SHILLONG: Aiming to increase awareness and encourage students to preserve cultural heritages, monuments and stately homes in Shillong, the Department of Travel Tourism Management of Martin Luther Christian University on Thursday commemorated the World Heritage Week 2015 by organising a Heritage Walk in the central part of Shillong.
The Heritage Walk, started at Motphran with Hayley DK Donn, HoD, Department of Travel Tourism Management, MLCU, gave a brief introduction of the objective of the Walk and also inaugurated the same.
MLCU students presented a brief history of the Motphran Memorial and spoke at length on the importance of preserving the monument which was built in memory of the Khasi soldiers who had fought in World War II.
The Walk then moved on to the house of Sitimon Sawain, great granddaughter of Babu Jeebon Roy.
The house, built by Babu Jeebon Roy, still stands as it did during his time with some slight modifications.
The students also visited the house of Spar Mairom, who also lives in Umsohsun and who is the great grandniece of Babu Jeebon Roy. She informed that Jeebon Roy used to live in this house when he visited Shillong.
She also showed old photographs and other relics which had been passed down to her from earlier generations.
The Walk then proceeded to the building of the Seng Khasi Seng Kmie located in Mawkhar, where Arwan S Tariang, general secretary, Seng Khasi, spoke on the history of the Khasi faith and how the British did not recognize it as a religion.
The next point of visit of the Walk was one of the oldest hospitals in the State, the Dr. H Gordon Roberts Hospital in Jaiaw. The students were given a brief history of the place and were later taken for a tour around the different working areas of the Hospital which remained in their original structure built in 1922.
The students were also taken to the power room which was the base for the steam engine used since the British era to provide power to the Hospital and the laundry room which still has almost all the equipment from that era with some of them too old to be used any more.
The last point of the Walk was the KJP Girls Higher Secondary School, where the Principal, H.M. Marwein, spoke about the history of the school which was established in 1982 by the Welsh Missionaries.
The main school building still remains as it did when it was first built with few additions of modern architecture to accommodate the growing number of students.
