January

In the past week I have managed to locate another French cousin named Claude, well at this stage we think we are cousins. Claude has been kind enough to locate some French records to help establish our potential relationship. It always amazes me that people I meet through genealogy are so kind and so helpful, even people who are not even related. This says a lot about the fact that the vast majority of people in this world are good and very kind. It's reassuring to know that in spite of all the negative reports we hear in the news about human behaviour, the vast majority of people are civilised and responsible. We only have to look to the events surrounding the recent floods in Queensland, northern NSW and Victoria. The response by people to these events is heartening.


During the past three weeks I have been going through some old photographs and loading many of them onto my flickr site. Many are not my photographs, some belong to my mother Jeanne, who would have to be the world worse photographer - renown for disembodying people and managing to capture ceilings, blank walls and the like in favour of the totality of the subject. There is a classic Jeanne photograph where the head of my brother Ross sits at the bottom of the frame and a vast expense of ceiling fills the field of vision. If I can locate that photograph I'll post it here. You'll need to have an invitation from me to see my personal photographs, but the vast majority are freely available at my flickr site.


During last year my best friend and his wife Asia (Joanna) visited Australia from Poland. Here are some photographs from their visit. I put up the Polish and Australian flags to signify welcome. L-R Myself, Julia, Asia and Kevin's mother Margaret outside my home. We all went up the coast to visit Margaret's rural property at Pacific Palms. It was good to catch up with some of Kevin's family, many of whom I've not seen for some years. While there Kevin and me got busy trying to remove the dreaded lantana as this shot indicates. Lantana removal is like painting the Sydney Harbour Bridge, once you seem to have finished, you have to start all over again. It's a never ending job - thanks Mrs MacQuarrie!!! L-R Kevin and me. We could have spent the entire time at Pacific Palms cutting down lantana.

Going through these old photographs I found some from my graduation so I thought I'd post one here. Photograph by Anthony Steklenborg. L-R my sister Yvonne, my mother Jeanne, myself and my good friend Barrie Jones, at the University of New South Wales, Kensington.

I've been remiss of late in not posting to my blog, and it is my New Year's intention to change that.

On the family history front, I've made some good progress, but much is yet to be completed. A new contact has been made with a cousin Gilles in France. Whilst I need to do more on the French side of the family, the English side seems easier to research. I'm in the process of joining a French genealogical society, which might make research a little easier.


In the past year our school in Poland has come along well, especially with the refurbishment of an old building leased to us by the Gdansk City Hall. We moved into the new building in September and both students and staff seem to be very happy with the move to a new location in Przymorze. We have also up-dated our web pages for the school. The new web address is http://www.bisg.edu.pl/index.php


As I'm not able to get about much these days, my photographic adventures have been some what curtailed - my family are always complaining that I never seem to show my photographs, but they never seem to visit my flickr site!


I made the big push to grow more vegetables to become more self-sufficient, but my tomatoes and peppers don't seem to share my enthusiasm! After giving them a final warning they seem to have picked up their game – but results are in the eating…I’ll keep you posted on their progress. Gardening use to be one of my favourite activities!


This blog seems more like my own personal diary, as I’m almost 100% sure nobody actually reads it. Of course that won’t stop me writing to it, because it will be here for posterity, long after I have gone. I really can’t complain too much as it has been a fairly poor effort so far by me. If I were to rate my own blog it would rate no more than 2 out of 10, and I’m being kind to myself.


My mother Jeanne and her Great Great Grandson Michael Harvey.


Our mother Jeanne celebrated her 91st Birthday in December 2010. She maintains a good sense of humour and her thinking cuts through anyone’s bullshit. People with a high opinion of their own self-importance have never impressed her. She says she is not interested to live to 100 years, but she always said she would when she was young.

In 2010 I managed to attend the 50th Anniversary Dinner and celebrations of my old high school. It was an interesting day and evening. More than 500 people attended. Although I didn’t find anyone I knew from my year. There were a few from the same time frame, but they were in other classes. It was amazing that our old Deputy Principal Mr. Ford was in attendance for the evening events, and at 98 years old he did a great job with his anecdotal accounts of his time at the school. They were all very funny, especially considering how our educational systems has become far too politically “correct” – and in the process has lost its way in dealing with the education of the young! School was tough in my day – it was a time when if you didn’t work, you failed school, unlike today when nobody fails. Schools today are sausage factories – turning out uniform items of production, many of which contain no meat!

My best mate Kevin and his wife Asia were her from Poland in 2010. It was great to see them and enjoy their company, although it was an all too short a visit. I also got to meet their beautiful little daughter Julia. She is just beautiful!

My best mate Kevin, with Asia and Julia.

My new project for 2011 follows the purchase of a new dat-recorder. Firstly, I'll need to learn how to operate this new device - more technology added to my list.