Pope Leo played being a priest as a child with ironing board as altar & cookies as communion wafers, brother reveals
CHOSEN ONE Pope Leo played being a priest as a child with ironing board as altar & cookies as communion wafers, brother reveals
POPE LEO XIV played at being a priest as a child and used the family's ironing board as an altar, his brother has revealed.
Robert Prevost — as he was known before he became the first American-born pontiff this week — also handed out biscuits as communion wafers.
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Robert Prevost became Pope Leo XIV this week
Credit: Shutterstock Editorial
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Robert, left, with his brothers John and Louis, looked set for a spiritual calling from an early age
Credit: John Prevost
His brother John, 71, who still lives in their native Chicago, said: 'He wanted to play priest so he put a tablecloth over our mom's ironing board and we had to go to Mass.'
He said young Robert also used an American biscuit called Necco Wafers, adding: 'These were the communion wafers. It was all taken very seriously, it was not a joke.'
Pope Leo, 69, the 267th pontiff, was one of three sons born to librarian Mildred and school principal Louis.
He studied maths at Villanova University in Philadelphia, then returned to Chicago to train as a priest. But John revealed his brother's calling started at a much younger age.
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He told US TV show Good Morning America: 'From the time he was five or six years old he knew this was his fate — not that he would be Pope, but that he would be a priest.
'He had that from a very young age, and he never faltered.'
His eldest brother Louis, who now lives in Florida, added: 'We used to tease him all the time, 'You're going to be the Pope one day'.
'We knew something was special about him.'
Very emotional
While maintaining his American roots — he supports the Chicago White Sox baseball team and is said to love deep-dish pizza — the then Robert made a life in the Peruvian city of Chiclayo, where he served as bishop from 2015 to 2023.
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He also became a Peruvian citizen, and Catholic writer Austen Ivereigh said of his elevation to the papacy: 'That is the genius of this election — both the US and South America can claim him.'
And the new Pope's goddaughter, Peruvian influencer Mildred Camacho Dioses — who was named after his mother — said her family 'jumped for joy' when this week's news broke.
Robert Prevost elected as Pope Leo XIV - the first from North American
She said: 'He's an excellent person and I still can't believe he's now the Pope. It's made me very emotional to know that he's the representative of God on Earth.'
Speaking from her family home in Chulucanas, near Peru's border with Ecuador, Mildred added: 'When I heard the name Robert Prevost I rang my parents and my aunts and uncles.
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'It's something we're still processing, because we can't believe it. He has always been present in my life, writing to me and sending me greetings on my birthday and other important dates.
'I last saw him last August, when he came to Chulucanas and he met my daughters.
'He gave them his blessing, and blessed my home and sent greetings to my grandparents who he also has a close relationship with.'
Asked if she had a message for the new Pope, Mildred said: 'Godfather, we're all so happy and so proud.'
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The new Pope is a keen rider
Credit: Instagram/peandersongomes
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John Prevost said: 'He wanted to play priest so he put a tablecloth over our mom's ironing board and we had to go to mass'
Credit: AP
The previous pope to take the name Leo, Pope Leo XIII, was an Italian whose baptismal name was Vincenzo Gioacchino Pecci.
He was elected in 1878 and led the Catholic Church until he died in 1903.
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He is remembered for his dedication to social justice.
The first Pope Leo — known as St Leo the Great — led the church between 440 and 461AD, and was known for his commitment to peace.
While the new Pope Leo has yet to say why he chose the name, it has been suggested that the deep commitment to social issues that the name represents is in line with his beliefs.
Notably, his first words as pope were: 'Peace be with you.'
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These (biscuits) were the communion wafers. It was all taken very seriously. It was not a joke
John Prevost
And Edinson Edgardo Farfan Cordova, the current bishop of Chiclayo, where Pope Leo used to live and work, called him a 'shepherd among people'.
He said: 'I am convinced Pope Leo XIV will continue the line of communion and closeness to the poor that marked the pontificate of Francis.'
It has also been revealed that the new Pope watched the film Conclave before taking part in the real thing so he 'knew how to behave'.
The award-winning Ralph Fiennes movie follows a cardinal organising the conclave who investigates secrets and scandals about the candidates.
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John said he asked his brother if he had watched the film to 'laugh about something because this is now an awesome responsibility'.
Of his sibling's new role leading the 1.4billion-strong Catholic Church, he added: 'We are so proud.'
