Chilean Army Officer Going To Antarctic

Press, Volume C, Issue 29403, 4 January 1961, Page 13

Chilean Army Officer Going To Antarctic

Learning English and show jumping of horses are two of the Chief interests of LieutenantColonel Hernan Danyau. an intelligence officer in the cavalry division of the Chilean Army, who is in Christchurch waiting to go south in the ice-breaker, Staten Island, as a Chilean Government observer of United States Antarctic operations.

Colonel Danyau arrived at Lyttelton last Wednesday in the Alatna, and expects to sail in the Staten Island on January 10. He did not expect to be in Christchurch so long (having come with only one suit beside his military uniform) but he is welcoming the opportunity to brush up his English, even if he will not have time to try out any New Zealand horses.

He will also welcome the opening of the shops today so that he can buy another suit, and a few souvenirs to take home to Chile.

Although the United States is the only English-speaking country Colonel Danyau has so far visited, he speaks English with an accent remarkably similar to that of the average New Zealander. He attributes this to the fact that he was taught to speak and write English as a child by an English woman in Valparaiso, Colonel Danyau's home town. Before leaving Santiago on his present trip. Colonel Danyau took a few “brushing up" English lessons from a Mr W. Rollitt, who runs an English school there. Strangely enough, his father, Mr Harold William Rollitt, lived in Christchurch before going to Chile, and Colonel Danyau is wondering if any relatives are still living here. Colonel Danyau speaks English fluently enough to enthuse about Christchurch. “I love Christchurch,” he said last evening. “As a city, it is the cleanest I have ever seen. You cannot see on the streets, beggar people. I have not seen slums here, but of course I have not seen the outer suburbs.”

Colonel Danyau said be had seen the Botanic Gardens. Hagley Park, and the city’s tree-lined riverbanks and squares. They delighted him, and he could not help noticing the interest of the Christchurch people in maintaining such cleanness and neatness, and giving such a good impression to tourists.

But most of all. Colonel Danyau said he was impressed with the friendliness of New Zealand people. "I’ve never seen more friendly people than you are,” he said. >

Colonel Danyau busily practised English by talking with a reporter about his career in the Chilean Army, Chile’s Antarctic interests and bases, language

studies in Chilean schools,, soccer and show jumping (two of the leading Chilean sports), and comparisons of climate and food between Santiago and Christchurch, and the devastating earthquakes in Chile last May. He had entered the Army as a cadet of 16. and became a second lieutenant at 20, he said. Now 44, he had seen 24 years' service, the greater part as a cavalry officer, although for a period he was second in command of a mountain infantry regiment.

As a cavalry officer. Colonel Danyau is naturally a keen show rider, and regularly competes in a sport in which Chile can hold its own with the rest of the world. Indeed, a Chilean horse still holds the world record for a high jump—2.47 metres. In 1952. Colonel Danvan won an important championship contested by riders from many different provinces throughout Chile, and he has had many other show ring successes. Colonel Danyau described an international show-jumping contest in Santiago last February at which riders from the United States, England. France, Germany. Italy, and other South American countries competed and said that a similar one would be organised this year. Colonel Danyau was chief of staff of an Army relief organisation set up after the disastrous earthquakes and tidal waves in Chile last May, and travelled throughout the stricken areas, seeing all the damage. “It was terrific,” he sn’d. ‘‘Some towns quite disappeared.” The death roll was put about 600. Colonel Danyau said. Valdivia. a fine city of about 63.000 people, suffered the greatest damage of all, and might have been completely destroyed had not engineers managed to release waters, dammed up by the earthquake, which threatened to sweep it away. As it was. some small fishing villages on the coasts were swent inland. One still could see the general pattern of the village where the streets bad been, but the houses and buildines hod simply been swept away and were left scattered about the fields inland.