MALTESE GENES

I suppose I was always destined to be a doctor. Genes certainly played a role in the matter. We have always had doctors in the family, ever since my ancestors came to Malta from France in 1751. Six of my seven uncles were doctors, my maternal grandfather, Salvatore, was a chest physician, and my paternal great-great-grandfather, Lorenzo, became the first professor of ophthalmology in Malta and, with his son Charles, also an eye surgeon, founded the philanthropic Ophthalmic Institute in 1908.

DR KILDARE, ARPEGGIOS, AND FIRST PAINTINGS

Of course Dr Kildare burst onto our TV screens in 1961 when I was a susceptible 4-year-old and Richard Chamberlain, who played the part, instantly became my hero. That year was a great turning point in my life. My father Gilbert, who was a pharmacist, took up a new post in the then Dowty Rubber Company and was asked to go to Cheltenham to study rubber technology for a year. (...)