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The Guardian
20 hours ago
- The Guardian
How to make the perfect peach cobbler – recipe
'If you go to a picnic in the south,' wrote the late South Carolina chef Emily Meggett, 'and there's no peach cobbler, someone's got some explaining to do.' Cobblers, a rustic variety of fruit pie that seems to have originated in the rough-and-ready environs of the American west, are now principally associated with the US south and are, as chef Brad McDonald observes, 'unglamorous' yet 'rarely fail to please'. As befits frontier food, they're extremely adaptable to a variety of climates and kitchens, too, but, as the southern food critic James Villas once explained, 'no matter how you construct a hot cobbler, the main principle is that the filling should never be either soggy or dried out and the crust must be crisp enough to create a good counterpoint with the soft fruits or berries – not to mention the obligatory scoop of ice-cream on top'. Far easier to pull off than a pie, but more impressive than a crumble, cobblers are a great way to use a bargain tray of overripe or bruised fruit, should you be lucky to come across such a thing. Peaches, obviously – but peaches in the UK will not usually be as fresh as those in the American south, which means we have to adjust our expectations accordingly. A couple of recipes call explicitly for 'ripe but firm' fruit, which does not mean those cannonballs sold as ready-to-eat in many British retailers; I speak from bitter experience when I assure you that a peach that is crunchy when raw will still be al dente once baked. Though not squashy, the fruit ought to give a little under your fingertips (a good fruit vendor should be happy to pick some out for you, though sadly our supermarkets do not offer that service, so you'll have to take it on trust or do some discreet and gentle squeezing). That said, even in the south, there's a delightfully bitchy hierarchy of peaches, with Villas instructing the reader of The Glory of Southern Cooking to 'forget most of what you've heard about Georgia peaches. Yes, Georgia peaches are certainly far superior to the pulpy, bitter peaches they grow in California, but where I go for sweet peach perfection is to the South Carolina Piedmont region, intersected by Interstate 77 and, more specifically, to the Peach Tree and other orchards in and around Filbert. Peach fanatics from as far away as Pennsylvania and Kentucky flock to the Peach Tree every summer to see and smell and taste the luscious early belles, white ladies, lorings and indian red clings'. Meanwhile, I head to the greengrocers. Controversially, I will not be peeling the fruit. Everyone peels the fruit, I know, because they seem to have an aversion to what America's Test Kitchen (ATK) terms 'any unpleasantly leathery bits of skin', but, as with apples, tomatoes and even potatoes, I happen to like a bit of chew – a skinless peach feels like a tinned peach to me, and though tinned peaches have their place (a hotel breakfast buffet), it's not what I'm after here. Plus, a ripe peach is a pain to peel. (I can almost hear the southerners murderously murmuring: 'Bless her heart'). Ripe peaches are a very wet fruit, which proves a problem in recipes such as the one in McDonald's book Deep South, where they're used raw – this proves the first clue to perhaps the most important lesson I learn about peach cobbler: the dish should always be placed on a rimmed baking sheet, because if it can bubble over, you can bet your bottom dollar it will. Cutting the fruit into chunky wedges, as he suggests, rather than slices, is a good start; too thin, and they have a tendency to dissolve into perfumed mush in the oven. Like ATK , McDonald uses cornflour to thicken those juices (Edna Lewis prefers plain flour) but, to my mind, more muscular action is required to stem the tide. While this shouldn't be a dry dish, equally, too much juice will make the topping soggy. Chef Joe Randall's recipe in the book he co-authored with Toni Tipton-Martin, A Taste of Heritage, marinates his peaches with sugar, flour and spices to draw out the juices, then simmers them until those juices start to thicken – yet with similarly liquid results. I'm beginning to suspect that ATK's claim that 'most of the juices are not released until the peaches are almost fully cooked' is correct. My multi-prong solution, like ATK's, is to drain off some of the liquid produced by mixing peaches with sugar and leaving them to sit, then to thicken that with cornflour and to pre-bake the fruit before adding the topping, to give that liquid more time to evaporate, as well as to leave enough gaps in said topping to encourage further evaporation. Everyone uses sugar, naturally, and some in quantities that are a little too much for those not weaned on sweet tea. Randall's dark brown sugar feels a little too treacly for this fresh fruit, but I like the idea of a lighter