east.

Mrs Josie and her French irregulars have helped me out here and there, but truth to tell, I know as much German and Italian and Dutch as French, nowadays, and all rolled together they barely get me a snort and a snigger when I order a beer.

Belgium, and lunch wasn’t quite as easy as we thought. None of us had much in the way of Euro left after Germany, and we either needed some place that would take cards, or an autoteller so that we could draw out further supplies.

We stopped to fill up at an odd service station. It was a servo at the front and a tavern at the back, but it wasn’t the sort of place that seemed to cater for a few quick sandwiches and soft drinks.

So we went off down the road, looking for something better. Which was sort of a Belgian Subway or Quiznos, once we found a place to park that wasn’t ridiculously illegal, marvelled at the roadside shrine at the front door, and looked inside.

Two problems: first, the ordering process seemed overly complex. Doubtless it was just a matter of selecting bread, filling, sauces and salads, but I probably had the best French of us all, and my few phrases weren’t going to be up to the task. Falling back on “point and grunt” might work, but would likely earn us no points with the long queue of hungry Belgians. Second problem was that there were no signs indicating acceptance of any cards we had. We could be seriously embarrassed. And hungry.

So we piled back into the car, hunted around for fatter pickings. No autotellers operational, no diners taking cards.

Eventually I took the wheel, found an autoteller in a neighbouring town – along with parking – and discovered that the brand of autoteller only served Belgian Post Office accounts.

Finally found one that worked for us, got some money, and looked for a food outlet. Seemed to be market day, and a cluster of stalls in the town square was doing fine business. We looked, and one stallholder was slicing meat patties in half – two semicircles – which he cooked and crammed into a half-baguette with salad and sauce. Consensus was that these looked quick and tasty, but what were they called so we could order them? A young woman received hers and began moving away.

“Go, on!” I was urged. “Ask her!”

“Um,” I said in my best French. I pointed at her snack, “Qu’est-ce que c’est?”

She looked at me, startled. “C’est un ‘amburger!”

March Newsletter

Hello
Hope this finds you all well and happy.
Well, as I said in my last notice it became very apparent that a definite date had to be set so I hope that Saturday 26th June will suit the majority. So circle those calendars and book those flights!!
I have attached our list of found and still to be found. At the time of writing we have located 71 past students and teachers from our year. A further 32 letters have been sent out to people whose addresses we are pretty sure of but they have not responded as yet. There still remain a number of people that nobody has an idea on. I am off to the electoral commission to try that avenue to locate them.

The Sunnybank Bowls Club has been booked from 5pm to 12 midnight on that date. The bowls club will provide bar staff and drinks will be at each individual’s expense.
I contacted the caterer who the bowls club recommended and Wendy Riedel(Wendy Litzow) was added to the found list. She has her own catering business and we have been lucky enough to not only have a fellow class mate with us but also catering for us on the night. Instead of having a sit down formal dinner she will have staff offering food so that people can mingle freely. There are seats and tables for those who would like to sit down. By the time we have finished the food offered it will be equivalent to a full meal.
Tony Smith is organising the audio visual side of the evening and 70’s music, along with John Olive who will be MC on the evening and making name tags for us with our school photos included to reduce embarrassment of not having a clue of the identity of the person we are chatting to. Sue Perry(Addison) is decorating the room in our school colours. So I guess we are on our way.
The cost will be $35 per head. Once we pay for the room hire, caterer, decorations, hire of screen and projector and name tags any funds left over will be donated to the Sunnybank High P&C on our behalf..

By next newsletter in April hopefully everyone who is attending knows they are and I will send bank details for people to pay into and thus confirm their attendance. It will give John a chance to start on those name tags.

Listed below are links to motels/accommodation in the area for people who may wish to stay close by on the night. I went to Sunnybank Hotel/Motel as well as the places listed below. The Sunnybank still has rooms but as the lady said they have no rating. Still in 70’s condition but clean she reassured me so that may also be a consideration for those who want to walk. Others in the area are

http://www.travelodge.com.au/locations/features.aspx?hid=770

http://www.sunnybankstarmotel.com.au/

http://www.gardencitymotorinn.com.au/

http://www.choicehotels.com.au/brisbane-hotel-comfort-qld-AU242-en?cid=618412

Partners are very welcome. I know some partners have no wish to listen to people with fading memories recount events that probably never happened but please know that they are welcome.

We still need photos!!! An 11E photo would be handy so that every person is accounted for with at least one photo. Any Year 12, formal, Singapore trip and Camp Shannon photos would be appreciated as well. For some reason we can only get our hands on 12 3 and 12 4 . No one kept those year 12 photos!!!

