AT THE PRIVATE PARTY OF MIKE AND YVETTE ‘S 50TH WEDDING CELEBRATION.
It must be stated here that this presentation of Mike and Yvette’s celebration of their Golden Jubilee East African Safari Party depicting 1968 is taken from their private party held in Antigonish on 8th June 2018, in which they created the ambiance for a super Safari tour for their family and friends in order to give them a taste of their world in the East Africa of 1968 from their first meeting, to their marriage, and journey via Europe to Canada, Mike’s homeland.
All the ‘ creations ‘ herein are the brain child of my sister Yvette to whom I give full credit as artist par excellence. She is most willing to share her creative ideas with all her family and friends who ask.
All the songs accompanying the slide shows are from that era, ie: 1968, together with a smattering of some pictures of Mombasa, Zanzibar and Nairobi and Kilimanjaro used to capture the true flavour of the East Africa of 1968. Full credit is given to the artists who had won the couples’ hearts fifty years ago, and still do fifty years today. The use of the songs and pictures herein are wonderfully complimentary in the creating of the ambiance for a most special nostalgic journey of ‘once upon a time in East Africa.’...a true love story.
The rest of the pictures from 1968-2018 are Yvette’s and her team of devoted camera artists attending the 2018 events, including the High Mass videos and songs taken at the Monastery, and the Safari party , and home brunch.
Enjoy the celebration captured in this website titled:
www.50th
Welcome to Antigonish...August 1969
Our three babies...24 karat pure gold nuggets in our hearts
Aleixo our first-born..the most beautiful baby I had ever seen born three days short of our first anniversary...1969
Anna Marie... another beauty...born on the queen’s birthday hence our princess...1972
Joseph...Our beautiful miracle baby...1977
St. Ninian’s Cathedral...Antigonish.
CITIES
Overview of Mombasa....where Mike and Yvette met and were married in, 50 years ago.
Mombasa
Mombasa...beach
Msa beach
Msa Old Port
A garawa [boat] for Mike and Yvette’s Safari honeymoon trip to Canada 1968
Old Arab door... Zanzibar... Yvette’s birth place
Memories of Zanzibar’s Stone Town, streets, museum and sultan’s palace.
WEDDINGS
Aleixo and Debra
Anna Marie and David
Joseph and Kelly
Mike’s parents’... Joe and Sophie Muise
Yvette’s parents... Aleixo and Laurie de Souza
AND,
HERE
IT IS... OUR VERY OWN ‘GARAWA’..that’s all we could afford to ferry us
all the way to Canada via sixteen stops over Africa and Europe ... a
trip of a life-time!
HONEYMOON TRIP
1... Overview of Africa’s highest mountain.
2...Mike’s pics of his conquest of Kilimanjaro in 1967, and wreath presented to him as successful climber of the mountain, and which he gifted to Yvette on their wedding day via his brother Medric before Mass.
1967 was Canada’s centennial year and expo 67 was a big hit, as was Mike’s conquest of Kilimanjaro.
NAIROBI... MIKE PROPOSED TO YVETTE AT THE NAIROBI ARBORETUM 24th December 1967
1...The entrance to the Arboretum.
2...A picture of serenity in the arboretum
3... Sign to the arboretum
4...Incense tree fronds.
5... incense trees
6...incense tree branch
7...LOVE KNOT... A special story...on Christmas Eve 1967 when Mike proposed to Yvette as they sat on a bench under a magnificent incense tree fro Lebanon, and as Yvette said ‘yes’, a frond from that magnificent tree fell into her lap, and taking it as a good omen she wove it into a knot she called the LOVE KNOT and told Mike she would keep it forever. She still has it.
8... Last Christmas 2017, Yvette brought out the Love Knot and photographed it with some felt poinsettias that were given to her by her dear friend Barbara Pluta, as Mike and Yvette celebrated the 50th anniversary of that proposal in Kenya that many years ago.
In 1972, Yvette and Mike met a Nigerian lady studying at the Coady International Institute in Antigonish at St. F.X. University. She was six months pregnant and as the university had no facility to house a new born infant, the baby was going to be shipped out to an African-Canadian family an hour away from Antigonish. Poor Regina was distressed that she was to be parted from her baby right from birth with no hope of seeing him for days or weeks at a time.
Mike and Yvette worried for her too, and before long offered to take the baby in to add to their family of four-month old new baby of theirs...Anna Marie, together with their three year old son Aleixo....for a period of five months afterwhich Regina would be returning to Nigeria. Thus Luke Coady became their adopted son and god-son.
1972 was Yvette and Mike’s international year as they helped yet another person from Africa settle in Canada when they sponsored Rita Dias a former student of theirs from Uganda who asked for assistance to get to Canada due to the political strife in Uganda . She arrived in September and was happily settled, and married. Her brother Polly came shortly thereafter and he and his wife Theodora were married from Mike and Yvette’s home.
1...UNITED NATION TRIO... Anna Marie , Luke Coady, and Aleixo.
2...with Regina....Yvette and Mike...god-parents.
3...the bishop of Nigeria came to their house and blessed y&m , the children, and their home with grateful heart.
4...Regina and her baby Luke Coady... a regal lady[ now in heaven...r.i.p.]
