Page 64 - A Life - my Live - my path

Higher education – emotional moment !

nuclear physics, with its atoms, electrons and the very
discovery of matter, appealed to me enormously.
In September 1971, when I was about to turn 20, I started
my studies at ISNA in Brussels. I chose the 'electronics and
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nuclear sciences engineer' option. When I made my choice,
I remember having some doubts compared with other
former secondary school students who had chosen subjects
such as chemistry, electricity, electronics, etc. I thought that
their training would inevitably be more specialised, because
my choice involved two separate subjects: electronics and
nuclear sciences. This doubt disappeared after a few days. In
fact, at a student meeting at the beginning of the year, a
teacher spoke up and, apart from explaining all the rules,
rights and duties, he insisted on one point:

" An engineer is like a diamond: the more facets it has, the
brighter it shines."

My life changed. The café's very specific hours and the
distance of almost 50 km between Piéton and Brussels led
me to enrol directly at the ISNA boarding school. The
boarding school was located on avenue Hamoir in Uccle, in
an upmarket residential area in one of the 19 communes of
Brussels. The boarding school was in fact a mansion with
around twenty bedrooms, a beautiful kitchen, a large dining
area, a library, a games room, sports rooms and a park of
over a hectare with trees over a hundred years old. The floors
were waxed every day. To get from the boarding school to

60 Institut des Sciences Nucléaires Appliquées
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