I would like to talk a little about how my introduction to science happened and how I became fascinated with Robert Koch. I remember it as if it were yesterday.
My mother was travelling to another city to take a civil service examination — a large city. While she was taking the exam, my father took me and my younger sister out for a walk. The city was, in fact, very welcoming and lively. I remember visiting many places before eventually stopping at a library. It was small, yes, but it contained so many books that I simply could not remain still.
My past self had always been slightly obsessed with science, so I ran through the shelves and large tables, searching for the small labels that read “Biology,” or perhaps “Science,” “Chemistry”… When I finally found the general science section, I picked up several books and began to flip through them until I came across one whose title I unfortunately no longer remember. In general, it discussed spirituality and science at the same time. I would truly love to read it again, as I never had the opportunity to finish it; if anyone happens to know its title, a comment would help me greatly.
In any case, I sat down in an armchair and began reading right there. The beginning was difficult to understand: complex words and passages whose meanings I could barely grasp. But as I often say, if you read a book and do not understand it at first, the worst thing you can do is abandon it and give up. So, even
without understanding much, I continued reading… until, gradually, the words began to make sense.
That was when I noticed a specific name: “Robert Koch.” I do not remember exactly what was said about him, but I recall reading about vaccines and about how Koch discovered bacteria in what seemed to be a contradictory manner. While many asked, “Why did this disease appear?”, Koch asked a different and far more insightful question: “What is always present in the body when the disease appears?”
Shaping the question in this way and shifting the perspective toward something invisible to society was, for me, truly transformative. To my younger self, that was the correct way of thinking — the way that great scientists of the world had always reasoned.
I had to stop reading when my parents returned to the library to leave. I remember pulling my father aside and asking, “Robert Koch invented the vaccine, didn’t he?” — because the book did not state this explicitly. The sentences confused me, but I had understood the context and connected the ideas in my mind: “If he discovered bacteria… then he must have discovered the vaccine as well.”
And BOOM — later on, my father researched it and found that I was partially correct. Of course, not only Koch, but also Louis Pasteur played a crucial role. Fortunately (or unfortunately), I was already a devoted fan of Shinobu Kocho, and upon noticing the similarity of the surnames and the fact that both were scientists, my focus inevitably remained on Robert Koch alone. My apologies, Louis Pasteur XDD
In any case, this is how I discovered Koch and began learning more about him, growing fond of his scientific perspective and finding inspiration for future study. I dream of the day when I might become like him — or at least somewhat similar — contributing to and perhaps revolutionising science and biomedicine.
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