Particular, but at the same time great, moments come to my mind from my time at the University: assistants as high priests of the faculty examinations, writing our 'maturity' examinations in the large lecture hall in the University’s main building. This happened a few times per academic year, following carefully crafted rotas.

The high lectern had a view over the diversity of the entire faculty. Students from various departments were frantically sharpening their pencils and formulating their answers to questions given by professors on small pieces of paper. The ritual was the same every year. The exams were handed out in brown envelopes, in alphabetical order. The surnames from A to L in the queue on the left, from M to Ö on the right.

Then came the magical words: You may now open the envelopes! This was followed by ripping and rustling as the envelopes were opened, then a silence and sighs, of equal profundity. We had to write on the blackboard with a piece of chalk: The exam will end at 1.16 p.m. You may leave at 9.46 a.m.

It was there on the lectern that I understood the function and value of the University. In that hall the studies, research and degrees came together in manifest destiny. It showed the academic community, its continuity and collegiality from one end of the alphabet to the other in one place, guarded by the austere architecture, sitting on the plywood benches. On the windowsills lay heaps of bags, containing books read right up to the last moment before the exam, repositories of all the wisdom that had so wonderfully transferred to the students’ minds and onwards to their exam sheets.