In my first year at McGill in 1965, I had to take French 100. The professor, Dr. Tadeusz Romer, was an elegant European who did his best with me, and I guess I did alright.
At the end of 2009, there was an exhibition at the McGill Library of the late Professor Romer. I visited it and was amazed to find out that this elegant, articulate man had been the last ambassador of Poland to Russia in 1939… He helped thousands of mostly Jewish refugees from Eastern Europe flee via Siberia and East Asia. I shook the hand of a man who had shook the hand of Stalin! Six degrees of separation…