>> I went to Rollins and before that, I went to prep school in New England, I spent four years
at Rollins, Political Science English major, and enjoyed it and it benefitted me a great deal.
My father was a Foreign Service officer and I was brought up overseas as much as I was
in the U.S., and so I was always very interested in international politics and the world
and always wanted to do something in that vein and by the time I got to Rollins,
I was pretty much sure of what direction I wanted to follow.
I went off to graduate school at American University for two years,
took the Foreign Services exam while I was a student there and passed it and left --
I completed all my coursework at American University but had not completed my thesis,
so I left without an MA and went into the State Department in 1966.
Entry level two months of sort of general orientation with a class
of 22 other officers and then language training.
I had French, but I was assigned to a French-speaking post
and my French was College French, not speaking French.
So, I spent four months brushing up my French
and then I went off on my first assignment overseas.
I was in Tunisia, North Africa, a small very interesting country.
Then just 10 years out of [inaudible] after becoming independent and my wife
and my daughter would accompany me.
And while we were there, we had twins that were born completing our family.
After two years in Tunisia, I went off to study Japanese for two years and then had
over the next 25 years, four different assignments in Japan sort of working my way up.
Not a planned career, but I kept getting pulled back there, and in between I was in Washington
in various assignments, some related to East Asia, some related to other things.
But I ended up in Tokyo at the end of my career as the Deputy Chief [inaudible] Ambassador,
Walter Mondale's Ambassador political appointee and I spent three years there as his deputy
and then one year as acting ambassador before Tom Foley,
former Speaker of the House came to become the Ambassador.
And then I went back to Washington to be President [inaudible] Secretary of State
for East Asia and then went off to Tunisia again, as Ambassador.