brown sugar with peaches – it just feels apt somehow. Almost everyone adds butter to their filling – I want to say it's too much, but I'm afraid it does help make the syrup deliciously rich, so omit it at your own risk. Lewis, or Miss Lewis as she was properly called and is always referred to in her book with Scott Peacock, The Gift of Southern Cooking, also adds a pinch of salt, which, like the lemon juice in Meggett's, Randall's and the ATK recipes, helps to make the peaches taste … peachier somehow. If you happen to have some knocking around, I'd also highly recommend a dash of the almond essence in Villas' recipe – not so much as to make the filling taste nutty, but just enough to enhance the flavour of the almond's close cousin, the peach. McDonald mixes the peaches with raspberries – which, personally, I don't care for when cooked (they break down completely in the peach juice, but if you like the idea, stick a handful in). She also adds vanilla and cinnamon, which we all like less than Miss Lewis and Randall's nutmeg; peaches and sugar are sweet enough, after all, without enhancing that with cloyingly sweet spices. Randall's ground cloves prove a surprise hit, but one spice feels like quite enough in a place where peaches hardly grow on trees. I thought I knew what a cobbler was until I started the research for this dish and found myself rolling out a lovely, delicately crumbly pastry for Randall's double-crust version. Peacock helpfully explains that 'in the US south, the term 'cobbler' is applied to a host of baked fruit desserts. To Miss Lewis, 'cobbler' meant a kind of deep-dish pie with fruit baked between a bottom and top layer of pastry … to other southern bakers, a cobbler might have only a top pastry crust. In Alabama, we called anything a cobbler that had fruit covered by a baked topping.' (He goes on to reminisce about 'one of the more distinctive cobblers of my childhood', from a local barbecue joint, that involved 'canned peaches covered with a box of Duncan Hines Yellow Cake mix – dry – with melted butter poured over the top'.) The most distinctive cobbler I try comes from Meggett's book, Gullah Geechee Home Cooking, co-authored with Kayla Stewart and Trelani Michelle, on the Lowcountry cuisine of coastal South Carolina, and particularly her lifelong home, Edisto Island. Instead of a top crust, the dish is filled with a buttery sponge batter topped with peaches – it's light, fluffy and very quick to make, though, good as all the recipes are, I like the scone-like toppings in McDonald and the ATK recipes best; if I'm serving up something called a cobbler, I don't want it to feel like a pie or an upside-down cake, but something distinctively different, as well as emphatically American. Both recipes use fluffy drop biscuits, rather than the flakier rolled kind – for a British audience, these are more like dumplings than rowies/butteries – which makes sense, because they're better suited to soaking up juice (and, in keeping with the spirit of the cobbler, much quicker and easier to make). The method is similar to scones, but uses a wetter dough, moistened with McDonald's tangy buttermilk, which my testers prefer to the more neutral but richer yoghurt in the ATK recipe. But we all agree some raising agent is required; an unleavened dough, though tasty, does have tendency to sit heavy as a stone upon the fruit. Adding it to a filling that's already hot helps it to cook through in time, and though the biscuit itself shouldn't be too sweet, in contrast to what lies beneath, a final topping of granulated sugar adds a delightful crunch. Miss Lewis served her peach cobbler with 'an unusual' (but very tasty) nutmeg syrup, but more common pairings are vanilla ice-cream (McDonald and Randall), whipped cream (ATK) and even, non-canonically, creme fraiche or yoghurt. But ice-cream is, in my opinion, the American dream. (Note that this is good served warm as well as well as hot, but not chilled, because that makes the topping turn a little doughy. You could marinate the peaches in advance, but don't make the biscuit dough until just before baking.) Prep 10 min Marinate 30 min+ Cook 45 min+ Rest 15 min Serves 6 About 800g ripe but fairly firm peaches (about 4-5 medium-sized ones)2 tbsp soft light brown or demerara sugar, or white sugar if preferredA pinch of salt 15g butter, diced, plus extra for greasing1½ tsp cornflour 1 tbsp lemon juice ¼ tsp almond extract (optional) ½ tsp freshly grated nutmeg Ice-cream, to serve For the topping100g cold butter 175g plain flour 2 tbsp caster sugar ¼ tsp fine salt 1 tsp baking powder 150ml buttermilk, or 145ml milk mixed with 1 tsp lemon juice or vinegar1 tbsp demerara sugar Cut the peaches into chunky wedges, scatter with the sugar and salt, then leave to sit at room temperature for at least 30 minutes. Heat the oven to 220C (200C fan)/gas 7, and grease a baking dish just large enough to hold all the fruit in a single layer. Grate