Welcome to WYKAAO
Welcome to WYKAAO
Mr. Francis Kong could not resist anymore. After listening to Mr. Wong Chin-wah singing Toselli's Seranade in Cantonese, and Mr. Wilson Hsueh's "One Day When We were Young”, he demanded equal time and sang a Japanese song. Fr. Joseph Foley sat there bemused and expectant. I later found out from Mr. Anthony Ho that Father was waiting for someone to ask him to sing the theme song of “Foon Lok Kam Siu”, the popular TVB evening program that topped the charts throughout the 1970’s and 1980’s.
To our eternal regret, no one did. The venue was the farewell dinner on board the Queen Mary in Long Beach. The event was the Wah Yan International Conference. The time was August, 2000. Fr. Foley passed away in Galway, Ireland in September, 2006, preceded by the death of Mr. Francis Kong in Hong Kong the previous December, and followed by that of Mr. Hsueh in Toronto in August, 2008.
We will be hosting the Wah Yan International Conference again next month. Much as we want to, we cannot present an encore of Kong, Hsueh, plus a challenge from Fr. Foley. And despite our sponsored invitations, Frs. Anthony Farren, James Smyth and retired teacher Yu Pun Leung are too weak to travel. But others have agreed to attend, including former Vice Principals Raymond Yu and Anthony Ho, and the Septuagenarian Wong Chin Wah himself, who plans to deliver a new composition.
It has been more than 50 long years since John Chan Doming from Hong Kong met some of his classmates in Toronto. During his very short stay, he and his wife, Jan, managed to find time to have dinner with the group on Thursday, July 22, 2010, the night before he left for Hong Kong via the States.
Looking back, the School Swimming Champion in 1960 found himself having studied 2 full years in Primary 6 in other schools before joining P6 at Wah Yan. Another proudly announced that he had the fortune of repeating three years before graduating from Form 5 in 62 and then moving onto McGill. Another record was set in the 50’s in Form 3D when 8 students had to repeat another year with the same Form-master, Father Mallin. Repeating was not unusual at Wah Yan in those years. Interestingly enough, many repeaters enjoyed their extra time at school.
Now that many are professionals, practicing or retired, anecdotes of their work were happily shared. Time flew by. They discussed their 50th Anniversary reunion in Hong Kong next year. Preparation has already been under way. Parting, they said, “See you at reunion.”
Click here for more photos.
The Co-chairman of IC2010, Dr. Albert Young (62), was in town attending a wedding. At a dim sum lunch on Sunday, July 11, he updated Mr. Ho and Peter Wong (62) on the conference which was only 40 days away. He came with his wife, Kathy and brother Aaron/wife Helen. Aaron went to University of Toronto for 2 years post doc after getting his PhD from Duke University. Food was excellent and stories interesting. The party had to break at two because of the World Cup Final.
See the 10 reasons for attending IC2010, http://sites.google.com/a/wahyan.com/ic2010/home/why-join-ic-2010
[The other Co-chair is Alex Man of class 97]
Former teacher Miss Monica Tang, presently a teacher with Toronto Board of Education, attended Encore, the finale of 90/85th Anniversary celebrations on July 10 at Hong Kong Coliseum. She writes, “The event of performing arts of past and present Wahyanites and their friends was spectacular. I had a brief talk with Fr Stephen Chow after the event, but did not have the chance talking to the other Fathers … I will not be attending the picnic as I will still be in Hong Kong…”
Monty Fong of Wah Yan One Family has kindly sent us the newspaper clippings of the event. (Thanks)
Note that the conductor Professor Gabriel Leung Cheuk-Wai, Under Secretary for Food and Health Bureau, is the son of the late Carmelo Leung (61).
Please click here to view the pictures.
Thank you for entering the contest. Now that the 2010 World Cup Soccer is over, we have the final tally of our fun contest. Nobody picks correctly all 4 semi-finalists and the champion; the five prizes go to:
| Edmond Choy (69) | 3 teams and the winning team Spain |
| Dermot Chan (65) | 3 teams |
| Andrew Tang (65) | 3 teams |
| Bill Ip (77) | 3 teams |
| Wilson Chiu (77) | 2 teams and the winning team Spain |
Each of the above winners will get a free ticket to our upcoming AGM in November. Edmond Choy, being our top contestant, will also receive a special prize. Thank you again for your participation!
Our condolences go the family of another Wahyanite who had served Hong Kong well.
Lam Po Hon (class of 36) graduated at WYK in the same year as the late Mr. Choy Shing Pang and Mr. Lee Hoi Chow. He joined the Public Works Department after obtaining his degree at HKU in 1941. He earned his Master degree in Civil Engineering at Imperial College, University of London in 1951, on government grants. After receiving his Diploma of Imperial College, he was promoted the Chief Engineer of Kowloon-Canton Railway in 1952. He became the General Manager of KCR in 1958 and was the first Chinese and the youngest Department Head in the Colony. KCR was known as a well managed and, at the same time, the only profitable railway in the Commonwealth. He held the GM position until his retirement in 1975. He settled in Toronto in 1983.
His two sons, Man-yiu Henry (64) and Man-lai Patrick (67), both attended WYK and so did his son-in-law, Ho Sun-lam Terence (63).
He passed away on July 05 at age 91.
Details of services are here.
(July 10 at Mon Sheong Court) Our President, David Wong gave a high-level yet interesting talk on 陰陽五行, 天干地支, 面相, 風水等等. The idea is to introduce to the audience the basic concepts and inter-relationships of the topics mentioned above. Basic it may seem, it certainly takes time and brain power to understand the underlying theories. This is meant to be an introductory discussion; more in-depth seminars may be held in the future depending on interests of the members.
David wrapped up the talk after a brief refreshment break; all attendees held on tight to the handouts with their scribbled notes because they know they will have more than food to digest afterwards (see the pictures here). If you are interested in obtaining a soft copy of the notes handed out in the talk, please click here and let us know.
"I have had a few moments of excitement last week hosting the tour of Her Majesty in Manitoba. Attached please find a few photo shots when I received E II R at our new airport which was still under construction
until September this year. My house was surrounded by securities during her stay at my residence. I did not comment on the English Soccer team in the World Cup when having a conversation with her. I was pleasantly surprised that when she made her speech which was 50% French; her French was very impressively accurate. She must have the genes of her great great great grandfather, Richard, the Lion Heart who was purportedly known to speak primarily French and very little English.
In this article, the author recounts his meeting with Zhou Pei Yuan 周培源, Fung You Lan 馮友蘭, Qian Wei Chang 錢偉長, Guo Moruo 郭沫若, Fei Xiao Tong 費孝通 and Su Bu Qing 蘇步青 in 1970s. "All these scholars were well educated in the Chinese tradition. They also had rich and notable experiences in universities outside of China when they were young..."
Click here to read the whole text.
Eliza and Don Yau (65) married recently. They were in town and attended a welcome dinner on June 24. They brought along a Red and a White which paired nicely with a menu drawn up by Gus Yueng and Andrew Tang. It was a very happy evening.
[Eliza and Don were at our 2008 AGM dinner held at the same restaurant.]
Click here for pictures taken by Andrew.
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