the passing away of a great educationist

read jeff ooi’s blog on ‘Remembering Rev. Fr. A Julien (1917 – 2004).

my comments can be found there.

the news is also found on the star paper of today on page 8. (can’t find it online!).
UPDATED: some excerpt from the star report.

He sailed to the then Malaya 52 years ago and dedicated a great part of his life to education and helping the poor.

When he passed away yesterday at the Little Sisters of the Poor, Datuk Father Arthur Julien had touched many hearts from students to labourers and fishermen.

The 87 years old Belgian missinary, who spoke fluent Mandarin and Hokkien, had founded three Chines schools – the Heng Ee Primary School in 1952, its secondary school in 1967 and preschool in 1969.

He was fondly likened to a “gardener” who had pruned and planted love in those who knew him.

his funeral will be held on sept. 14, tuesday at 10.00am at the cathedral of the holy spirit, island park, green lane, penang. the heng ee board of director’s vice president, seow teng heang had said that nearly 2000 students from SM heng ee uniformed societies would reprsent the school at his funeral. and of course heng ee’s school band would be there too.

personally i do not knew fr julien well. when he was retired and was sent to the little sisters of the poor, once in a while, he would come to the parish which i belongs to – church of our lady of sorrows, which btw, is next to the heng ee primary school (same grounds) – that was the time i used to run into him once in a while.
several of our priests have a ‘doctor’ tittle but he was the one and only with a ‘datuk’ tittle!

may the soul of fr julien rest in peace.
(NOTE: click on trackback to read peter tan’s blog on fr julien with pictures after he went to pay his respect to him this morning)