On 19th July Janette Steel said goodbye to her work as principal of the Chelsea Community Hospital School (CCHS) in London. I heard about this a few months ago through Martin Dixon.
I am very grateful to Janette for her work for hospital education in general and for her contributions to HOPE in particular. Janette was on the team that prepared the HOPE Congress 2006 (in London). HOPE has already had 5 excellent board members through the CCHS, for which Janette always gave space. Janette has always been the driving force behind CCHS’s wonderful initiative “Well at School”.
In short, Janette has contributed a lot to HOPE and that seemed like a good reason to surprise her at her farewell party.
Martin and I made a plan for this and last Friday I appeared at her party in London as a “mystery guest” in the form of an unrecognizable clown. I had chosen four music fragments that said something about me and HOPE, to give them hints when guessing the mystery guest.
All in all it was a very successful act, which caused a lot of fun at the party. At the end of the act I showed my real face and that was a nice surprise for everyone. Of course, in a short speech at the end I thanked Janette very much for her fantastic work for the CCHS and HOPE in all those 38 years.
(I paid for this trip to London myself and I will therefore not declare anything to HOPE for this.)
I wish you a nice summer and a good holiday.
Jan Haverkate
President of HOPE