WE have:

1970 8.9
1971 9A2 9B1
1972 10A2 10A4 10B1
1973 11A 11B 11C 11D 11F
1974 12.3

Well I guess that is all the news from me. I went to Sydney last weekend to spend some time with Gillian. She lost both parents last year and it seemed we only saw each other at hospitals and funerals so decided to have just a fun and joyful weekend. I came home with a strained hamstring and a shoulder I could not lift for 4 days. We unfortunately started playing each other tennis on WII Fit until the wee hours after too many vino’s and the competitive streak kicked in. I lost I am surprised to report. Remember I represented Sunnybank High at Tennis, she was a debater!!! Gillian obviously has more time on her hands than my good self to practice computer games. I am just wondering when the’ grown up gene’ will kick in as we will be 53 years old this year.

Looking forward to 26th June.

Regards
Donna

Hello Everyone,
The date has been set for the reunion to allow people time to plan holidays and book flights from interstate and the far north of Queensland.  The big day is Saturday 26th June

John Olive and I went to visit the Sunnybank Bowls Club today and we are booked there  from 5pm to Midnight on the above date.  I do not have full details as to cost  as I am yet to phone the caterer to organise food. Drinks will be at your own expense and  the bowls club will provide bar staff.  Just mark your calendars and organise those  flights.  John will put together accommodation options close to the bowls club for those who do not live locally.

I did not know I was going to book this when I sent the newsletter yesterday but it became obvious that a definite date was necessary.

Look forward to seeing you all!

Regards

Donna D

Hello Everyone,

I have decided to write a monthly newsletter leading up to the reunion just to let you know you have not been forgotten and let you know ways that you may be able to help.

Class photos!!!! It is becoming apparent that we may need to put your photo on your name tag on the night just to give some of us a gentle reminder as to who they are talking with!!!!!. I have seen this done already on school name tags at a 40^th reunion and it worked a treat. Secondly we plan a slide show on the night. Already we have formal photos, Camp Shannon photos as well as just a few class photos but we need more. Below is a list of photos we have:

• 1970 8.9
• 1971 9A2 9B1
• 1972 10A2 10A4 10B1
• 1973 11A 11C 11F 11D
• 1974 12.3

As you can see we only have one year 12 photograph so please search through your old photos for more party, formal and class photos. Could you please put names to the photo as this helps refresh the memory. Just scan them and email them to me and I will pass them onto to our Reunion Photo Department headed by Tony Smith and John Olive. Tony is in charge of IT/Reunion presentation and John is in charge of putting all our photos onto nametags so there are no embarrassing moments at the reunion.

We have had a very successful month in finding people and I have attached a list of who we have found, those I am pretty sure of their details but they are yet to make contact. Some we just know snippets about and unfortunately the last column is still pretty full as we have no idea where they are. Please have a look and shoot me an email with any information or recollection or gossip because we slowly built up enough information to CSI style to track them down!!!

Next newsletter I will share with you a great Reunion article I read.

Basically it is about “as we start to worry about appearance and trying to impress each other at the reunion, remember that it will be a complete waste of time because you will never impress any person who knew you as a teenager!”

So with that in mind I have decided that the 20kgs are staying put and so is the grey hair.

Have a great February everyone!

Regards

Donna

–DonnaD

Contact List

Not easy finding time to post – especially at the length I like to talk about a day, an incident, a song etc.

But I’m enjoying it, posting in between passengers from the front seat of my cab. Rather miffed to find that the Amazon links to MP3 downloads I’ve been pasting into the Top 10/20/40 listings don’t work in Australia, although you can get a short preview. YouTube videos are more easily found.

I’m beginning to look for people via Google and Facebook, in my copious spare time.

And learning more about WordPress, customising the blog, adding new widgets etc. It really is a wonderful blogging environment.

I’ve had a bit of a look through my boxes of “stuff”. Found my graduation certificates for Junior in 1972 and Senior in 1974 and 1975. Will scan and upload for posts in due course. I must have more. I’m sure I have diaries for some of those years. Somewhere. I know I threw out a bunch of old papers last year, but I think they were mostly university.

I’ve got another seven months or so to cover 1970-1974/5. Even at the rate of a week a pay I can’t make it, and I don’t have that much time – or memories. I’ve got two big overseas trips planned for April and August, and I’ll be flat out then, out of contact for a lot of time. I’m hoping to find others who will help out.

–Peter Mac

In Control – photo by mkranz

All those songs we listened to on the radio? They’re back again, just like a long lost friend. Amazon or iTunes has them all. YouTube has the videos. Just download them for a small price or whatever, depending on the site, add them to your playlist, set it on shuffle, and you are back in 1970. Simple as that!

My blog posts cover a week at a time. I’ll list the Top Ten or Top Twenty or Top Forty for that week, link the titles to an appropriate download site, and discuss one or two of my favorites. After a while, the schoolyard memories will grow ever more sparse and it will be just the music.