5...Christening day at St. F.X. Chapel
6... “ “ at Chapel steps
7...The trio again
8 ...the blessing
9... Regina’s thank you note to Yvette and Mike
10... Forty years later [40]...Regina and Luke came back to visit Yvette and Mike he calls his parents.
11... the trio once again.
12...Our home of 1972
13 ... Rita and Polly visit.
SACRED HEART
SACRED HEART 1972
This macrame hanging made by Yvette in 1972 when they bought their home, was blest, together with their home which was dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, by their dear friend Fr. Doug Murphy, in the presence of dear friends and neighbours. Yvette had grown up with devotion to the Sacred Heart through her grandparents Agapitus and Christina de Souza in Zanzibar.... and both Mike and Yvette have a special devotion to the Sacred Heart. Amazingly, Mike had taught at the Sacred Heart High School in Mombasa.
AND.... WHAT YVETTE CALLS SERENDIPITY..is this.....when Yvette was researching the readings for the Anniversary 2018 Mass, she discovered to her delight beyond belief, that this year 8th June 2018 was the solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus feast. This assured both Yvette and Mike that heaven was on their side now more than ever before. This was the creme de la creme.
WEDDING PICS
WEDDING PICTURES
Yvette and Mike would like everybody to know that their wedding day was made even more beautiful in 1968 by their school children whom they had invited to their wedding. The pictures tell the true story of much the children loved their teachers as they attended a what they called a fairytale wedding. Y&M consider themselves truly blest. It poured,not only rain, but blessing galore amidst buckets of flower petals an confetti as the pictures tell.
Mike and Yvette have loved and dedicated their lives to ‘Children’, and they are still reaping the wonderful blessings from their devotion to teaching children everywhere, with unconditional love.
WILD LIFE PICTURES AND MORE
#1620...Mombasa Kilindini Road...The Tusks
#1621... Two Fishes hotel ... honeymoon spot....Mombasa 1968
#1622...Yvette ‘S Star of the Sea School... Mombasa
#1625...at the summit of Kilimanjaro
#1629... Nairobi Arboretum
#1640...zebra skin...inspiration for Yvette’s knitted zebra blanket
#1654...Zanzibar
#1655...St. Joseph’s Cathedral Zanzibar.
#1660...Mike’s Sacred Heart School Mombasa
#1662...Mike’s parent’s home, built by his father Joe Muise in New Waterford Cape Breton
#1668... Yvette’s wild life animals mounted and ready for the 50th anniversary
#1676... Safari Drink.... gifted to Yvette and Mike some 35 years ago
#’s 1710-62... East African Wild life.
YVETTE AND MIKE BEFORE THEY WERE MARRIED
#1660/1662...Sacred Heart and Mike’s parent’s home... a painting by Yvette.
#1672.../1678... yvette at Kenya’s concours d’elegance scooter rally in Nairobi 1963
Yvette won a trophy for the best dressed lady coordinated with the colours of the Vespa scooter of light grey and green she owned.1679
#1679...Mike and his motorbike...1968
#1680... tennis partners at Highridge college Nairobi
#1681 ...yvette sings Tammy at the Goan Institute mombasa#
#1682... y at University of Southampton at Chamberlain Hall of residence 1964
#1683,,,y... scooter girl at Earls Court London England
#1684...A farewell to Yvette by Fr. Eddie Cochran and their combined choirs.
#1686... Y’s grade six class in New Victoria Cape Breton 1968
#1687...Y sings at a party
#1689...Yvette’s Star of the Sea School pic 1967
#1691/1702... I am Mike.... Mike am I.
WILDLIFE
PLEASE NOTE
ALL THE WILDLIFE PHOTOS WERE TAKEN BY BENNY AND ANYONE IS FREE TO COPY.
Yvette Muise did the same trip to Ngorogoro Crater in 1965 with her School kids and would have captured the same wildlife pics as I have done many years later.
PLEASE NOTE
ALL THE WILDLIFE PHOTOS WERE TAKEN BY BENNY AND ANYONE IS FREE TO COPY.
Yvette Muise did the same trip to Ngorogoro Crater in 1965 with her School kids and would have captured the same wildlife pics as I have done many years later.
SPECIAL NOTE TO BEN AN BETTY
THANK YOU BEN AND BETTY AND ALL YOUR FAMILY FOR THE LOVELY GIFT OF THE BLOG YOU ARE ASSEMBLING FOR US AND WHICH WE ARE AWAITING ITS ARRIVAL WITH MOST GRATEFUL HEARTS. WE’RE SURE IT’S GOING TO BE A HIT WHICH WE WILL SHARE WITH ALL OUR FAMILIES AND FRIENDS.
THANK YOU. ASANTE SANA
LOVE
YVETTE AND MIKE
THANK YOU BEN AND BETTY AND ALL YOUR FAMILY FOR THE LOVELY GIFT OF THE BLOG YOU ARE ASSEMBLING FOR US AND WHICH WE ARE AWAITING ITS ARRIVAL WITH MOST GRATEFUL HEARTS. WE’RE SURE IT’S GOING TO BE A HIT WHICH WE WILL SHARE WITH ALL OUR FAMILIES AND FRIENDS.
THANK YOU. ASANTE SANA
LOVE
YVETTE AND MIKE