My first real encounter with Scientology was on a street corner with someone offering free introductory lectures. I would have walked on by except that a week or so earlier, a leaflet had been pushed under my front door describing the Communications course that was run at the local Scientology Organization. This leaflet had really got my interest, even though I didn't have the confront to actually find out more at the time.

     I did attend the lecture, even though I had been on my way to the main city library to find out what I could about a German town where I had just been offered a job. It evoked more interest. The lecture broke up and I was still intent on getting to the library before it closed.

     My thoughts kept returning to the leaflet on the communications course, and how it had indicated to me that I could actually improve something about me. Something I knew that needed improving, to help me succeed better in life.

     I suppose what really got me was that here was something with a real ring of truth about it. Neither the lecture nor the leaflet was a PR exercise, and somehow I managed to perceive the truth that was there.

     I took all my courage to go back, one evening, to that Scientology organization, but I knew instinctively that if I missed this opportunity now, I would never do it, and would regret it for a very long time. Here was something I had been waiting for, without knowing what I had been wanting.

     I bought a book, on Dianetics, and enrolled on a communications course. Then I skulked out, wondering if my confront would disappear before I started the course. It didn't, and one evening I found myself in a small course room, run by Linda and an assistant. About 15 people were studying and doing different activities. I was introduced to the methodology of study and drill, which are a fundamental part of Scientology courses. I then studied the components of communication, and drilled each in turn afterwards.

     Over a couple of weeks I began to notice a difference in myself. I became more confident, brighter even, and even enjoyed some of the drills. One in particular, called bull baiting, was quite interesting. It taught how to carry on confronting someone, no matter how embarrassing or awkward or funny they were. Now that I found useful, just being able to look at a person, feel comfortable, and actually respond in a sensible way, no matter what was being said.

     The course was completed a day or so before I flew off to my new life in Germany, but not before Linda provided me with the address of a Scientology Organization over there. I wasn't sure at the time that I would ever get to go there.

     It took me a few months to settle into my new home, and then I began to look around my new environment. I must have walked past the Frankfurt mission several times, before I decided that, yes, this imposing looking building was really the place. It then took all of the confront I had gained from the Communications Course earlier to go inside and find out more about this thing called Scientology, and in the end, it came down to one thing. I had glimpsed some truth. I could not even guess at this stage where that truth led. I had experienced the benefits of it, and all I knew at that time, despite my fears of the unknown was that I wanted more of it.