or dice the 100g butter for the topping and put it in the freezer. Drain the juice from the steeped peaches and reserve. Arrange the drained peaches in the base of the rimmed baking dish. Put the cornflour in a small bowl, stir in two tablespoons of the reserved peach juice, plus the lemon juice and almond extract, if using, until dissolved, then toss this mix and the nutmeg with the peaches. Top with the diced butter. Put the peach dish on a rimmed baking tray, pop the lot in the oven and bake for 10-15 minutes, until the juices are bubbling. Meanwhile, put the flour, caster sugar, salt and baking powder for the topping in a large bowl. Add the frozen grated butter, toss to coat, then rub in with your fingertips just until the mix resembles coarse crumbs with visible pieces of butter still in there – it shouldn't be fully rubbed in. Once the peaches are bubbling, turn down the oven to 200 (180C fan)/gas 6 and stir the buttermilk into the flour to make a wet, shaggy dough. Dollop this on top of the fruit, leaving spaces between the blobs for them to expand. Top with a sprinkling of demerara sugar and bake for another 30-35 minutes, until golden. Remove, leave to cool for at least 15 minutes, then serve with ice-cream. Proper southern peach cobbler? Go on, tell me how it's really done!
The Herald Scotland
a day ago
- The Herald Scotland
The quiet Scot who revealed some of Hitler's last words
And that, as the conflict in Europe came to an end and the celebrations began, it would be Fife-born Rena who would be given a particularly onerous task; one that required all of her language skills, acute attention to detail and ability to keep a secret. Alongside another young woman who, like her, had studied at St Andrews University before being picked to work at Bletchley Park, Rena's war efforts continued well beyond VE Day. While 80 years ago the nation's focus turned to victory over Japan and VJ Day, she was in Germany, translating interrogations of German intelligence officers and, critically, Hitler's personal will. Bletchley Park, centre of Allied codebreaking during the Second World War Just how a young woman from Fife came to be given the job of translating the final personal will of the architect of the Holocaust was captured in the nick of time, when she finally opened up about her wartime work at the top secret home of the codebreakers, Bletchley Park. However, just a few months after speaking about her work to biographer Victoria Walsh, Rena passed away. She was 100 years old. Rena's memories of working in the German Book Room at Bletchley Park and her role translating Hitler form the basis of a new book that traces her journey from Lundin Links and a childhood 'filled with books, music and Scottish dancing' to the heart of the secret war effort and, later, a pioneering role at the BBC. 'They had the secrecy of their work drummed into them,' says writer Victoria, whose chats with Rena in her final months offer fascinating insight into the camaraderie of the Bletchley Park women, the daily demands made on them and the personal sacrifices they made then and in their later lives. 'She was still incredibly active even though she was 100 years old, and she remembered the war years very well. 'But even though the Official Secrets Act had been lifted and people like Rena were allowed to talk about their work, often they still didn't want to. 'And some would take it to their grave.' (Image: Contributed/Victoria Walsh) Perhaps surprisingly, adds Victoria, often the women who toiled at Bletchley Park, churning through tens of thousands of coded messages and translating snippets of details, didn't even realise the importance of their role. "They knew there was a secrecy aspect," she adds, "but they didn't even think they were doing anything special.' Read more Sandra Dick: Born in the Fife coastal village in 1923, Rena was bright and bookish with a fondness for poetry that blossomed into a love of languages. Determined to choose a career over being a housewife, she studied French and German at St Andrews University. Young Rena Stewart growing up in Fife. Image: Stewart Maclennan 'She was determined not to follow the usual route for women of the times, which was get married, have children or maybe teach," says Victoria. 'She thought studying French and German would open the world up to her. 