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Mon Pere Est Mort

For an oral exam, when aged thirteen, my father was asked questions in French by a visiting professor in trench- coat and gold-rimmed spectacles, who was lean with the thin, pursed lips of an enemy interrogator. He pressed my father to say what his father's métier was — an awkward question, for how many schoolboys know the French for 'Real Estate Agent'? Adopting a tragic expression, my father just replied, 'Mon pere est mort.'

The professor blushed to commiserate; when the results of the examination were known, my father had the highest score.

Jarnie Grant

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