OUD ROEST DOWN UNDER - THE STORY

In 1985 an ex RIL ships officer, Willem Bras, called on other ex Royal Interocean Lines personnel to get together.
Retired Captain Wim Schroeder read Willem Bras’ request in the Nedlloyd Parade, the in-house magazine of Royal Interocean Lines and called Willem.

Wim Schoeder had kept in touch with many ex KPM, RIL and Nedlloyd people and also maintained contact with the Sydney Nedlloyd office. The Nedlloyd office offered their mailing list of ex personnel and together with Wim Schroeder’s contacts a list of some hundred names was produced.  
The two organisers booked an Indonesian restaurant, the Warung Indonesia, for a Saturday night rijsttafel and set out to advertise the venue.
Willem Bras managed to get the company he worked for at the time to print and post the convocations and 80 invitations were sent out for the first Reunion.

The first Reunion was a huge success, and it became clear that many eligible people were disappointed not to have been invited. It was then decided to publicise future reunions on the S B S Radio Dutch language program, in the Dutch Australian Weekly and at the same time open the reunion to others who had been closely associated with KPM, RIL and Nedlloyd.
As a result the mailing list grew to double the size and included many names from interstate.

The reunionists refer to themselves as Oud Roest which in colloquial Dutch means, scrap or scrap heap, but dont let the name fool you! Each and every Reunion has been shiny! The second Reunion had the biggest attendance, 95 people; the average number of people nowadays is 60.

Over the years our reunions have been held in Indonesian, Malaysian or Chinese restaurants. We have had a Harbour cruise for variety but we try to keep the venue in the City and close to public transport. The annual Reunion is always held on the last Saturday in May.

Nedlloyd offered to print and post the invitations after the third Reunion. P&O Nedlloyd continued the tradition and fully supports our annual get together.

The Reunion itself is informal. There are some announcements and we do invite the Companys Manager to give a short address on what has happened in the Company over the last year.

We are now looking forward to our 20th Reunion on Saturday 28 may 2005.

Sadly Wim Schroeder passed away in October 2003 after a long illness. He will be missed by all of us.

John Papenhuyzen
+61 2 9871 4637

May 2005

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