St. John's celebrated its 112th anniversary on Monday, January 18, 2016.
At the same time, we also bade farewell to Mr. Mustafa Kamal, the former PK HEM now promoted as PK Tadbir and Kurikulum in SMK Taman Desa.
The guest-of-honour for the birthday celebration was Mr. Michael Simon, President of the Malaysian Federation of La Sallian Alumni Associations.
As early as 7am, invited guests began arriving at the Board of Governors room to sign the visitors' book.
At 7.45am, the guests were ushered to the assembly area, accompanied by the bagpipes. After the Negaraku and state anthem, a series of speeches followed, starting with the School Captain.
Next to speak was Dr. M. Puvanendran, Principal of St. John's. He was then followed by Mr. Mustafa Kamal who addressed St. John's for the last time.
Last to take the podium was Mr. Michael Simon, the guest-of-honour for the birthday celebration. In his speech, Mr. Michael placed forth a challenge to Tuan Megat Mizan Nicholas Denney, the Chairman of the Board of Governors, to reinstate St. John's as an English-medium school to arrest the slide in English proficiency among students.
The school was then brought down memory lane with a presentation on the 112 illustrious years under the various Directors, put up by the prefects.
The grand finale of the event was the cutting of the cake. This year, every class brought a cake to the celebration and the cakes were cut after the singing of the birthday song.
It was indeed an exciting day for all Johannians, and it was good to see a number of old boys attending the birthday celebration this year.
Here's to a great year in St. John's.
Happy birthday, St. John's, and may God bless you always!
*Pictures courtesy of Deevnish (a.k.a. Jenko Chugani San), Garudamas