Elizabeth and her family with them from New Zealand for Christmas. Another daughter Claire works for the Commercial Farmers Union in Zimbabwe on ostrich breeding, she too hopes to be with them for Christmas. Tony and Deirdre are concerned about the serious AIDS epidemic, the widespread poverty and unacceptably high level of violent crime in South Africa.

Of course they grieve for the people of Zimbabwe too, who are facing starvation as the farming industry and businesses are being forced to close thus robbing them of the means of earning a living. While in England recently Deirdre visited Wooton-under-Edge, which is where she was originally evacuated, just for pupils and a small group of religious from the convent in Portsmouth, during the war. She found the big house in which the community and pupils lived. It was from there that she came as a pupil to the convent in Boscombe.

Paul Gillings rescued a book which recorded the winners of prizes and certificates in the Convent Junior School; it was started in 1936 and kept up until 1983. It was revived in 1988 for St. Thomas Garnet's School. Paul has kindly lent it to me and I hope to photocopy the pages to have a record to keep. It makes fascinating reading.

Glenn Edgeley-Long has spent some time recording most of it - from 1936 to 1974 - on the web site, under the title - Junior School Awards, - on the Junior School section.

Paul has also been able to help a little in answering the query concerning the whereabouts of the big statue of an angel, which watched over St. Joseph's, our Junior school. The family who donated the statue were keen to have it back when the Convent was closing; the plaque has gone too so we do not know who they are. Maybe someone knows?

If we can help you get in touch with old friends please ask; if we have no address we can publish the request in the newsletter.

Another way of making contact is via the intemet; if you have access to it please log on to www.rc-churches.net

Glenn Edgeley-Long has made the Website most interesting with photos and things of interest. He would be pleased to have some material, especially photographs, for a "where are they now," section.

There is another Website dedicated to reuniting school friends. Margaret Simpson (Atkins) told us about it. www.friendsrcunited.co.uk

Margaret found that some people had entered the school as, Convent of the Cross, and some as Boscombe Convent, obviously depending on when they were there.

Amanda/Mandy Dalley contacted Margaret asking if she was Trudie's sister, surname either Atkins or Simpson. Trudie is one of the girls Mandy is trying to track down from Junior boarder days at the convent; she left in 1969. Does anyone know of Trudie's whereabouts?

An e-mail has just arrived from Theresa Connolly (O'Neill) who was "in the class of 1966." Theresa would like news of Katie Board, Niki Fletcher Hilary Swan and Jennifer ?? (an ice skater)

In September Christine Thackray ( Browning) went to Australia for the wedding of Emma, daughter of John and Gay Donlevy(Browning), Pat Baff ( Browning) from Western Australia and Dorothy Sawtell (Brooks ), with whom Gay lives in Sydney while she is nursing, were there enjoying the celebrations.

THE LAST WORD

Jean Walsh spotted the following in their Parish newsletter; we thought that it might appeal to the majority of our readers!

One day, three men were hiking and unexpectedly came upon a large raging, violent river. They needed to get to the other side, but had no idea of how to do so.

The first man prayed to God, saying. "Please God, give me the strength to cross this river. "

Whoosh! God gave him big arms and strong legs, and he was able to swim across the river in about two hours, after almost drowning a couple of times.

Seeing this, the second man prayed to God, saying, "Please God, give me the strength and the tools to cross this river."

Whoosh! God gave him a rowboat and he was able to row across the river in about an hour, after almost capsizing the boat a couple of times.

The third man had seen how this worked out for the other two, so he also prayed to God saying, "Please God, give me the strength and the tools ... and the intelligence ... to cross the river."

Whoosh! God turned him into a woman. She looked at the map, hiked upstream a couple of hundred yards, and then walked across the bridge. "