3000 It's hard for austraLasia to show its age - each edition is a new birth
austraLasia #3000
It's
hard for austraLasia to show its age - each edition is a
new birth
EAO: 27 January 2012 --
Welcome to austraLasia #3000. How old are we? In human years,
15, but
in many ways it is hard for austraLasia to show its age -
every edition
is a new birth!
The Program of Animation
and
Government of the Rector Major in 1997 did not know
about blogs,
Twitter, Social Networks. It had in mind only one thing with
regard to
the then Australia-Asia Region, the same idea taken up in the
subsequent six year plan for the new EAO Region: encouraging provinces to create
an
electronic network. We can note, however, that it
also wanted
such a network to improve communications between the 'Centre'
and the
Provinces (B4.11 above). In the event they got a network which
could
help improve communication amongst the provinces, mainly.
The austraLasia network, beginning with a handful of email
addresses
and now closer to a thousand, was and remains today more along
the
lines of communication between the masses than
centre-periphery-centre. There are other tools for this
latter, and
austraLasia tries not to be one of them! In fact austraLasia
has served
many purposes, amongst which providing fodder for good nights,
putting
people in touch who haven't seen (or spoken!) in years,
offering
exercises for EFL, being a conduit for vital information in
conflict
(Timor and the Solomon Islands).
Interestingly enough, given the forms of content delivery that
have
evolved especially in the past decade (blogs, Twitter and
Facebook
especially), the form of content delivery that is the regular
email
newsletter has its own place in the communications ecosystem. It
delivers content in a particular way that other media do not.
Readers
of austraLasia over the 15 years, have continued to show their
appreciation for this form, occasionally urging some
adjustment to the
format, which is a separate matter. Thanks to Fr Dominic Savio
(THA)
for encouraging the most recent change of format, and to Bro
Hilario
Seo (KOR) for producing the current 'livery'.
The current year's collection of the e-letter is always stored
on Bosconet
(in fact I have yet to adjust it to 2012), but for all 3,000,
or most
of them, you can search themin
their own collection on SDL. This raises interesting
possibilities. You can search them by number or ID, which will
also
show that within the first 500 there are some gaps,
unfortunately; only
once things were well-established did we become more conscious
of the
need for accurate preservation. You can also search by subject
and even
by word (single) or phrase (using double quotes). For a more
scientific
search you can also use the 'phrase' search facility.
If you have an historical bent, you could find it interesting
to look
at the first 20, which quickly gives one an idea of the way
the medium
attempted to create this early network, indicates some of the
early
contributors, and provides some interesting historical
titbits.
The first 3 were all dated the same day (7 November). The year
is
missing, but it was 1997. You will note that the Fiji
formation house
was 'predicted' a year and a bit before it actually happened
(#2. It
was already in the planning, obviously), and that the first
contributor
from India was Fr Maria Arokiam, who is now the Regional for
South Asia
Region (#7) and still an avid reader. It was a sad item about
the death
by drowning of a confrere in Madras province. You will find a
tongue-in-cheek reflection on what the Millennium might mean,
two years
before it happened (#8) and an article by a lay person, Ashley
Trethowan, who 15 years later is still doing the same sterling
work and
has received civil recognition this year (#9 and #2908). In
other
words, you can already see that the e-letter was intended for
the
Salesian Family, and for provinces making up the entire
Region, and
offers a kind of running commentary on events in the Region.
Over time the e-letter's readership extended to all
English-speaking
provinces and a few non-English-speaking ones as well. The
inimitable
Fr Eddie Fitzgerald, now deceased, from Ireland, even
contributed with
a joke (#20). There are not a lot of jokes in the 3,000
- maybe
there should be more! So, given that an ex provincial
economer
sent me one today, and suggested it could be useful for fixing
Italy's
(and Greece's and just about anywhere else in the world's)
financial
woes, it seems appropriate to conclude this 3000th edition
with it,
just to emphasise one more feature of the e-letter - it is
intended to
brighten up your day, be constructive, as much as possible!
THE BANKING CRISIS SIMPLY EXPLAINED
Young Paddy bought
a donkey from a farmer for £100. The farmer agreed
to deliver the donkey the next day... The next day he
drove up and said, 'Sorry son, but I have some bad news...
The donkey's
died'. Paddy replied,
'Well then, just give me my money back'. The farmer said,
'Can't do that. I've already spent it'. Paddy said, 'OK
then, just bring me the dead donkey'. The farmer asked,
'What are you going to do with him?' Paddy said, 'I'm
going to raffle him off'. The farmer said,
'You can't raffle a dead donkey!' Paddy said, 'Sure I
can. Watch me. I just won't tell anybody he's dead'. A month later, the
farmer met up with Paddy and asked, 'What happened with that
dead
donkey?' Paddy said, 'I
raffled him off. I sold 500 tickets at two pounds a piece
and made a
profit of £898'. The farmer said,
'Didn't anyone complain?' Paddy said, 'Just
the guy who won. So I gave him his two pounds back'.
Paddy now works for
the Royal Bank of Scotland (or any other bank you care to
name!)
