Welcome 59ers and Cathedralites of All Years,

This Seventh Heaven Google Group was set up in 2005 by Annikki and Jacob Matthan (Moderators). It had been meant for 59ers from Cathedral and John Connon School, Mumbai, India, to discuss issues which would lead up to the 50th Year Reunion in November 2009.

Their 50th Year Reunion is over. It was the Mother of All Golden Reunions. It was 7 days of fellowship, fiesta and frolic and fun in Mumbai and Alibaug.

The Directory produced by our Moderators raised the bar so high that it will take a long while for any other Class to catch up with the 59ers.

The School was rated as the Best in India in 2010, the year it celebrated the 150 year of its Founding.

At the same time, in a poll conducted by the Seventh Heaven Blog, the Class of 59 was voted as the best ever in the history of the School! (No 59er vote was counted in this POLL!)

Now that the Golden Reunion is over, 59ers have decided what they should do with this Group.

Their Seventh Heaven Blog (which has been temporarily disabled (see below)), is now the property of all Cathedralites of all Years.

This Seventh Heaven Google Group will still remain as the private domain of 59ers.

But by consent of most of the members, it was decided to open up this Google Group for all Cathedralites interested in affairs of our School. It would, however, primarily remain as the domain of 59ers around the world.

We are now in the New Year, 2011.

This change is being effected by this new Welcome Message which will appear on our new Google Group Site.

You are free to send in your comments to make the changes to it during this year.

The above is a composite of two pictures of 59ers in 2009 taken by Hasnain Chinwala. It was taken at the last event of our 50th Year Reunion, the Parsee Dinner hosted by Piloo Tata (née Dastur) and Armeane and Mary Choksi, with help from Adi and Feroza Cooper and Ratan and Niloufer Singara who were responsible for the music and refreshments.

A few who had to leave our Reunion Celebrations early, as Bashir Currimjee, Noel Ezekiel, Ramesh Mirchandani, Vijay Nayar, Vinay Dabholkar and Viney Sethi, are missing from this photo, as also one of our hosts, Armeane, who left early that evening as his wife, Mary, was not well.

The staff members who so graciously took part in many events of our reunion are also not in this picture - William and Pushpa Shiri (Canada), John Billington (UK) and Mr. and Mrs. J. P. D'Souza (Goa).

The Golden Reunion events were as follows:

1. "Breaking the Ice at the Middle School Hall" organised by The 50th Year Reunion Organising Committee.
2. "Cocktails and Dinner Evening at the Bombay Gym" hosted by Viney and Purnima Sethi and Ooky Elijah and Rivca Elias,.
3. "Under the Stars Dinner / Dance at St. James's Court" hosted by Vijay and Meera Nayar.
4. "A Rooftop Evening with the Findians at Chitrakoot" hosted by Annikki and Jacob Matthan and Gita Simoes (née Vaswani).
5. "An Afternoon at Alibaug to Honour 59er Ashok Kapur" hosted by Madhu Kapur.
6. "An Evening of Fun, Frolic in the Spirit of 59ers" hosted by Ashok and Amla Ruia and Anil Ruia.
7. "A Parsi Evening at the Sea Front" hosted by Piloo Tata (née Dastur), Mary & Armeane Choksi and Adi Cooper and Ratan Singara.

The turnout at the Golden Reunion by the amazing bevy of beautiful 59er ladies was astounding: Anjula, Asha, Farhana, Gita, Harmohina, Ketty, Piloo, Pravin, Renuka, Sheryn, Veena, Zarine and Zenobia.

All the events at the 50th Year Reunion were unique and beyond wildest expectations. Despite cyclone warnings, 59ers stood firm, as their Captain, Vijay Shivdasani, led them on regardless. Mumbai shut down – but not the 59ers!

The participation of 59ers, as a Group, at the Founders' Day Church Service was phenomenal. Never before has there been such a huge turnout of ANY YEAR for this event.

Same can be said for the presence of 59ers at the Alumni dinner.

Well done 59ers!

Without the participation of so many 59ers from around the world, some with spouses - Armeane and Mary Choksi (US), Arvind Thadani (US), Bashir Currimjee (Mauritius), David and Jane Colaco (UK), Ellis Hayeem (US), Hasnain Chinwala (Canada), Jacob and Annikki Matthan (Finland), Noel Ezekiel (US), Peter and Monica Miovic (US), Robert and Hootoksi Tyabji (Malaysia) and Vikram Savara (US) - this reunion would never earned its title as the"Mother of All Reunions".

59ers must especially give thanks to the Madhu Kapur, wife of beloved late Ashok, who in the face of the tragedy that struck her (and all Cathedralites) on 26/11 in 2008, opened her heart and her Alibaug home, along with her two equally brave children, Shagun and Gaurav, and their spouses, to all of us 59ers.

At the Golden Reunion all 59ers were honoured, especially those who have left us for peace.

Without the dedicated work of our Mumbai / Pune / Delhi team and their spouses: Adi, Anil, Ashok, Elijah, Jangoo, Naubir, Percy, Ramesh, Ratan, Venkat, Vijay, Vikram, Vinay and Viney, so magnificently led by Piloo and Shivi, this Reunion would never have seen the light of day.

