It's sleepin' with the fishes

I remember my school days fondly. The teachers we had were stern, but they also paid a lot of attention to you. It was at school that I developed my skills in football and an overall interest in sport.

I attended St Patrick's Boy's National School, which is attached to the teacher training college in Drumcondra, Dublin, and I was taught by lay teachers. I had one teacher right through school, a Mr Hayden from Co Leitrim. I remember him as a man with wild grey hair who was sensitive to the fact that in material terms I came from limited circumstances. He was fantastic and really focused on the pupils as individuals.

He gave us a good solid education and my two favourite subjects were Maths and English. I was a good student and didn't have to work too hard. I enjoyed the work so it wasn't such a strain on me.

Bertie Ahern, the civil servant Michael Tutty and of course, PJ Mara, were in the school too. Bertie was a few years behind me and I don't remember him. But I remember Michael Tutty (now a leading civil servant in the Department of Finance) as being studious, quiet and meticulous - I suppose a bit like he is now. A bit of a swot, I suppose.

PJ Mara lived near me and was wearing a pin stripe suit almost from the age of 12. He was a legend in the area and everyone was used to seeing him around in his dark overcoat, which he still wears.

The headmaster was Mr O'Brien and he a stern figure alright. That was the way the school was - speaking to someone on first-names terms was unthinkable. But it was a good regime and I was never brutalised by anyone.

The worst thing I did while in the school involved Mr O'Brien's strap. There was a general purge in the school over some major incident and all the pupils were facing some serious punishment.

So myself and another boy stole the strap from Mr O'Brien's drawer and after school we threw it in the Tolka River. It was my first act of rebellion. The whole school was awash with rumours of who did it. Well I was the guilty man, I can now reveal.

The school had a good social mix in terms of the boys who attended. They were the kids of decent, respectable, hardworking people. It was a wonderful school for that reason and many others.

While the school mainly concentrated on Gaelic football, we would play soccer day and night. I was from Richmond Road and there was a dump nearby and we even played in there.

I remember it as a good time growing up, although we were materially not that well off. We lived in rented rooms when many people around us owned their houses. And we were aware of this. It was a kind of genteel poverty, which can often be worse than real poverty.

After finishing at St Patrick's, I got a one year scholarship for a secondary school in Sandymount. It was a culture shock for me to go there on the number three bus every day. I did not enjoy it as much there because I was anxious to get out and see the world. I was a bit of a dreamer.

In 1960 things were pretty bleak, there were really two choices, to continue in secondary education or take up a trade as a plumber or an electrician. Unfortunately I was no good with my hands so I did not end up going to the "tech", as it was known in those days. In fact, my ambition at that stage was to join the British army and I went as far as sending off for the forms.

After the year in Sandymount, I saw a small ad in the Evening Herald for a messenger boy and I got that job. I did this for a year and it was very enjoyable, cycling around Dublin on my bike. I remember my salary was one pound and a shilling a week and as far as I was concerned, I was a millionaire. The best place to call into was the American embassy where you were always given a tip and more importantly, 20 Marlboro cigarettes, which were regarded as exotic in those days.

Thanks to the legendary soccer scout, Billy Behan, I got a chance to play football in England and that meant the end of education in Ireland. But it didn't end my education overall, because throughout my career I was reading and keeping myself informed.

My view of education is that I can understand people staying on at third level to do engineering or to become a doctor, but I haven't as much time for all the other things. The education system is like a sausage machine, if you go through it you come out like a sausage - what kind of sausage, often depends on good fortune.

My two children Timothy and Collete have made up their own minds about education. After my career, I could hardly lecture them on staying in school and both of them decided to leave early. Both are doing very well and are making their own choices in life.

In conversation with Emmet Oliver