?When I think about my time at La Visitation (primary school), I recall very well the Figon ladies (for their dedication and the fact that it was easily noticed that they were really cut out for teaching. Then, there was Mrs. House who, according to me, was like a monument. I also remember very well having had Mrs. Désiré who was a woman immensely cultured. She had the potential to write such good English and French with ease. As far as I know, she has produced many students on a grant during her career (I am referring to the junior scholarship).

For secondary school, I moved to Loreto Convent, where I got a mathematics teacher by the name of Mr. Honoré for the last two years. He was extraordinary; a first-class mathematician. Earlier, when we had to do music in lower classes, I had a teacher called Lucie Némorin. I always felt that she was not cherished that much by the students. But I personally considered that she knew how to teach with some emotions and with whom I always had a good relationship. I still think about her with a lot of sympathy and compassion. Before naming the one that really marked my education, I would like to pay tribute to two geography teachers, namely: Mrs. Amelot and Mrs. Tadebois. Although they knew how to communicate with the students, they had such a talent for teaching. They were so good that they knew how to make us appreciate the subject. I still have vivid memories of them whenever I travel or look at maps because obviously they used to teach us the names of different countries and so on.

As many, I also experienced bad times as a student. But the worst experience is definitely with a French teacher who was unjust towards me. She was extremely pretty, a goodness. Nevertheless, she had lots of prejudices and I may say that she was very unfair in her decisions. So much that she would take into consideration only a part of the class. The fact is, once I did work on Verlaine and allowed one of my class-mates to have a look at my work and eventually she almost copied the text verbatim. The teacher accused me of having cheated by having copied on that classmate. The teacher even went on to say: ?It cannot be you who has been copied!? More surprisingly I was a good student but, despite this, she took nothing from this. However, this harsh experience has taught me a lot of things for my whole life!

Now, it is a difficult task to identify only one teacher and tag him/her as my ?best teacher? as they have all contributed for my education in different manners. But if I was to choose the teacher who has had the greatest impact on me, I will say it was Mother Patrick who was an Irish woman, and who taught me when I was in my last year of secondary school. She was highly motivated and very brainy. Importantly enough, she was lovable as well as she knew perfectly how to maintain a good relationship with the students. I honestly believe that when we had her, we really found out what was teaching. Otherwise, generally speaking classes are more or less passive, but this was really not the case when Mother Patrick was doing her classes. She really inspired me by her deep knowledge, her charm and her simplicity. She was almost perfect. As the English say, ?she was in a class of her own?.?