There were some wonderful songs in those years. I’d sit on the radiocassette, just waiting for the right moment to hit record. And another favorite song would be mine forever, complete with station identification and smart-arse DJ comments. A pity I no longer own anything that will play cassettes…

But, there they are on the web, there they are on my iPhone, and once again I marvel at this magical science fiction age we live in.

– Peter Mac

1974 Grade 12-3

Donna Dancer sent me a list of students and staff. She’s looking for contact details for most of those and she has about six months to do it. Obviously many people can be found by Google, White Pages etc, but apart from this taking time, many ex-students and staff won’t be found this way. It’s been well over thirty years, and half a lifetime can break many links.

So I’m looking for help. Or rather, Donna needs all the help she can get, and every person we can contact in the limited time left is a bonus. It might be something simple, like remembering a given name where we only have initials, or remembering a married name, or a career path, but every little detail helps.

I’m still trying to work out the best way of handling this task here, being mindful of privacy concerns. I don’t want people to feel they are being stalked, for instance. One thing I must insist on is that addresses, phone numbers and email addresses should not be posted in comments. Facebook or Twitter or other publicly visible IDs are okay – those sites have their own mechanisms to handle spam and other abuse. Send them to Donna, but let me know you’ve found them, so I can make a note.

As time goes by we can tick more boxes until eventually we have a shrinking number of “tuff” names.

One possibility is that I make up hundreds of sub-pages to present what information we have. At the moment, most pages would be just a name.

Not that I’ve got a lot of time myself, being a taxi-driver working thirteen hour shifts. but every little bit helps, and if we can get just one person to attend the reunion who wouldn’t have otherwise known about it, let alone made it, that will make it worthwhile. Just to see a smile.

–Peter Mac

Here’s the reunion newsletter Donna sent me, titled Newsletter 1 for 2010:

Hi Everyone

Hope you all had the Xmas and New Year you had hoped for.

We had a major breakthrough before Xmas as John Eggleton had kept a Graduation Program so I believe that the attached list is all the seniors of 74 (thanks to Doug Wait for sending the list on) and with the help of Graham Payne, all the staff.

I have highlighted in green all the people that we definitely know how to contact and who have made contact. Could you please look at the list and just shoot me an email on any snippets on the new names added because even to look up the white pages you need a suburb at least . I don’t mind how many emails you send with thoughts on where people live, work or who they married because it has proved very successful in cross referencing peoples memories.

The people in bold did not appear on the graduation list so maybe some of them did not complete year 12 but that of course does not mean they are not welcome at the reunion.

How does Saturday 18th or Saturday 25th September sound for possible reunion dates. Let me know your preference.

Looking forward to seeing you

Looking at the Friends Reunited page, it looks like Saturday 18 September has been chosen.

1. Change the colour scheme to Sunnybank uniform colours.
2. Get some graphics going
3. Work out how to handle people – I want one page per person so we can add information until we get a contact address
4. Dive into shed and find stash of high school stuff
5. Add to blogroll. Surely more people than me have blogs
6. get a twitter account
7. and Facebook and gmail
8. add author boxes for posts

Things done

Not counting content. Admin and configuration tasks completed:

1. Bought domain as an addon to BlueHost site
2. Installed WordPress 2.9.1
3. Uploaded StudioPress Lifestyle 4.0 theme
4. Added various plugins: SexyBookmarks, RSS Blogroll, SEO Slugs, WP Stats, WordPress.com Stats
5. Added Authorboxes (using cut and paste code from StudioPress support forum here)
6. Created PeterMac user as Administrator
7. Created DonnaD user as Editor

Just another morning in Canberra. The heat of the past week or so has vanished and it was cold last night, dropping down to four degrees. My wife, making a quick visit home to retrieve a forgotten item, reported a light dusting of snow on the Brindabellas.

Snow in summer.

I worked my way through my emails. One from Schoolfriends Reunited caught my eye. My high school year was having a reunion. I didn’t think there’d been one before, but I’d moved away and fallen out of touch. Maybe they all got together each month, got maudlin drunk and swapped stories about what went on at the other end of the ovals when the teachers weren’t looking.

Apparently not. This was to be the first one in thirty-six years. 18 September 2010 in the bowls club beside the school. It’s a long hike from Canberra to Brisbane, but I’m not noted for my aversion to travel, so I marked it down as a possible, filled in a few details on the site, and shot off an email to the contact, Donna Dancer (Griffiths), noting my change of name and that my memories of those days were pretty hazy.

She responded:

Hello Peter
Can I tell you that you are not alone in the hazy memory department. I guess it is coming back to me as I access Graduation Lists and people are sending photos they have. It will be essential that we have our school photo on our name tags at the reunion.
I have attached correspondence  that I have sent to everyone and a list of 1974 Graduates that may help that memory.  If you have any contact with others on the list that I have not found please let me know
Donna

And it went from there. I looked through the spreadsheet, sent back a few details to fill in a hole here and there, and before I knew it, I was being drawn into it all.