Cramming in a quick trip to Boston, Cambridge and New Haven and catching up with some ex-students and seeing them in their university environment was very inspiring and full of proud moments.
First stop: visit my two Berklee Babies in Boston. Both Cliodhna and Ankti were in my IB music class and both successfully auditioned in the first ever Berklee College of Music auditions to be held in Singapore, March 2012. I remember the weekend we did some practice auditions. I threw sight-reading, ear tests and interview questions at them. Ankit (or “Kitty” as he is affectionately known), was horrified when I asked him to sing back some short melodies. He said “I’m a drummer, I don’t sing!” – Hah! I tried to explain to him that it was a necessary part of aural testing. The best I could achieve was getting him to hum. The next day they both returned feeling good about their interviews and Kitty exclaimed that yes – he had to sing, and sing he did! Good for him!
The worst part of the process was the month long wait for the results. They were to be 
notified on the first weekend of the end of term holiday when I was to be in Melbourne for the exciting arrival of my first grandchild. I told them both to text if they didn’t get in and call if they did. You can’t imagine how excited I was when I saw their names pop up on my ringing phone! Visiting them was such fun! Kitty met me at the bus station and took me to his spotlessly clean apartment which he shares with Young Oh – another ex UWCSEA student. Cliodhna did not know of my arrival and Kitty had arranged for her to come over for dinner. Here is her precious reaction which blew me away – I am so glad Kitty captured this moment!
I stayed three nights and we had some wonderful moments. They were great hosts and took me on a tour of Berklee, including the library and I also got to sit in on one of Kitty’s ensemble classes.
They also showed me around Boston, which seems such an interesting and beautiful city. I was a little surprised we could not go to a bar and enjoy some live music, especially being in such a musically vibrant place, but the rather strange thing about USA is that the legal drinking age is 21! Very difficult to comprehend considering they can drive at age 15 and own a gun at age? They were not even permitted to be IN a bar to listen to some live music without drinking alchohol – even with me! (We more than made up for this with some parties in the apartment).
I initially did not realize that Harvard is so close to Boston, being in the quaint neighbouring city of Cambridge. I arranged to meet up with Brandon, class of 2003, and Enzo, class of 2010. Brandon was in Cantabile (my choir) and played Jesus in our mega Jesus Christ Superstar production. He is now doing postgraduate Law studies. Enzo is an undergraduate student in his 3rd year. He was a scholar at UWCSEA from Lima and I was fortunate enough to meet his family when I was there in August. Enzo gave me a whirlwind tour of the campus with its magnificent buildings.
From Boston I took a train to New Haven on invitation from Chihiro, class of 2011 and another Cantabile singer. I was actually met by Vaskar, as Chihiro was in class when I arrived. Vaskar is a very special young man. On request from a keynote speaker, Peter Dalglish, founder of Street Kids International, I invited Vaskar to a Round Square conference I ran at UWCSEA. He was a bright young boy from Nepal and the trip was full of many firsts for him. Vaskar ended up returning to UWCSEA with the help of a generous sponsor and graduated with an excellent IB score that earned him a well deserved full scholarship to Yale. He is currently in his third year majoring in Mathematics.
Yale is also a beautiful university with magnificent old buildings and courtyards and impressively equipped colleges.
Chihiro had specifically asked me to visit on a Thursday as she wanted me to come to one of her choir rehearsals. I felt a tinge of pride when she introduced me as her high school choir teacher. She sings in a Slavic girls choir, which I find quite remarkable. They sing mostly in three parts and have a tradition spanning over 40 years. Once they started singing I strongly suspected that perhaps they were originally inspired by the famous Bulgarian Womens’ Radio Choir. They were very impressive, with distinctive middle eastern intervals, melismatic lines and rich, gutsy altos. Here are some snippets of the choir…..
I stayed overnight in Chihiro’s college common room before returning the next day to New York by bus.
I had many invitations to visit students studying at universities all over the US and Canada. It would have been really very interesting to do so, and it was difficult to accept some and turn others down, but I am headed for Africa. I guess I will have to plan another sabbatical!