'She didn't know exactly where it would take her and certainly couldn't have known it would lead her to Bletchley Park.' By the time she began her studies in 1940, Admiral Sir Hugh Sinclair, head of M16, had already taken over the country house near Milton Keynes for use as part of the secret war effort. Rena Stewart studied French and German at St Andrews University during the early years of World War II. Image: Stewart Maclennan Earmarked for the Code and Cypher School and Secret Intelligence Service, it was handy for a supply of bright students from Oxford and Cambridge. Soon, though it was snatching bright young graduates from around the country, many of them young women like Rena who could handle the huge amount of information that flowed through its walls. Recruited in early 1944, she worked in the German Book Room, surrounded by around 40 other women like her rattling away at typewriters, working in German and handling secret German military messages. Rena had a role at Bletchley Park (Image: Stewart Maclennan) 'She would be analysing secret messages, filling in any gaps and making sure they read properly so intelligence analysts could use them to chart the course of the war,' says Victoria. 'They worked all day in shifts, and it was serious work, probably in a smoky room and it would be stressful because they would know how important it was to the outcome of the war. 'But they also made sure they had fun in their spare time.' To keep spirits up and to drown out the constant clatter of typewriter keys, the women sang songs, including one which Rena sang for Victoria as she recalled her war work. Signatures of Bletchley Park women left on a song sheet from May 1945 (Image: Contributed) 'The second and last time I met Rena, in her living room down in London, we were talking about Bletchley Park when all of a sudden, she burst into song,' she recalls. 'She had remembered that she and the 40 women of 'The German Book Room' had made up a song about their time there, toiling away at their typewriters. 'The song went to the tune of My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean and was called The Swan Song of GBR. 'It was all about how fed up they were of typing and how they wished for the war to be over. 'Rena couldn't remember all the words, but it was an unforgettable moment.' Victoria later found Rena shared a typed copy of the song, signed by the German Book Room 'girls' in May 1945, to the museum at Bletchley Park. The end of the war in Europe brought their German Book Room work to a close, but Rena's service was not yet over. Instead of being demobbed, she and some others from the German Book Room were sent to an interrogation centre near Hanover in Germany, where they were given the important task of translating the statements of captured Nazi officers ahead of the Nuremberg Trials. Rena and other women on parade in Germany (Image: Stewart Maclennan)Another role specifically for Rena – known affectionately as Sgt McHaggis – and fellow Bletchley Park colleague and St Andrews alumna, Margery Forges, from Dundee, was even more pressurised. Handed to them by the head of the unit, Major Bill Oughton, they were told to work together on translating a document with the instruction: 'Take as long as you like, but there must be no mistakes, and you must agree on all details'. Hitler had two wills, a political will and a personal will which stated who his executors would be, stating how he had married Eva Braun and who was to inherit his belongings. It had been dictated 24 hours before he killed himself. It had to be perfect and they consulted every dictionary they could to make sure it was absolutely right. Tracking down the two wills had already been something of a saga involving a trio of messengers' efforts to smuggle the documents out of Germany before they were finally seized by the Allies. Sergeant Rena Stewart - affectionately known as Sgt McHaggis - while serving in Germany (Image: Stewart Maclennan) Rena and Margery were trusted with Hitler's personal will: a task Margery's family only discovered by chance, years after her death. Rena was finally demobbed in 1947, but that was just the start of another remarkable chapter. Having refused to settle for marriage and housework and having had a taste of international relations, Rena set sights on becoming a journalist with the BBC. But she was at an immediate disadvantage, says Victoria. Read more Sandra Dick: 'She couldn't say anything about her secret wartime work,' adds Victoria. 'It took her a long time to find a job and there were a lot of people who had been demobbed ahead of her. 'But she was very determined and she became a huge inspiration for younger women.' Having started at the bottom typing scripts and making tea, she rose to become the BBC World Service's first female senior duty editor. Rena Stewart went on to blaze a trail for women at the BBC World Service In her later years she occupied her time with simple tasks: editing the magazine for the church close to her Ealing home, running Scottish country dancing sessions and planning Burns Suppers – all a world away from the pressure of Bletchley Park. 'Rena left Scotland in 1943 and never moved back,' adds Victoria. 'But she was always incredibly proud to be Scottish, and she kept up her love of Scottish culture for a century. 'She deserves to be better known.' The Story of Rena Stewart is published by Pen and Sword Books.
The Herald Scotland
a day ago
- The Herald Scotland
Exam results day is unmatched in America – is that good?
