SUVA: 17th May 2006 -- These days find Fr Klement,
Regional Councillor for East Asia-Oceania, astride the international
dateline, pretty much literally! Other than some parts of the
Kamchatka Peninsula and Eastern Russia there is nowhere else on the
globe that you can stand astride the dateline - except in Fiji!
Fortunately they push the actual 'date' a little East on sea rather
than land, so people don't have to spend their day walking backwards
into the future! But tomorrow Fr Klement will have the odd
experience of an hour and bit flight to Samoa where he will arrive
yesterday, only to find himself in some sort of tomorrow three days
later again, having lost a day out of his life - confused? Then
you'll know why most international visitors to Fiji and Samoa often
arrive too early or too late, including not a few important Salesian
visitors.
However, with the assiduous attention of the
Australian province, to which these two entities belong (only
Salesianwise, they are independent nations), Fr Klement is guaranteed
to be arriving on the right day, so long as Air Fiji and Air Pacific
have their act together, and, well, that is another story.
In speaking with the nine brothers in formation in
the community - all nine of them in preparation for priesthood at
various stages - immediate postnovitiate to their final year of
theology - Fr Klement has taken pains to describe the wider EAO Region
to these young men, and has opened up vistas of the Congregation's
missionary dimension for them. Three of those in their final year
spent their practical training years in Papua New Guinea, while a
fourth spent his time in Australia.
Tomorrow, Fr Klement moves on to Apia, Samoa and
from there will come through Australia (Melbourne) before heading back
to Rome - though in reality he will only be in Rome a few brief hours
before moving out to Jerusalem with the General Council who will be
making their annual Retreat in the Holy Land.
austraLasia hopes to keep up some kind of service
over the next week or so, but its coordinator is in the African
continent engaged in communications meetings. That means he
should be 'connected' of course, but you will understand if the odd day
passes without something coming your way.
And one final note - today is the Name Day of Fr
Pascual. He also keeps a birthday but as he has often told people
at the Casa Generalizia, his birthday falls too close to
Christmas! Anyway, austraLasia offers him greetings in the name
of its readers, but it's never too late to follow that up personally if
you wish.
________________
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