When I was a kid I wanted to be a teacher. I enrolled for a teaching degree at ‘varsity. One lecture of Pedagogics and I ran away screaming. Fortunately it was during the first week when I could still make a subject change. I changed to Latin. One lecture of Latin and I ran away screaming. I made another subject change. To Political Science. It was a good change because I ended up majoring in it.

My having run away screaming from Pedagogics is no reflection on teachers. My Mom is a teacher and I have great respect for teachers. It was just not for me. Pedagogics is about the art of teaching. It is an art, to teach. And to do so responsibly, with passion and care.

I thought Latin was going to be easy because Portuguese is based on it. I just didn’t see myself sitting for a whole year through the driest of dry subjects. Latin is a grudge subject. Most people do it because they have to (or had to at the time), like Law students.

After realising that teaching was not for me I decided I wanted to become a lawyer. So taking Latin did make sense. What made me drop the idea of becoming a lawyer was not the dryness of Latin. It was the dryness of law. I found myself reading, with the same curiosity reserved for People and Heat magazine, the cases that made it to court. All the scandals and tragedies that make up family law. That was the most interesting part. Learning the actual statutes was not for me. I suffered through 1 year of law before settling on English Literature as my second major.

And here I am, 12 years later, with a career in IT!