Tamil Nadu - Udhagamandalam   

Long-time wish fulfilled

Udhagamandalam: For Terrance Tiessen, a Canadian retired Professor of Theology and Ethics, a long-time wish was fulfilled a couple of days ago. Having been a student of the Breeks Memorial School here about 50 years ago, he had for long nursed a fierce desire to ‘return to Ooty some day’.

With the time finally arriving Tiessen and his wife Gail were on a clicking spree on the Government Botanical Garden road here on Friday when The Hindu caught up with them.

Son of a Hyderabad-based Protestant missionary, Terrance had joined the Breeks Memorial School in 1953 and finished with a first class in 1959. According to Gail who had married him 43 years ago, conversations with Terrance invariably veered towards his days in this hill station. “I am glad we finally made it,” she said with a beam.

On Ooty in its present condition, he lamented ‘it has been ruined’. He added that because he had been warned he was not surprised. However, Gail opined that what she saw of the town from her hotel on Sheddon road had pleased her. “It is still a very beautiful place”, she said. In any place development is bound to take its toll, they said. Taking a walk down memory lane, Terrance said that one of his treasured possessions was a signature of Jawaharlal Nehru in his book of autographs which his headmaster E.A. Willy had obtained for him when the leader was here in 1959.

He recalled the names of some of the teachers who had taught him. Films seen in The Assembly Rooms and visits to the hills above the Botanical Garden for collecting wild guavas were etched in his memory.

While the trip to the Nilgiris was the highlight of his current tour of India, a feature which was likely to remain in his memory for long was a trip by the Nilgiri Mountain Railway. He was glad to learn that efforts were on to protect the heritage building which houses the Breeks School.

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