| rook |
Posted
on 09-Jul-03 08:45 AM
FYI First Posted by Ashu
Eugene L. Watrin was born on 28th July 1920 in Dayton, Ohio in America. It's a town that lays claim to fame in the fact that the Wright brothers lived there. He says it was a normal childhood where his father worked with General Motors and his mother was a housewife, and he tells me that he had 3 sisters and one brother he grew up with. Looking for a key moment that might have turned him towards his chosen field, I ask him what it was that put him on his path of service. He tells me simply that he chose it for himself - though his parents and teachers were amongst the people that influenced him in his outlook.
So, it seems that there were no visions, no key moments and no drama that turned Fr. Watrin's life to the service of God. Just a man making a choice about what he wanted to do with his life.
From high school he went to college at Xaviers University Cincinnati for a bachelors degree in literature and then on to Loyola University Chicago from where he earned a M.A. in English as well as an M.Ed in Guidance and Counseling. He was by now a member of the Jesuit priesthood and in 1946, he set sail for India to arrive on January 1947 on the shores of what would be his home for the next eight and a half years.
n 1947 the British were fast losing their grip on the Indian subcontinent and in August 15th 1947, when India gained independence from England, Father Watrin remembers being at Sacred Heart School in Bihar, where he was fulfilling his first assignment. This was followed by two years teaching at St. Xaviers, Jaipur, a year in Pune, Maharashtra, followed by a stint in Kurseong in West Bengal. In the year before he came to Nepal, he was back in Bihar for a short period and remembers visiting Nepal for the first time in 1955, flying in on a DC3 Dakota.
At that time, our international airport was what its original name implied, a grazing ground, and so, when Father Watrin made his second journey into Nepal to begin his work here, it was the monsoon season and the airport was closed. And so, he journeyed through Rauxal on the Indian border to Nepal, and walked for three days over to come to Katmandu. It was May in the year 1955, and he arrived in Kathmandu on the 15th of that month.
Once here, he took up the position of Vice-Principal at St. Xaviers High School at Godavari, and since it was such a small school back then, he also held the position of Hostel Prefect and Senior English teacher. He also started the Nepal scouts at Godaveri in the same year. He tells me that there were just 5 students appearing for their Senior Cambridge Examination that year, another five the following year, and 14 in the third year.
In 1962 he became the Principal of Godavari High School and held this position till 1967. Two years later, he moved to the city to take up his duties at the newly formed St. Xaviers School at Jawlakhel and here, between 1969 and 1988, he taught English at the school and was also Moderator and Director of GAA. In the same year, he also started St. Xaviers College in Maitighar.
By now my conversation with Fr. Watrin had already covered 43 years of his stay in Nepal and in this period, he had already become a citizen of this country. It seemed to me though, that I had missed out on it entirely. After all, what I had were just the simple facts that he taught at school and administered the GAA, and this seemed too little to make a story out of.
There was of course his involvement with the GAA and its work, and the SAV and other institutions, but somehow at all seemed too simple. About now it had begun to occur to me that this was pretty much how he saw himself and his achievements.Before I leave, I ask him if he has some pictures from earlier days that I may look at and he brings an old, thick album from the next room. Poring over them, we come across pictures from an era when photographs were in black and white only, and yellow and faded clippings printed a quarter century ago by the Rising Nepal and other papers trace awards, moments in his life, and moments in the history of Nepal. It is an album filled with memories, as old albums tend to be, and it gives me a glimpse of his history and work, that I could not hope to represent here.
And finally I ask myself; do these four pages do any justice to the life of this man? Probably not, is the answer. But to a man who would write about his life in a page and a half, these four pages might even seem a bit extravagant.
The fact is, his work and life cannot be represented in a few words, or even many. It is represented in the lives of the people he has affected and influenced - and that is a whole lot of lives in the years he has been here. It is not a concept for words to encompass, rather a feeling that is there with those that know him.
For here seems to be a man who through his steadfast dedication to his ideals, has done what he set out to do, and more, without making a big noise about it. To me, the man is an example of how one could live a good life, even a great one, if one has the vision and the will to do day by day, what he dreams of doing with his life. And great things will happen. Just look at Eugene L. Watrin.
He is recovering at
Fr. Watrin
%Helen Chloe
5081 Bristol Court
Loveland, Ohio 45140
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