RETIRED councillor Monica Morse was taken by surprise last week when she was honoured with a tree in Bathurst's Ohkuma Garden.
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Bathurst has a shared a sister city relationship with Ohkuma since 1991, and Mrs Morse has been involved in that relationship throughout the 30 years.
She just concluded her career with Bathurst council, opting not to run for a fourth term, but the council wasn't quite finished with her.
To honour her decades-long commitment to the sister city relationship, council presented Mrs Morse with a plaque and tree in the garden she helped establish.
The presentation itself came as a complete surprise.
"That naughty, naughty David Sherley. I had a message from his secretary saying he would like to run something past me. That sounded like he wanted to talk about an idea, didn't it? Well, no," Mrs Morse said.
"When we got there, there were all these chairs and a podium."
Being honoured with a tree and a plaque was also unexpected.
"Quite frankly, the whole of the sister city relationship was such fun, and you don't expect to be honoured for doing something that's fun," Mrs Morse said.
Some special guests were invited to the presentation.
They were all familiar faces to Mrs Morse, who took a trip down memory lane with them as they reflected on the various projects they were involved in over the course of the sister city relationship.
"We all had such happy memories," she said.
"We truly did have happy memories of the people coming to Bathurst, of us going to Ohkuma, the building of the garden - that was a hoot."
She has been credited with having the idea for the garden, which was first discussed as a concept in 1996.
"They did say that the Japanese Garden was originally my idea, but as I pointed out, any idea is only as good as the people who take it and go running with the idea, and that's what happened," she said.
The former councillor is very proud of the sister city relationship and expects that Bathurst and Ohkuma will remain connected for many years to come.
She is also proud that the garden continues to serve as a symbol of that relationship.
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