Sunday 1 July 2007

Farewell Mr Jameson!!

Friday marked an end of an era - Mr Jameson, principal of Rangeview Intermediate School retired! It's amazing how he was the longest serving principal in New Zealand before he retired! The assembly was held in their big new gym. Aonghas was part of the group representing Rutherford so he sat with those guys in the corner, while Hamish and I went upstairs to watch and my dad was somewhere down below.

The farewell assembly was pretty standard Rangeview stuff, starting off with the national anthem followed by prayers in both English and Maori. The rest of the programme consisted of school singing, orchestra, choir and kapa haka. The head students were wearing the new Rangeview blazers which look flash! It was also announced that the new garden at Rangeview with a sundial would be in Mr Jameson's memory. It's amazing how things are developing at Rangeview!

The assembly ended with Mr Jameson giving a speech. I was wondering if he was going to cry, but of course him being his staunch self he didn't in the end.

As soon as the assembly was over I rushed over to the Rutherford students to take a photo before going over to the basketball courts where everyone gathered for a final goodbye to Mr Jameson who was standing above on the staffroom balcony. As soon as everyone left we rushed over to Miss Rai's (the music teacher) classroom to catch up with her. On the way I caught up with my old yr 7 teacher Mrs Beaguely who still recognised me! She had kept up-to-date with all her past students' successes!

We then met up with Miss Rai in her classroom. We had a bit of a talk. Just as we were leaving we went past one wall with photos and newspaper clippings of current and past students and was surprised she still has the newspaper clipping and photo of me when I was back at Rangeview! Before leaving she also introduced us to the new principal of Rangeview who somehow recognised us as well!

We were on our way out when we walked past the hall where a function seemed to be taking place. We wanted to say goodbye to Mr Jameson so we were looking through the door to see if we could spot him when we were invited to come inside and have something to eat.

It was just lucky we were asked to come inside too! I caught up with an old intermediate school friend Kelsey (the receptionist's daughter too!), and a few other teachers as well. There was heaps of food there, and by the end of it we were given a whole plate of scones to take home!

The farewell assembly was pretty sad but it turned out to be a good catch-up and a walk through the old Rangeview memories!

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