Usually in those times, I have lived here long enough to have a sense of the context involved, and I can wrap my head around what I am covering. Every year, however, I have a day at work where my American brain cannot help but think: 'Why, though?' Unfortunately, it happens to also be arguably the most important single day in Scottish education reporting: SQA results day. My ambivalence about results day has grown over the years. Five years ago, on my first results day, I visited Lossiemouth High School to speak with students who had aced their exams and were on their way to top universities across the UK. It was a great day. My favourite part of this job is speaking to students and teachers. At the time, the pandemic was disrupting daily life, and we were all happy to celebrate. I never hesitate to celebrate student achievement, but over the years, results day has raised new questions as I started to think more about the young people who we do not see in the headlines. I wonder whether the spotlight we shine on success doesn't increase the disappointment of the many students who don't receive their desired result, especially on a day that is already so charged with anxiety and emotion that students might feel like they may as well be back in the exam hall. Of course, I understand that the results matter. The Scottish Government, particularly in the past decade, has made it virtually impossible for anyone wanting to heap praise or criticism to look away from attainment statistics. Beyond politics, unless some of the loftier goals that have been kicked around recently come to fruition– for example, by ending Scotland's reliance on high-stakes exams, creating new pathways to university and careers, or better recognising young people's work over the course of their careers – the fact remains that exam results open and close doors for young people. As I've continued to report on proposed changes to student evaluation, some transatlantic comparisons have come into focus. Read more In the United States, there is no results day. There is no single day when clicks on the 'Education' tab of every major outlet's website skyrocket, fuelled in no small part by readers who will not be seen there again until next August. Still, students, teachers, and communities are judged on student performance. Sometimes that judgment leads to improvements. At other times, it is unfair and masks deeper problems that children are facing. The major difference is that there is no one test—no single key that unlocks access to university. Instead, there are many. At first blush, this may sound like an improvement over the highly charged exam system in Scotland. Here, countless teachers and other education experts have argued that the threshold of three or more Highers as the key to university is outdated, but the vision of a world where those results are not so decisive is not yet a reality. In the US, the key to higher education is spread much more thinly, and the doors to university are opened by a healthy diet of alphabet soup. For years, the gold standard for students leaving high school was a score of 1400 (out of 1600) on the SAT, along with enough passes in Advanced Placement (AP) courses to boost their Grade Point Average (GPA) and earn university course credit. The SAT is a standardised test administered by the College Board, an American non-profit organisation. It covers reading, writing, and mathematics using the same format every year. For context, although Harvard University no longer requires students to submit an SAT score, 1530 is the recommendation for an applicant to be competitive. Alternatively, some students opt to sit the ACT, a similar test but with more focus on science and mathematics. Depending on where and when a student went through the US education system, they may have been encouraged to sit both, one over the other or, as happens far too frequently, told not to bother with either. Read more: The last point is an important one and speaks to another major difference in the two systems I am familiar with. As challenging as closing the attainment gap has proven in Scotland, it is at least relatively well-known. In the US, the gap is much wider than it appears on paper, because many students who are struggling the most do not even make it into the statistics. The senior phase of secondary school genuinely has no comparison. When I first explained it to him, a friend who has taught for years in the US suggested it sounded like 'bonus high school' for top students. The early exit is much more fraught in the US, meaning many students who might not carry on to the senior phase in Scotland find themselves still struggling through higher-level courses without the foundation they need to succeed. Often, these students are from poorer and minority backgrounds. If they are encouraged to sit the SAT, ACT or something similar, they are usually still at a disadvantage compared to their wealthier peers, who have better access to the multibillion-dollar test prep industry. In the context of the attainment gap, they are the demographics that Scottish education policy is trying to lift up. In the US, instead, they are often pressured through the grade levels until they finally reach the end, sometimes with very little concrete qualifications to show for it. This context has given me an unusual view of standardisation. The SQA will be replaced by a new body called Qualifications Scotland in December, and with that comes the potential for changes. As the reaper's scythe swings lower, the SQA has come under renewed criticism for having a near-monopoly on qualifications in the country, particularly in the senior phase. There is not the same level of government or single-organisation involvement in America. Instead, major companies administer the tests and dozens of international corporations and local businesses profit from test prep materials and courses. Nothing like the singular focus on one type of test on one day exists in America. Instead, results days play out in miniature at different times across the country all year long. And even though students unlock the next steps in their careers in different ways, each of these paths opens a new opportunity to be exploited. Whether I will ever fully accept the hysteria of results day is a question for another year. What I can say for sure is that, when it comes to exams, the grass is best described as yellow on both sides of the ocean.
