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A Celebration of Thirty Years of Bliss in Canada.
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BCI Celebrates Thirty Years of Bliss in Canada.From Sophia Kalman and other Bliss-Friend Hungary
Dear Friends,
Those miles you were mentioning in your message are real: the miles are outnumbering our available funds for travel, but spiritually we will definitely be with you. As a coincidence on October 20, we will have a day long brush-up day for teachers, therapists, and assistants, which will provide a great opportunity to remember the roots of our work.
During the last few years, I had the opportunity to describe the history of AAC in Hungary several times, and have never failed to express my deep felt gratitude toward BC! and personally, Shirley and Penny, who influenced my life so strongly, though unknowingly in 1983. At that time Hungary was a closed country hidden behind a cruel and senseless iron curtain, and to become a member of the Bliss-family meant not only a professional stronghold, but it also carried the opportunity to become a member of the "normal" world at the same time.
As I usually explain to my students, AAC is a huge and delicious cake, which Blissymbolics was the first slice to taste from. What happened in Hungary was exactly the same as it happened everywhere else: first people were eating only Bliss-cake and at the end said that it was not so tasty for everybody and stopped eating it. Today when we have the choice, hopefully the teachers of every country will realize that everybody should eat that special par of the cake which tastes (and serves) her students the best.
Keeping this in mind, we can only wish for BC! and ourselves that Blissymbolics find the appropriate and respected place among the other possibilities of AAC and be able to help people around the world and bring joy and meaning into their lives for another thirty years at least.
Good luck to all of you, and when you open that bottle of champagne, think about us thinking of you!
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