Videos, Cds and photographs of the reunion are available from a variety of sources. Each records the enormous success of this Golden Reunion. The Directory of our Golden Reunion is available for download online from

http://www.lulu.com/product/hardcover/golden-reunion-directory-of-59ers/14264655

A hard cover version is also available for those who want to purchase this labour of love by the Moderators.

This Directory will be updated annually. If you are on the list of those who have the original hard copy, or a hard copy purchased through the internet, updated pages will be sent to you automatically for the next 5 years.

This Seventh Heaven Google Group is now in your hands to do what you want with it.

Annikki and Jacob will continue to moderate the Group so that the hundreds of spam messages (from Viagra pills to love you love me messages) that are received every day are not forwarded to you.

Also, Jacob will try to remember all 59ers on their birthdays. Do let him know the date of birth of your spouse and yourself and any special occasion that you want to share with this Group.

One important change is coming in 2011.

Due to personal reasons, the Seventh Heaven Blog and over 15 other Blogs run by Annikki and Jacob have now ceased to be updated as of November 2010.

To overcome the problems, they are setting up their own server. The cost to establish this is € 12000. (Due to negotiations the special offer has been made to Jacob and the cost reduced by half - to just € 6000!)

They have made a plea to their worldwide readership base for a small donation of €5, $ 5 or Rs. 100 to establish this independent server. (59ers have responded magnificently. They have sent amounts from $ 10 to $ 100!)

Slowly but surely this amount is being raised.

These are their sites which we have closed down completely:

1. Jacob’s Blog
2. Seventh Heaven Blog for Mumbai Cathedralites
3. Kooler Talk Blog for Delhi Stephanians
4. JM Politics
5. JM Talk Shows
6. Move the UN
7. Findians
8. CHAFF (Chamber of Assistance for Finns and Foreigners)
9. Oulu Best (Worst) Buy

Many years ago Annikki and Jacob went through a political crisis due to the similar situation that Julian Asange is going through. Several readers rallied around them then and offered financial support.

Luckily they were able to weather that storm. God intervened. They did not need any assistance from anyone. Every cheque received was returned uncashed. Every penny received was returned.

They have since carried on 12 long years from that day without any support from anyone. They have used the free Google and Yahoo networks for most of their work. Jacob has been ahead of the technology curve for several years and managed to keep everything going smoothly. Others have copied his style and that is a tribute to his far-sightedness.

The situation is now different.

Because of Security and School Teasing Problems affecting their family they are unable to run their internet presence the usual way. That is the bad side of Social Networking.

One third of their active lives dedicated to their worldwide audience has vanished into thin air.

Annikki has weathered it better than Jacob as she is a creative artist with many other things to do. The internet was only a small fraction of her work.

Not so with Jacob. Internet friendships have been the most active part of his life.

For almost two months they tried to come to grips with this.

There is a solution but unfortunately it is not free or cheap.

To implement this solution they need financial assistance to be able to overcome what has disabled them. They have to set it their own dedicated server and then run it.

They have no personal ability to launch such a system which will be safe and workable and bring them back as Communicators among their audience.

When launched they would be able to re-position all their extensive archives in a manner that the readers would have access to them. Yet it would not be accessible to those who only want to trouble and destroy,

It is with this request that they approach you all humbly to help them implement this system that will help them once again reach you with all the things they have been doing for the last 15 years and yet not trouble the lives of their loved ones.

If you feel up to it and think that their service has been worthwhile, please contribute just a few Dollars / Euro / Rupees so that they can implement a system which will be able to side-step the weirdoes who are haunting them.

You can contribute in one of three ways:

1. Put a very small sum, say a 5 Euro note, a 5 Dollar note, a Rs.100 note or any other currency you fancy in a plain envelope and send it to us at their snail mail address:

Annikki and Jacob Matthan
Vesaisentie 11 A
FIN-90150 OULU
FINLAND.

Print your name and address on the outside of the envelope and put a small self-addressed unstamped envelope inside.

Please do not send cheques or drafts. These instruments are no longer used in Finland and cost over € 100 to encash!

(They have received even € 50 in covers from some people in Europe – but that is a risk, and ill-advised!)

2. Anyone wanting to contribute a slightly larger sum can bank transfer whatever you can afford (and absolutely no more) to their bank account

Annikki and Jacob Matthan
Nordea Bank IBAN Number: FI91 2498 1800 0699 68
SWIFT Code / BIC: NDEAFIHH

Please put the words “Save Nostalgia” in the message box.

3. If you have a Paypal Account just send the small sum (virtually no cost) you can afford to this email address:

jmatthan@gmail.com

All amounts received will be acknowledged.

They hope to implement this new solution over the next few months.

They should be able to host some of your sites also.

(The operating server system (Snow Leopard) will be Apple Mac based so you can be sure no one will be hack into it!)

They will raise enough money to carry out this plan and get them back amongst all Cathedralites as well as their very wide spectrum of worldwide readers.

Annikki & Jacob Matthan

Moderators of the Seventh Heaven Google Group

Oulu, Finland

Seventh Heaven for Cathedralite 59ers

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